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'After the Oil Runs Out' - WP has editorial on Peak Oil...wow

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Petrodollar Warfare Donating Member (628 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 10:11 AM
Original message
'After the Oil Runs Out' - WP has editorial on Peak Oil...wow
Very, VERY rarely does the crucial term "Hubbert's Peak" ever get mentioned in the mainstream US media re Peak Oil. I'm glad the Washington Post had the courage to print this short but informative article. Afterall, this is a challenge to humanity itself.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A17039-2004Jun4?language=printer

'After the Oil Runs Out'
By James Jordan and James R. Powell

"...It now appears that world oil production, about 80 million barrels a day, will soon peak. In fact, conventional oil production has already peaked and is declining. For every 10 barrels of conventional oil consumed, only four new barrels are discovered. Without the unconventional oil from tar sands, liquefied natural gas and other deposits, world production would have peaked several years ago.

Oil experts agree that hitting Hubbert's Peak is inevitable. The oil laid down by nature is finite, and almost half of it has already been extracted. The only uncertainty is when we hit the peak. Pessimists predict by 2010. Optimists say not for 30 to 40 years. Most experts expect it in 10 to 20 years. Lost in the debate are three much bigger issues: the impact of declining oil production on society, the ways to minimize its effects and when we should act. Unfortunately, politicians and policymakers have ignored Hubbert's Peak and have no plans to deal with it: If it's beyond the next election, forget it."

...."Whatever non-oil transport technologies prove best, making the transition from our present systems will take many years. It took decades for the first automobiles and airplanes to evolve into effective systems, and decades to build the interstate highway network. We can't afford to wait until Hubbert's Peak occurs. We should begin now to plan and implement the new, non-oil technologies. If we don't, our economy and living standard will be in serious trouble."

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phantom power Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 10:18 AM
Response to Original message
1. there is a point where rational self-interest exerts itself...
Unless you are a hopeless idealogue, such as the current occupant of the whitehouse.
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Eurobabe Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 10:20 AM
Response to Original message
2. So what does GM do? Expand ops in China
That will hasten the process. Less conservation, more global warming.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/07/business/worldbusiness/07AUTO.html?hp
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bemildred Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 10:23 AM
Response to Original message
3. Correction, pessimists say right about now. nt
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Warpy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 10:29 AM
Response to Original message
4. It's not just our cars
We're exporting every industry we have as fast as we can, mostly to the far east. As the oil begins to dry up, transportation costs will far exceed any short term savings on labor costs, making imported goods more and more expensive. Meanwhile, a second industrial revolution back here will be much more difficult to accomplish, thanks to (you guessed it) increasingly expensive energy costs.

Then wait until you see what your food is going to cost. Farms are industrialized and mechanized and totally dependent on oil.
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Fovea Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 10:47 AM
Response to Reply #4
5. transportation costs will far exceed any short term savings on labor costs
Since 1999, I have been predicting that will occur.

I also think that large companies will have to outsource manufacturing to regional franchise groups that will make products that are too expensive to ship in a value added state around the world.

I keep hearing this new idea that oil is spontaneously made by some yet unidentified geologic mechanism. If that were true, why havent depleted fields recharged themselves?

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phantom power Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 11:16 AM
Response to Reply #5
6. the abiotic oil theory is pretty much one guy's theory
It's not widely accepted. And even if it turns out to be true, that doesn't mean we aren't using it up far faster than it's being regenerated.
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ixion Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 11:31 AM
Response to Reply #6
7. not using it faster than it's being regenerated?
give the simmer time for oil in measured by millenia rather than days or even years, I think it's pretty safe to say that we are consuming it faster than it is being replenished.

We have been drilling for oil for only a century, and we have nearly exhausted the supply, and not one, NOT ONE, oil field is replenished.

It has hardly been a tick of the clock, geologically speaking.

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Petrodollar Warfare Donating Member (628 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 12:20 PM
Response to Reply #7
8. Correction....Peak is the mid-point of porduction
..."and we have nearly exhausted the supply"

Actually, we most likely at the mid-point of supply, hence "Peak Oil" looks like a bell-shaped curve. What is crucial to understand that all oil on the "back side" or downward slope is more difficult to extract from an energy perspective, is typically of lower quality, and eventually the EROEI will go neutral. At that point, no more oil will be produced from that field(s) as the energy expended to get that oil exceeds the energy potential of the oil being extracted. Hence, the world will never run out of oil, but it will not make any sense from an *energy* perspcetive to produce that oil. Just thought I'd clarify that issue.

EROEI = Energy Returned on Energy Invested, which is a matter of physics)

ROI = Return on Investment, which is matter of economics.

Please note Mr. Birol's comments in the article when asked if supply (3 million added barrels of oil) can meet demand..."You are from the press? This is not for you. This is not for the press."

Therein lies the problem, no political leaders here or abroad will answer that question....so rather than face the truth, we'll send young men off to fight and die in wars under the false guise of the next "war on terror." Here's the basic problem as I see it:

Peak Oil = the clashing of the immutable laws physics vs. the laws of economics. Physics will prevail, as economics is simply a construct of man. This is why almost *no economists* will admit to the concept of global Peak Oil, as it implies an *intrinsic* limitation to econimic growth in our current global economy, and not even a Harvard educated PhD in economics can crack that dilemna....so, more men, women and children will die violent deaths in this decade and into the next.

Unless of course our humanity prevails...but I'm undecided on that one.
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hatrack Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 04:53 PM
Response to Reply #7
9. A great illustration on this point
Take a pencil and paper and draw a six-inch horizontal line. At the midpoint of the line, place a small bell curve about one inch high.

That bump represents the 100-year period during which we will extract and consumer about 80% of the world's oil supply.

If you'd like to include the time it took for geologic processes to produce that oil, extend the same line five miles to the left.

Oil almost certainly is being continuously produced somewhere within the outer crust of the planet, but on a time scale that is meaningless in human terms.
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sam sarrha Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jun-07-04 05:32 PM
Response to Original message
10. i met an old oil man in WA 10 yrs ago who said he had been drilling and
Edited on Mon Jun-07-04 05:34 PM by sam sarrha
capping wells for 30 years, none had ever been pumped.. he said that we were using up the Arabs oil then selling ours for 10X more.

On * 's 2nd day in office he vetoed the solar project pilot project.. new technology that could provide 82% of the daytime energy for the nation.. in 3or4 10 square mile units across the SW. places where water can be pumped up to reservoirs in daytime and can run the water down and put it in the grid at nite. I consider * 's action treason or at least an impeachable offense to deny the citizens CHEAP renewable energy.
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