73 comments on New BP statistical review
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http://www.canada.com/topics/news/national/story.html?id=bcd2dba8-319b-44aa-add5-fa555ae3b2c5&k= 93706
My blog entry on it (written for a more beginner-level audience than the normal TOD fare):
http://www.grinzo.com/energy/blog_entry_archive/2006/06/2006x06x14_1.html
Of course this kind of article is a distraction from the real problem, in twenty years twice as many customers will be chasing half as much production worldwide. But its still useful in that it encourages people to think about the problem and possibly help raise money for independents who are trying this kind of operation.
Even by the most conservative modelers, ASPO & Koppelaar, it will be 36 years 'til production is halved from 2006. Using the Scenario average, that day (of 42.5-mbd annual extraction) will not come for sixty years. Nice try...
I suspect Freddy Hutter will be singing a vastly different song, or even using another internet pseudonym in a few more years. As for his increasing quarterly production numbers, I'd like to see the sources of his data because I don't see any meaningful increases at all in the EIA or IEA data. I think right there Freddy is blowing smoke.
My Uncle Charles Passel in Abilene died happy, respected and well off drilling wells in the Fort Worth Basin, but he never spotted a location based on my Aunt Alda's claim to be able to witch up oil with a dowsing rod. These scientific types all seem to lack faith in the intuitive process. And she never quite forgave him for not letting her dowse new locations, she thought if he'd just follow her hunches they could be the richest people in Abilene. Its a pity I never asked her about the Barnett Shale.
"Y'all were wrong in 2003. Y'all were wrong about SARS. And oil over $40 for months on end is as likely as your nat'l gas of $10-$15 was. When members learn about demand destruction and substitution principles,they will end that jarring thud of their heads banging the wall season after season."
Hey, nobody is right all the time.
We're all (I hope) here to try and achieve the same goal and it's not to perform drive by fruitings :O) (Mrs Doubtfire...if you recall)
There are two elements to this discussion. Being right on forecasts and giving correct statistics. My record is clear on a plethora of forums on the forecasting front. And on stats, it was the ASPO cheerleaders at Yahoo's EnergyResources that flamed me for a year for posting with detailed analysis evidence that their emperor (Campbell) had no clothes. After i was kicked out for blasphemy, Colin admitted that my calculations were in fact the correct ones and he restracted his URR and production analysis and replaced them with mine. I was one of very few that he shared his Excel data with and i was confident that i had found mistakes.
It is unfortunate that many have cult like postures on the Peak issue and cherry pick their data to suit the agenda.
2005 global production has exceeded 2004 by 1.0-mbd. The monthly production record was set in Feb/2006. 2006Q1 is the highest production quarter in history. And despite Mile's and others pondering the likelihood of a Recession after the hurricanes, Unemployment rate has gone down and Real GDP up just as my GAO link in October had espoused. Life is unfolding as it should and as foretold by yours truly in the TOD archives. Have i made any wrong predictions? Maybe one or two. Have i ever got a stat wrong? Very rarely. My analysis is based on study. Many here base assertions on wishful thinking and often the truth hurts, eh. That separates the analysts from the neophytes and gives me a high degree of confidence when i suggest something.
No it wasn't, Freddy , and no it isn't (ask the EIA).
Further, these monthly totals are not cast in stone. About every six months, IEA goes back with revisions to the four previous years as they receive more interim and final stats. They correct the annual production figures, but we never know what months were affected and thus there is some discrepancy.
While on stats, the valid concern at ASPO is that many nations are using former URR figures in subsequent annual submissions. We know several countries have found that while they have extracted much, some fields have not drawn down. Inward seepage has replenished all drawings. Some would call that "the Gold effect". Others judge the phenom to reflect inadaquate measuring in the first instance and/or better techniques of measuring fiels volume on the subsequents. But Colin Campbell seems to be afraid that we are seeing procrastination and nonchalence at play which may mean that when those nations get a round tuit and give their new URR's, we will see drastic write downs. In turn this affects his "past production" and "future production" numbers and when the Peak "was" or "will be". This is why he is constantly moving both the conventional Peak and all liquids Peak from Y2k to 2015. Really it is an acedemic concern, not related to production, unless one believes that the Hubbert Peak is also the Extraction Peak. Again, for conventional crude, it is an exercise in academics for purists, but if Campbell's figures suggest an all liquids peak within five years into the future, then there are some very grave misconceptions out there by stakeholders and decision makers that will have to be addressed.
Again it leads to the discussion, is URR falling or going up? For those of that believe URR is rising, we are at ease about futue production. But if in reality, URR is falling despite ASPO's upward paper revisions that are based perhaps on faulty provided data, then the arm waving and antics of those on the book selling and speakers bureau circuits could have substance.
Maybe. Maybe wishful thinking? Maybe the tooth fairy? Maybe just the lower specific gravity of oil finding it way to the top of the formation vis a vis formation water over long periods of time versus a human lifespan but a blink of an eye in terms of geologic time.
I happen to believe that URR will go up over time as new techniques and some relatively old techniques such as CO2 injection boost recovery, but I have not seen evidence that this will be enough to significantly delay a peak, and am unable to reconcile a tweaking of URR with much of an extension of the age of abundant cheap oil.
Increases in what is conventionally thought of as the amount of original oil in place, what I interpret as your "golden effect" is real when reservoirs are conected [typically replenished though faulting from below] but this does not appear to be nearly enough to stave off a peak. Think one thousand barrels a second. Ask yourself who is going to drill with the intent of tapping into a depleted reservoir to the "gold." Go one step further and ask yourself who is going to continue to produce from anything offshore in the expectation of a trickle of oil refilling a deplested reservoir ... and if a large reservoir exists at greater depths why not simply drill into to that lower formation and be done with it?
Your comment "again it leads to the discussion, is URR falling or going up? For those of that believe URR is rising, we are at ease about futue production." this a the wrong question unless you believe that the URR growth is real, is pervasive / or at least truly significant and that other reservoirs are indeed just waiting for a drill bit as increases in URR for a given field don't lead to a new peak for even that field. Even the often cited example in the GOMEX [Eugene Island?] has never recovered to its peak. It has after a partioal recovery merely continued to produce what IIRC is chemically different crude longer that the original estimated productive life. In the grand scheme of things BFD!!!
In regard to the reported reserves of many OPEC nations, you can't seriously believe that those reserves are actually static. Since they are reported as being the same year after year they must be arbitrary. They might be too high. They might be to low. They are for damn sure wrong. Stop endorsing this nonsense, it diminishes whatever credibilty you might otherwise have.
In summary, you might be right or your position might constitute what I would with all due respect call a "golden crock."
In short, trust the silent majority (and the Courts) when the noise gets unreasonably loud...
My publishing of the Oil Depletion Scenarios is as a messenger and careful analysis of their data with some degree of due diligence. That is proposes that most of the Peakist Cult find the results offensive is unfortunate but it explains fully why the media, their friends, their neighbours, their co-workers and their family continue to dismiss their message. Due to the hurricanes, speculation in the oil futures and much insurgence in Iraq, Cultists have been able to convince the gullible. But, the GOM is back in the game, speculators had to cover their positions and Iraq is again up to 2-mbd production from the recent lows of 0.4-mbd.
By all measurements the 2005 Peak was wrong. The chance of a Peak in 2006 with presently known medium term activity is as likely as Trinidad-Tobago winning the World Cup...
http://trendlines.ca/economic.htm
However, there is a real "shoot the messenger mentality here" that wants to mark any opposition as trolls and then ignore them hoping they go away. "How dare they doubt that the end of the world is coming", they seem to say.
Gas is getting more expensive because oil supply is diminishing. Oil rich countries have been rewriting contracts for thirty years as the power has shifted to them. This continues.
The other two questions are complex and depend on who "we" is. Why did France and Russia try to stop the Iraq war? Why are Russia and China tying to protect Iran. These are also complex.
The answers to your questions and mine partially involve oil and partially other issues. Life is complex and few things are black and white.
Many people want to live in a simple world and believe what they want. I live in a very complicated world with lots of grey. I would like to be able to discuss it with people on this site, preferably those who disagree with me.
I'm not a singing with the choir kind of guy and don't think this has to be a singing with choir kind of website.
I agree, we should have a Freddy VS Jason here.
Anyone from TOD want to step up to the plate and challenge Mr. Freddy, pull out your spread sheets and diagrams and go to town.
That reported reserves remain precisely the same year after year is either a cosmic coincidence or [by application of Occam's razor probably] total nonensense. I think that as a minimum Freddy Hutter needs to provide some evidence to establish a measure of credibility ... or switch to a more plausible line of reasoning ... or simply admit that he is merely trying to bait the more passionate believers in the concept of a near term peak in world oil production.
Peak supply/extraction/export of the energy source is the most parsimonious explanation I have discovered. I tend to believe Occam's Razor rather than more convoluted theories.
I appreciate your veiwpoint and respect it, the world is not black and white. But, there are also times to take a stand. For me, that time is past due.
2030 is not that far off, I hope to be alive then, and hope even more that my children are. It would really be nice if our leaders were spending 1% of their time thinking about this.
The Hirsch report thinks it would take at least 20 years to prepare - there is nothing that indicates it is too early to start. What is the down side for the US to begin using less hydrocarbons now rather than in ten years if optimistic views are correct?
But sometimes choices must be made for other than economic reasons. Warfare is a simple example of this. Choices are made for strategic and tactical reasons first and economic reasons are not primary motivators. We are now facing a potential crisis unlike anything homo sapiens has previously ever experienced. We have never had this level of technology. We have never had this many people with lives dependent on this technology. A failure of this technological civilization could be catastrophic for both our species and our planet. It makes perfect sense to do serious risk analysis and management of this problem so why not do it? I can tell you why - quite simply, those who worship the market don't want to be told that the market is not omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent. (It says so right on the package!)
And tho it usually ends up the same way, a few junkies just confound you and live forever.
The diference between these two numbers is 84.625 mbd is 99.846616718777653235797298% of 84.755 mbd.
Is Freddy trying to tell me that this is a sign that there is alot of extra capacity out there and I should relax or could it be that we are so close to the peak here that only a mathmatician thinks the diference between these numbers is important.
We are spliting a percent here are we not? IMO this doesn't look rosy. Please tell we where I'm wrong?
Because ASPO uses a URR that is more realistic defined than BP, we deduce than that the all liquids Peak will be 2010/Q1. And this calculation from Colin Campbell's data is known to be the most conservative of our 11 modelers.
We then move on to show that we are indeed on this forecasted path by monitoring Production. The folly in using annual data is that there have been 9 years since the oil crisis days where annual production actually was less than the previous year. Production has cycles just like the economy and politics and weather and they are weakly related. Having said this, there is then greater folly in watching quarterly figures and making decisions on monthly data is outright lunacy.
None-the-less we all watch, doomsters in the hopes that the occasional downtrend will not recover ... which never happens. And the optimists and pragmatists are looking for occassional new record highs to validate the upward trend.
That's it in a nutshell. 2005 had 1.04-mbd higher production than 2004. That record validates the overall trend. On the medium term, 2006Q1 84.55-mbd production broke the previous record of 84.44-mbd in 2005Q2. Q3 & Q4 were hurt by hurricane and insurgency factors, but again the trend is validated and extended to 2006. The most unreliable indicator of monthly production set a new high of 84.72-mbd in Feb/2006 and we have a tentative high of 85.0 in May (yet to be revised). By all indications these monthly figures show us that a new quarterly record may be set in Q2 and that would almost quarantee 2006 Production greater than 2005.
Most Depletion scenarios are counting on an annual increase of 1.25-mbd thru this decade. We are right on target when we look at production and spare capacity (currently 2.8-mbd for OPEC & 0.9-mbd globally.
In summary, those looking for a Spring 2005 Peak or at best a plateau, are just being silly. None of the Depletion Scenarios is in jeopardy. None. URR indicates that we a way to go yet; and extraction is verifying that hypothesis.
http://trendlines.ca/economic.htm
Further, studies shown by ASPO and others illustrate that the "Hubbert Curve" of no other commodity has led to higher prices or disruption. That aspect of the doomster outlook is laughable and has no economic basis.
I guess I'm still not getting something here. You also state that slight variations up or down are going to be pounced on by either camp to prove thier position. My point is that while 100,000 bpd +/- does add up, this in the big picture a slight fraction of a percent(<.2). Diesel truck fuel has gone from $1.25 to over $3.00 in 5 years or 240%. Subtracting any "fear premium" for any disaster, war or what not, this is a huge increase. 240% vrs <.2%. Take a months worth or even a quarters worth of data (or more) over 5 yrs. from this (to smooth the curve (s). There must be something I don't understand because I don't see why I should relax- and I really wish I could. trying to run a business with diesel,gasoline, propane, and plastic price increases this is getting a little dicey.
The big problem with current analyses, in my opinion, is the never ending search for a silver bullet, or the use of a lack of one to predict doom and gloom. Short of aliens showing up and giving us a magic gizmo that turns sea water into light, sweet crude, there won't be a silver bullet, but a whole pocket of silver BB's.
I suspect that increases in URR will be a major player in the next 10 to 20 years for exactly the reason you mention: A relatively minor improvement there can significantly alter the situation and push the post-peak part of the oil production curve to the right by several years.
I think the truest think peakers frequently say is that the age of cheap oil is over. Peak oil doesn't mean no oil, but it does mean a very long and expensive transition to other fuels and technologies.
Bloody hell; yesterday it was desalinization, today it's converting the oceans into light! Then I read beyond the comma ... :)