I think that's a pretty darn good read, and then of course we have to confront the "all liquids" issue again (for what, the 400th time this year?! :-), because NGL, GTL and the "dash to gas" are sure to accelerate as light crude oil gets harder to find, to get, and to afford.  This must also be combined with the various logistical issues  (my old distinction about "geological peak vs. logistical peak."

The problem is, we still have a problem.  I am amazed at how groups like CERA and other "bright and sunny types" can use the facts above, which indicate, even if not immediate peak, an obvious sense of chasing the treadmill on the part of oil and "liquids" fuel producers, as somehow an indication that "all's well".  This is not a comfortable situation no matter how you can piece together a "Rube Goldberg" technical/logistical house of cards to keep "official peak" at bay for one more, two more, three more, whatever (?), years. IF let us say, peak is in 2017 and not yesterday, ALL IS STILL NOT WELL.  Given where the oil comes from in the international community, and the CO2 issues, all is MOST CERTAINLY NOT WELL.

  As a nation and a world economy, it has the feel of slipping down an icy slope to the edge of a cliff....one inch, one foot....and then you don't slide for an hour or two and call it victory, even though there you are still on the edge of the icy slope....then, one inch, one foot more.....but you rejoice, your still several feet from the edge!  How long do we want to go on that way without turning our heads about, and looking for a way off the slope, or at least, a way back up it?

One last concern:  in this seemingly eternal "death by a thousand cuts" inch by inch slide, there will be price and supply crisis, followed by relief, followed by deeper and more varied crisis.  After awhile, in one of the "relief" periods, and in sheer weariness of hearing that the "end is nigh", people will just wander off the topic, and the hope of gaining real momentum on energy conservation/efficiency/alternatives begins to wane....until it is too late.

Despite prejections by some "doom" peakers saying that TWSWHTF (the whatcha' stuff would hit the fan) by the first third or half of this year, and we would already be well in the full meltdown....it may be tomorrow, but wasn't yesterday....and we just crossed out of the sixth month.

I am more and more opposed to predicting a date for peak oil, which I have stated before is a very vague term, and would be all but impossible to prove until years or decades after it occured.  It becomes an argument about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, and pulls us aways from real, big scale change, which is what we really need, peak yesterday, or peak 20 years from now.  

Roger Conner  known to you as ThatsItImout