The Oil Drum

Thanks for a summary!

With the above ground uncertainty currently being what it is, it seems easy to side with Sadad Al-Husseini's 85ish Mbpd currently being the peak.

I wonder if Libya's Shokri Ghanem's / Margerie's 100 Mbpd max prediction is also a reference to crude + condensates or some other combined category? I can't find the original exact discussion on this.

It'll be interesting to see what Fatih Birol and his team make out all of this in their EIA November revision of USGS and other reserve figures, and thus, production estimates.

They were sitting in the front row in the same conferences as the gentlemen giving the forecasts above and have already given signals that revisions are due. It'll be interesting to see if they'll be minor concessions or real revisions.

To me, it seems that now even the mainstream estimates for peak are converging to a quite narrow range. The peak estimate range has clearly shrunk from 30-50 years (2005-2050) to 10 years (2012-2020), with most starting to drop near 2012ish or lower for at least a temporal peak, if not final peak. This of course includes most of the UK/US IOC estimates.

I expect to see more widespread downward revisions and more converging of estimates at increasing frequency in near future. At the same time, I hope I'm wrong :)

Also, it looks like the peak will for all practical purposes be a combined above ground + underground factors peak. Not a pure geological peak.

Meaning it might run for a slightly bit longer as an "undulating plateau" than a pure geological peak would, IF the political issues can be solved in time to keep the production steady for a while.

If so, it could be that once the peak timing discussion is at least somewhat settled in the inner sanctums, the length of the undulating plateau (& final decline rate) will be the next battle frontier.

IHS: "The plateau will stretch out to 2040"

ASPO: "Fairly short plateau, 6+/-3 years"

etc.