The Oil Drum | Why We (Really) May Have Entered an Oil Production Plateau

194 comments on Why We (Really) May Have Entered an Oil Production Plateau

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Sam Foucher on November 13, 2006 - 3:18pm

Therefore, is there any way to characterwise what percentage of Type II production is EOR to help determine the possible duration period of the plateau?

It's very difficult to know without detailed field-by-field data. If the logistic model holds for the group III and Canadian Tar Sands production double by 2010, the supply coming from group II has to increase by a minimum of 10 mbpd (+10%) by 2012. 10 mbpd is the equivalent of a new Saudi Arabia! and I was very pessimistic on future demand growth (+1.5%).

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Jason Bradford on November 13, 2006 - 4:37pm

What a fantastic post!

I have noticed the tendency of analyses like these to be "conservative" in the sense that the potentials for future projects to come online in time, depletion rates to remain low, etc. are given the benefit of the doubt.

What I would like to see is a "conservative" analysis in the sense of "what if things don't go according to plan?" What does it look like if "another Saudia Arabia" doesn't manifest from the Type II countries?

How fast is the global depletion rate likely to be and when does it become very noticable?

I don't believe total predictive ability, just want a set of scenarios we can consider realistic considering Murphy's Law. What we have here is a kind of "best case" scenario, what would be a "not so great case," in other words?

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jim burke on November 13, 2006 - 9:59pm

Mentioning Murphy's Law is spot on.

Khebab's excellent post demonstrates what we should consider a best case scenario. Political, military and environmental factors can do nothing but provide setbacks to production.

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Sam Foucher on November 13, 2006 - 10:46pm

Thanks for the kind words!

It's hard to tell, There are so many things that can go wrong! The worst case scenario is SA or Russia going south. Another issue is the likely overestimation of Middle-East reserves. You have to read my post also in light of Stuart's analysis (Why peak oil is probably about now):

There is also the result of the HL on Saudi Arabia which is worriesome (Texas and US Lower 48 oil production as a model for Saudi Arabia and the world):

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194 comments on Why We (Really) May Have Entered an Oil Production Plateau

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