47 comments on A Simpler Way to Calculate Global Oil Reserves?
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GAIA Host Collective
The only places that the majors can expect to be able to develop are the US and Canada. And they are already developing all the fields that they can reasonably expect to develop. My real expectation is that the majors will sell all of their production and just be refiners and marketers in the future. The future in the world is with the independents and the national oil companies.
The Majors know geo politics well.
There back in Libya now who would have though that ten years ago.
The NCO have a problem they have coasted the last 20+ years on the fact that they have large reserves of easily recoverable oil. Outside of KSA/Russia(?) that have not developed the expertise to extract from post peak reserves. The majors have the ability.
Consider Mexico/Pemex. Large debt and most of the money goes to the goverment. Suddenly there faced with falling production
or probably more correctly collapsing production. Now the NCO is in a bad situation pretty much regardless of the price of oil. The goverment has been pumping the oil money into the economy for years to uphold its powers. Suddenly oil revenue begins to drop what are they going to do.
1.) Husband the national resource and rest the fields while they try to increase production via favorable contracts with the majors or satelite western oil firms. And basically admit peak oil.
2.) Give in and invite the majors back in ( Libya )
Now consider the NCO finicial situation.
Production dropping by 10%
Internal demand increasing by 5% (WestTexas ExportLand tm )
This mean they need the price of oil to increase by 15% to stay revenue neutral.
Internally there is the expectation that revenue is increasing as the price of oil goes up lets say the populace of the NCO country feels it should get 5% richer each year.
So there is enourmous pressure to increase revenue by at least 5% to match the rising oil prices.
The only way to do that is to increase production even if a significant amount of the revenue from the new production goes into the pockets of a major oil company.
Of course the majors are going to claim that not only will they offset the decline but they can increase production for the NCO. (doubtful)
So the NCO's and associated goverments will be in a pretty tough situation. Either they try and keep production going with the expertise they have in house and see revenue begin to drop say at 5-10% a year or more as rising oil prices fail to cover the lost production or they cut a deal.
Think about it the NCO will be in the situation that they really want oil prices to rise at 20% a year so they can show revenue increases.
60->72->86->103
Unless I'm wrong this is a very very important point.
Peak Oil is also basically peak revenue for the oil producers. They will never make as much money post peak as they made at the peak.
Of course the price will bounce around but you see the trend.
Now lets consider the actions of the big players in the Oil industry.
1.) The Majors are not intrested in peak oil in fact they generally aggresively deny it. Why ?
They know a big payday is comming as they reenter former NCO countries and develop the tired fields to "increase" production.
2.) Opec is acting very strange even with the high prices. Why ? They need the price of oil to continue to increase at a nice rate just to break even as they deplete. Right now Opec or better KSA needs a 20% yearly increase in oil price minimum to offset dropping production. If there depletion rates are higher then 10% the problem is simply worse.
In the real world the price will almost certainly begin to fluctuate over a wide margin as demand destruction internal revenue needs and depletion play out so expect the situation for the NCO to be fairly grim as there revenue begins to fluctuate fairly wildly.
Over the past few years we have seen the big run-up in prices as we have peaked and lost all reserve production. This has resulted in a large cash infusion into the NCO countries the problem is that post peak they won't see any more hefty increases in revenue as demand destruction dampens the price and simple depletion/internal usage cuts into the amount of product they have to sell regardless of price.
The winners here are the majors everyone else loses.
They only monkey wrench is how many deal will go to the Chinese.
Mark my words, in ten years you will see the majors mostly out of production of oil because they can't make any money at the game. All it does is draw flack from environmentalists and from people enraged at ",windfall profits" , and they will see that they will be much better off as refiner/marketers such as Valero. So when flush production collapses you will see them dump the fields, shit on all their E&P employees and tell the touts on Wallstreet that they don't have to worry about decining reserve base because they don't have reserves. And I'll sign my name to that prediction.
Bob Ebersole
I don't disagree with most of what your saying.
I'm just saying that they expect the NCO to invite them back to produce the old and difficult fields.
Tell me what you think the NCO's will do in the scenrio I've outlined.
Oil price increases 10%
Production declines 10%
Internal usage increases 5%.
The are making less money every year and they don't have the expertise to extract the older fields like the majors do.
In exchange the majors get to book reserves in these countries.
Give me your opinion of how the NCO will operate refute my claim that they will be at best revenue neutral post peak for example. You have not addressed my prime example Libya.
So please give me your position on the NCO's not just the Majors.
Now once this scenario plays out I agree there is a saying that goes like no icebox company ever manufactured refrigerators. The oil majors will not be players in alternative energy. But because I see that the NCO's will get desperate I think your missing a step.
Mike
Exxon and Chevron can't make money on 9 barrel a day wells,the median production in Texas, and they won't. They'll lay off the exploraationists and retire the production engineers, and the NOCs and service companies will hire them. This is what they did onshore in Texas and Louisiana, they will do it again because they will come to percieve that that will make more money. And they will be too controversial to get NOC contracts.
As for Libia, I'm pretty sure that it was the treat of invasion that made Gadafi come to Jesus. The international oil companies were already buying their products for use in Europe. American companies ignore US sanctions at will as they suffer no penalties.
KSA can pull off hiring the small companies as contractors since they have the infrastructure for building big project.
I think that the rework project needed to try to keep production rates up will be large and complex. I don't see most NOC capable of pulling them off. You have to consider that when depletion finally sets in most of them will be hit by surpise. I'm sure Pemex even with the warning that we know that have been given is not seriously working on how to keep the oil flow up if Cantrell tanks. I suspect that many of the NOC's are more delusional then Pemex about their production capabilities.
I think your underestimating the pressure that the NOC will be under to keep or even increase their oil revenue.
I'm not convinced that simply taking the approach of business as usual and hiring in foreign contractors is going to solve the problems there facing.
Now I do believe the major's are capable of keeping production rates up in depleted fields at the expense of total recovery and with steeper declines later in production.
Now if they don't bring in the majors the NOC's could very well be facing production declines steep then 10% if the situation in the fields gets beyond their ability to handle with contractors. Realize that after the US peaked the drilling campaign was massive and probably won't be repeated even in the situation I'm talking about.
I suspect we will soon find out.
If I'm right then I'd expect the initial drops in production rates to be fairly gentle with declines say in the 2-5% range but say going rapidly to the double digits 10-20% several years later. Consider if they try to put together a number of contractors for a large project they will be faced with a lot of issues. The contractors will be unwilling to sign long term deals since the price the can charge will be skyrocketing. I can foresee numerous delays and problem as contracts pressure for higher prices or leave for greener pastures. The reason I think the major can pull it off is they will have the backing of the western governments to ensure that the projects are kept on schedule. Politics will play a big role in ensuring the success of NOC projects that accept the help of the majors.
If your right then we will probably see initial declines say in the 5-10% range moving fairly quickly higher.
I do see in this case that internal political issues could become explosive. So I'm not convinced.
==M.