 | Estimating the World Production Decline Rates from the Megaproject Forecasts | The Oil Drum | DrumBeat: November 20, 2007 |  |
WSJ Article - Oil Officials See Limit Looming on Production
Posted by Gail the Actuary on November 19, 2007 - 8:00pm
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: cera, Wall Street Journal [list all tags]
Today, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) had a Page 1 article about limits to world oil production. The article begins:
A growing number of oil-industry chieftains are endorsing an idea long deemed fringe: The world is approaching a practical limit to the number of barrels of crude oil that can be pumped every day.
Some predict that, despite the world's fast-growing thirst for oil, producers could hit that ceiling as soon as 2012. This rough limit -- which two senior industry officials recently pegged at about 100 million barrels a day -- is well short of global demand projections over the next few decades. Current production is about 85 million barrels a day.
The WSJ sees a number of above-ground issues as being the reason for this looming plateau (below the fold...)
1. Lack of investment during the time was oil priced low, leading to less exploration and less production now.
2. Resource nationalism curbing investment too.
3. Untapped resources in all the wrong places (conflict zone, inhospitable climate, environmental concerns)
4. Talented workers are retiring; not enough trained workers to replace them.
All of these issues are important, but they do not address the underlying issue -- we start with a finite amount of oil, and this is gradually being depleted. As it gets depleted, it becomes more and more difficult to extract economically, so production tends to decline. For example, this is a graph of US oil production.
US oil production reached its high point in 1970, and has fallen since then, despite the discovery of additional oil in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico, and many technological advances. This decline was forecast in 1956 by M. King Hubbert.
We are also seeing declines in other fields that have been produced for extended periods, such as the North Sea.
The Wall Street Journal article says:
Traditional peak-oil theorists, many of whom are industry outsiders or retired geologists, have argued that global oil production will soon peak and enter an irreversible decline because nearly half the available oil in the world has been pumped. They've been proved wrong so often that their theory has become debased.
This is non-sense. One by one, each field that has been pumped extensively has gone into irreversible decline. The production of the majority of countries of the world is now in irreversible decline. It is becoming increasingly clear that in the not-too-distant future, world production will begin to decline. The coming decline of oil production has been predicted by many. The estimated date has varied, but the general time frame has been around 2000 to 2020.
One aspect of peak oil theory that is being refined is the method of prediction. One of the earliest techniques predicted that oil production would begin to decline when half of the available oil had been extracted. Methodology has been expanded, so other forecasting techniques are now also used. (It is doubtful that this was ever the only technique used.) Some reasons for not relying on this technique:
• There are many types of oil resources, including free flowing traditional oil and the very difficult to develop oil sands and oil shale. If a 50% factor is applied, it must be applied to each type separately. Thus, adding oil sands reserves which are very slow to be developed does virtually nothing to push forward the peak oil date.
• New technology can change the pattern of production. Sometimes, new extraction techniques can "hold up" production until perhaps 60% of the ultimate resource extracted has been removed, so that the decline begins later, and is steeper.
• Many of the frequently quoted reserve amounts appear to be seriously overstated. OPEC numbers appear to be too high, as indicated by this analysis. Even US Geological Study reserves have been questioned as being too high, in analyses such as this one. Reserve estimates are not audited, and different organizations have different standards for setting their reserves.
Because of the these issues, those involved with the study of the peak oil use a variety of techniques to project the peak in future production, rather than simply applying a 50% factor to estimated ultimate production. For example, many analysts are now looking at planned new production, together with expected decline rates on existing fields, to make their forecasts. For an example, see this recent presentation by Chris Skrebowski.
All of the techniques seem to be converging to show a likely decline in production in the next few years, or even starting about 2005. Oil production data suggests that world oil production has been flat to slightly declining for the last two years, so it is possible the decline has already begun.
The oil production forecasts that have been truly erroneous are those of the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), the International Energy Agency (IEA), and Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA). All of these organizations prepare estimates that are consistently biased high, as indicated by the analysis EIA forecasts by researchers at Penn State University, and by this analysis of CERA forecasts by Dr. Euan Mearns. One starts to wonder whether the forecasts of these organizations are based primarily on forecasts of future demand, together with a large measure of wishful thinking.
The WSJ article quotes Randy Udall:
Randy Udall, co-founder of the U.S. chapter of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas, has written that these unconventional oil supplies are like having $100 million in the bank, but "being forbidden to withdraw more than $100,000 per year. You are rich, sort of."
This is a good way of understanding our current problem. There is a lot of oil in the ground, but it is complex oil to get out. It is expensive, and requires a lot of trained workers. We are rapidly reaching the point where we cannot pull as much oil out of the ground, because the "easy oil" is gone, and the remaining oil is in difficult locations and is hard to extract.
One of the issues with respect to extraction of oil is that we must use scarce resources in the extraction process - oil and other energy resources, water, and trained workers. Once we reach the limits on these, we cannot extract more oil. If we start spending more than one barrel of oil to obtain a barrel of oil, we have a clear problem. If we expect to use huge amounts of fresh water in areas that are subject to drought, water may also be a limiting factor. Additional manpower can be trained, but this takes time, and resources of other types. We are rapidly reaching the point where obtaining adequate resources for oil production is a limiting factor, so production must fall.
The impact of declining oil production in future years is likely to be very significant. Rear Admiral Hyman Rickover predicted many of the issues we are facing today in his speech from over 50 years ago. Mr. Rickover talks about the close tie of fossil fuel use with our standard of living. This is likely to be one of the big challenges in the years ahead.
For those who wish to learn more about energy and our future, The Oil Drum has many articles of interest. Some links to individual articles are shown at the top of the TOD page. Euan Mearns put together a compilation of worthwhile articles by various Oil Drum authors. This is a link to a PDF compilation of some introductory articles I have written. In the comments, some may want to share links to their favorite articles.
Edit 11/21/2007 This is a link to a graph someone posted in the comments below, showing CERA oil price estimates alongside the actual prices.
They've been proved wrong so often that their theory has become debased......
When one finger points to you, three point back at yourself.
Unfortunately, the early Peakers have been debased.
A few of us in the PO movement have repeatedly said that premature predictions of irreversible decline will lead to exactly this accusation. At the same time, Peakers take great delight in pointing out all the missed predictions of the cornucopians. So what goes around come around.
Additionaly Peak Oilers make a big argument about "geological decline", when this is not the fundamental issue. The perception that it is a question of access and expense was never made part of PO theory, yet this was clearly the line that Lynch et al were taking.
While Peak oilers were still trying the explain abstruse mechanics of oil reservoirs, CERA have taken the ball and run with it, and now have the ears of the people who matter. This outcome was all too predictable.
To be honest, I don't care if CERA have stolen the PO message, as long as the message is getting on the front page of the WSJ.
I'm an 'early' peaker - essentially saying that 2005/2006 was the high water mark, though acknowledging that a month or two in the future may be higher in production (say, that 3 or 4 major projects all come online in a short period), the essential peak was then.
And unfortunately, my position is based on facts that have yet to be contradicted, even as the statistics grow ever murkier - all liquids is a fine measure of oil production, except it isn't, of course.
Don't be silly.
The non-oil components of "all liquids" compete directly with oil in a number of markets - NGL in gasoline blending components and ethylene feedstocks (plastics), for example - so looking at all liquids is absolutely the correct measure.
It might make sense to normalize the volumes for energy content, but then again it might not - it's not clear that different energy levels make a difference for feedstocks.
What absolute nonsense. Even if they do compete directly, which is only true to a degree, they don't all have the same energy density, so volumemetric comparisons are meaningless. Just assuming that a barrel of oil is equivalent to an barrel of ethanol is plain wrong.
Does that matter for ethylene feedstocks?
I have no idea, but I suspect neither do you, so there's no indication energy density is the key factor you suggest. Hence my qualification that normalizing by energy density may or may not be wholly appropriate.
At any rate, the point is simply that non-crude liquids in the oil supply directly substitute for crude in some very substantial uses. Accordingly, an increase in those other liquids displaces crude use in those areas and makes more available for other uses, effectively increasing the supply of crude. We can quibble about the relative worth of different liquids (I suspect NGLs and ethanol should be discounted by 20-30%), but that's a secondary issue to the fact that the EIA includes all liquids in "total oil supply" for a very good reason.
They've been proved wrong so often that their theory has become debased......
When one finger points to you, three point back at yourself.
Another key argument used by CERA to "prove" we have plenty of oil (in addition to "people have said were were 'running out' before") is to talk about how no one could have imagined cell phones. It then follows that technology will figure out how to get oil out of capped wells.
For numbers they like to include oil sands as if they were oil. Not sure if they include oil shale as if it is oil.
And probably the thing most key to a CERA or IEA argument against peak oil is faith. Faith that there is an incomprehensibly large amount of oil underneath Saudi Arabia and their neighbors. And faith that even though discoveries have been in decline for 40 years, that that is just a "short-term market correction".
How many times in the last five years were the oil shales going to be profitable, switch grass bio diesel, algae, solar, hydrogen?
Why are the Tar Sands of Canada producing such limited quantities of oil compared to their vast "reserves". (flow rates)
How many times was the oil price "not supported by the fundamentals"? (that is it should have been lower)
Lets not forget predictions have been going both ways. I have heard many predictions on MSM about current oil being overpriced and blaming Chavez, Putin, OPEC, Iraq war and anything else except for reduced supply.
Then we get the classic a few weeks ago that we don't have a supply problem it's a demand problem. *scratches head* I always thought they called it supply and demand. The keyword linking the two being AND but I guess when you can't stick a pipe into oil shales that have more oil than the middle east then yeah it's a demand problem *rolls eyes*
Right now today 19 November 2007, you would have to be quite satisfied if you were a believer in Peak Oil being sooner pre 2012 rather than later post 2020.
WSJ *yawn* still playing catch up from way way way behind.
May we live in interesting times :)
Of course they do - it is currently the source of large amounts of oil, after all.
It already has, to a certain extent - enhanced oil recovery technologies have allowed substantially more of the oil originally in place to be extracted than used to be the case.
If you're trying to make an argument that the peak oil theory is not debased, you need to carefully consider what you're going to say and what the real argument is.
Both of your arguments here are off the mark - peak oil is not about reserves. Peak oil is about flow rates, and it's clear to everyone that flow rates are restricted in tar sands (physically) and the Middle East (politically).
In many ways, the peaker obsession with the amount of recoverable oil remaining is a red herring - it really doesn't matter if there's enormous amounts of oil remaining if we can't access it. Many people are clearly resistant to the idea that not much oil is remaining - and for good reason, since you have poor evidence of that - but most people will agree with you that there are above-ground issues limiting the flow rate of oil right now, from political (OPEC quotas, unrest in Iraq/Nigeria, hostile climates in Venezuela/Iran) to physical (manpower and infrastructure capacity limits in the tar sands).
You may really, really believe that the world's used half its oil, but that's simply not the best way to talk about the subject.
Of course they do - it is currently the source of large amounts of oil, after all.
They have reserves greater than Saudi Arabia per CERA. They are pumping astonishingly low amounts of oil if that is the case? Do you think they would benefit from increasing their rig count? Seems puzzling, such a large oil reserve and such a relatively low flow rate???
It already has, to a certain extent - enhanced oil recovery technologies have allowed substantially more of the oil originally in place to be extracted than used to be the case.
Has enhanced oil recovery stopped Mexico from peaking? Has it stopped the US from peaking? Has it stopped the North Sea from peaking?
Both of your arguments here are off the mark - peak oil is not about reserves. Peak oil is about flow rates, and it's clear to everyone that flow rates are restricted in tar sands (physically) and the Middle East (politically).
Well I hope CERA is reading that comment because they are the ones who talk about oil sands reserves being larger than Saudi Arabia without considering flow rate. You appeared to realize that and be defending them a few sentences ago.
Many people are clearly resistant to the idea that not much oil is remaining - and for good reason, since you have poor evidence of that
A peaking of oil production in the majority of oil producing nations is considered good evidence that "not much oil is remaining". A peaking of discoveries and gradual decline over a fourty year period is great evidence that "not much oil is remaining". Only a strong faith-based approach to oil discovery can counteract that. The faith is strong at CERA and the IEA and the mainstream media. Their faith is going to be severely tested as oil prices soar and oil production stagnates or declines. If it weren't such a looming disaster I would say that it is gonna be fascinating to see how long CERA, the mainstream media, the politicians, the average joes, etc., can keep the faith.
Many people are clearly resistant to the idea that not much oil is remaining - and for good reason, since you have poor evidence of that - but most people will agree with you that there are above-ground issues limiting the flow rate of oil right now, from political (OPEC quotas, unrest in Iraq/Nigeria, hostile climates in Venezuela/Iran) to physical (manpower and infrastructure capacity limits in the tar sands).
I don't believe that "above-ground issues" are limiting the flow rate. That's CERA and the mainstream media and the other faith-based oil prognosticators and pundits.
You may really, really believe that the world's used half its oil, but that's simply not the best way to talk about the subject.
I didn't say a word about what percentage of the oil has been used.
Only if you're being purposefully obtuse. Tar sands produce oil, but require more work than conventional wells to get the same amount of oil. Those two facts are not in conflict.
Bait-and-switch fallacy.
You talked about technology getting oil out of capped wells, so I talked about enhanced oil recovery, so now you're pretending we're talking about technology preventing a peak. Different topics.
Re-read what I wrote, then.
The listener gets to decide what constitutes "good evidence", not the speaker. You can insist you're providing "darn good intelligence" until you're blue in the face, but that won't make your points one iota more convincing.
For example:
This backdating trick undercuts your point. Technological advances have allowed more oil to become recoverable than was originally possible, effectively adding "technological discoveries" of oil to the regular geological discoveries.
If we discovered no new oil but recovery rates increased over time to 100%, your method of plotting oil discoveries would show years and years of zeros even while remaining recoverable reserves were rising year after year. It should hardly be a surprise that that kind of evidence is less than fully convincing to everyone.
How long has Campbell "kept the faith"? He's been predicting imminent decline for, what, almost 20 years now?
It's a grave error to assume that someone who disagrees with you is irrational and mistaken.
You're simply wrong. As the most obvious example, insurgents have been repeatedly targetting oil infrastructure in Iraq and Nigeria, keeping hundreds of thousands of barrels a day of existing production from being used.
You may believe that the key is below-ground issues - and you may be right - but don't let that blind you to reality. That you disagree with something an opponent says doesn't mean you must disagree with everything they say.
Reserves are significant because they put a definite limit on flow rates. When there's only 10% of a field left, the flow rate's going to be slow no matter what you do.
And when you're describing these things to people, if you never mention reserves, then they won't understand why flow rates can't be increased. There's a tendency for people to reply to knowledge of peak oil with, "well, perhaps we're short today, but tomorrow the price will go up and more will be produced, so nothing to worry about." Knowledge of reserves, and the interplay between reserves levels and flow rates, that changes that.
Just FYI, spouting trite, childish sayings is not an effective way to defend against claims that your theory has become debased. Indeed, in case you're planning on pulling out the big guns, "neener neener neener" will prove similarly ineffective.
Of course, as BobCousins has noted, the theory has become debased, thanks in large part to people who insist on crying "wolf!"
Don't want to look like crackpots? Muzzle the boys who cry wolf.
Even if we wanted to do it, it's not possible. The guy who cried wolf, in the view of the WSJ and rest of the MSM is Colin Campbell. How are we supposed to muzzle him?
See, the whole 'boy who cried wolf' analogy actually has no part to play in this debate about peak dates.
That boy cried wolf because he was bored.
Lets replay the story, only this time the boy cried wolf because he thought maybe he saw a wolf, or smelt a wolf, or saw the sheep come running as though there was a wolf.
If it weren't for Colin Campbell, would TOD and general Peak Oil awareness be anywhere like where they are now.
Those who advocate avoiding predictions, just incase they come to early, are like some sheep-herder who hangs on until he's quite sure whether its a wolf or just a wild dog killing the herd before running to get the townsfolk.
I'd FAR rather be seen as a crackpot by the ignorant-to-date, and find myself prepared when the inevitable arrives, than worry that the ignorant might choose to see me as a crackpot because they're not broadminded enough to realise that someone yelling wolf isn't necessarily just relieving boredom just 'cos the wolf isn't immediately visible when they go to look.
Pitt, to my mind the argument you make is just totally irrational - and dangerous. Thank whatever we thank for the likes of Colin Campbell for getting us here, today.
[rant over - that ones been building for a while]
[]edit - I retract 'dangerous' - because I don't think those who are saying 'stop making predictions' are actually going to have any effect on those who do]]
--
Jaymax (cornucomer-doomopian)
Hey, thanks, Jaymax. We needed this. A lot.
Don't forget that the boy who cried wolf was eventually right, and the entire town suffered for it. I have never been sure of the moral of that story-- did the townspeople mess up by not responding because they thought that the effort of running to the field twenty times outwieghed the damage to the flock? Of course not. The townspeople fell prey to the same base human flaws that the shepard did. The mature townspeople should have appointed at least a committee to run out each time, or hired a better shepard.
Those who do not read fairy tales are condemned to relive them, said the princess late one sleepless night, while searching for the pea.
It's all very reinterpreting the analogy to your own ends, but:
IOW, do not raise false alarms, as you will lose credibility. Therefore this analogy applies exactly.
This is exactly what some PO adherents have done, and now the WSJ says they have lost credibility. Some surprise, huh?
Anyway, the horse has already bolted. Now that the WSJ are on board with the idea of a plateau, work with them. Get them to ask where future supplies will come from and how much they will cost. Point out that developing alternative energy sources may be a business opportunity.
Probably.
Peak oil didn't become even remotely mainstream until prices shot up and oil supplies were obviously tight. Rapidly rising prices - especially to the psychologically-important $100/inflation-adjusted high level - would get people talking about the difficulties involved with producing oil and possible future problems with or without any particular person pushing the issue.
Has his work in bringing attention to the issue outweighed the reputation for making false predictions he's associated with it? Hard to say.
What use do predictions of a particular peak date serve?
The issue is how producing oil is becoming harder and harder, and satisfying rapidly-growing demand (especially from BRIC nations) will become increasingly difficult. Predicting a particular year for when "slow increase" becomes "slow decrease" is largely irrelevant to that central issue.
If all you care about is yourself being prepared, why bother discussing it at all?
If you care about society being prepared, then how your message is being received is of central importance.
Then your mind is mistaken.
My argument is explicitly rational - I'm saying that the costs (credibility) and benefits (attention?) of making predictions of a particular peak date need to be taken into account to determine whether it's something we should be doing or supporting, and that evidence suggests it's more harmful than helpful. I could certainly be mistaken, of course, and I'm more than open to the possibility that such predictions are more valuable than being repeatedly wrong is harmful.
Mostly, I'd just like to see some more people doing that kind of evaluation of what is useful behaviour. If you believe certain behaviour - such as predicting peak dates - is useful, you should be able to explain why it's useful and why its drawbacks are worth it, just as you should be able to explain the strengths and weaknesses of any argument you support.
Your argument is only rational if you manage to twist historical reality to an absurd degree in order to make it so... You're 'probably' comment re Colin Campbell seems ludicrously false beyond my comprehension.
We are unlikely to come to any agreement on this.
To answer your challenge: Peak oil going mainstream has a solid pre-prepared resource, including the likes of TOD, which only exists BECAUSE of individuals who wern't afraid to make predictions which turned out to be wrong in detail, but who's basis for those predictions was shown to be mostly robust under analysis.
The downside to society from those predictions is virtually non-existent, the benefits have given us several years advance preparation for society. But you will refuse to see that historical reality; why I'm not sure.
You should be able to explain what would be different had those predictions NOT been made - perhaps you think that society would give 'us' more credit, would be 'buying into' peak-oil theory more readily; but 'us' would not even exist, and the Saudi pronouncements on 'peak-oil' would be going unchallenged.
--
Jaymax (cornucomer-doomopian)
Disavowal.
If someone is doing something that reflects badly on a group, and that group does not take pains to distance itself from that person, it's assumed he or she is representative of the group, fair or unfair as that may be.
In this particular case, it might be helpful to see peak oil folk explain why predictions of a specific peak date miss the point, especially in response to media throwing attention at those predictions. Additionally important, though, is to not actively engage in that kind of obsessing over peak dates and predictions - and, unfortunately, doing so is pretty common. People need to not harp on about peak dates, and to stop lionizing those who do so - even though that group includes most of the big names of peak oil.
Fundamentally, a particular peak date only really matters if you expect production to fall off a cliff right afterwards, and - honestly - that's a pretty silly expectation given the broad range of world production. Absent that, the difference between "up 0.3%" and "down 0.3%" is fairly negligible: both are going to result in higher prices, demand destruction, substitution, and increased interest in alternatives.
Crying wolf and predicting or calling a peak may be great for getting attention, but at the cost of diverting attention - and credibility - away from the basic problem of demand outstripping supply. It's not easy to argue against both those who underplay the problem and those who overplay it, but it's important to do so in order for the problem to be seen as it truly is, and to be dealt with maximally efficiently and minimally painfully.
I think that's silly. ASPO, Simmons, Deffeyes, etc., are the ones getting the press, not us. They can disavow us. We can't disavow them. It sure won't "muzzle" them.
We've done that. I don't think it's really useful. People don't care, and it just comes across like 20-20 hindsight.
I could not disagree more. Like Tom Whipple said - nobody cares unless you can give them a date. The first thing they ask him on Capitol Hill when he talks about peak oil is "When?"
Just FYI, spouting trite, childish sayings is not an effective way to defend against claims that your theory has become debased. Indeed, in case you're planning on pulling out the big guns, "neener neener neener" will prove similarly ineffective.
Just FYI, when oil prices are rising rapidly, and production is stagnant and discoveries continue to be dismal, calling a theory that oil production is peaking is as childish as anything a child would say.
Of course, as BobCousins has noted, the theory has become debased, thanks in large part to people who insist on crying "wolf!"
Somebody making a too-early prediction of oil production peaking doesn't debase a theory that oil-production is about to peak. Only a faith-based or childish reasoner would think that. What debases the theory is oil discoveries exceeding oil usage. So in actuality, since the early 1980's, the faith-based cornucopian view of oil production has been debased.
Don't want to look like crackpots? Muzzle the boys who cry wolf.
Oil discoveries peaked in 1965. Oil usage has exceeded oil discoveries for over 20 years. There are some crackpots out there. But they aren't crying wolf, they are crying "all's clear, everyone can come out and play".
I'm not entirely sure what you're trying to say here. The verb in the sentence is "calling":
"Just FYI, when X, and Y, calling a theory that Z is W."
Did you mean to say "calling a theory...debased is as..."?
Of course, that'd be wrong anyway. WSJ may be wrong to call the theory debased, but they're not childish to do so.
Of course it does.
Suppose I have a theory, complete with equations and stuff, that says you'll win the lottery tomorrow. And I keep telling you this, and, day after day, you keep not winning the lottery.
After the 10th time I tell you "my theory says you're going to win the lottery tomorrow!!" and you don't, you're not going to pay much attention when I tell you that yet again. The theory has been shown to have extremely poor predictive power - "debased", in the WSJ's terminology - and hence cannot be taken as viable evidence.
Exactly the same is true about the theory "oil is peaking now!" - it's been trotted out multiple times before, and has always been wrong. Your argument is simply "this time is different!!", and maybe you're right, but the simple fact of the matter is that that's not enough to rehabilitate a debased theory. You need evidence that it really is different this time, and that the factors which made all the previous predictions wrong don't apply anymore.
Simply denying that repeated failure discredits a theory is nothing more than willful self-delusion.
Straw man - nobody's saying that. OPEC isn't, IEA isn't, and even the EIA is talking about "the substantial range of uncertainty in the world’s future oil markets".
If you want to convince an opponent to change his beliefs, you need to understand what his current beliefs are first. Dismissing most of the world as silly cornucopians isn't a very effective strategy.
Theories don't become debased. They are proved or disproved.
And an alternative way of looking at it is that the people who are crying "wolf" are getting others to at least pay attention. Many hands make light work.
And, bad metaphor, Pitt. The boy who cried wolf was right, there was a wolf, and the boy got eaten in the end. Cassandra warned of impending doom and was right, too, and died anyway.
Want to have a rational discussion about these earth-changing issues? Stop being so combative, Pitt.
OK - flow rates are going to under perform our expectations over the short term due to political considerations and over the long term due to geologic constraints and that will cause issues with the American consumer because we are unable to secure a reliable source of affordable petroleum derived products. This underproduction will not be offset with new technological advances due to the capital expense and personal constraints and by the simple fact that some of the recovery technology is in a "pre-innovation" stage. It is unknown how much of this new technology can reliably scale and how energy efficient it is without "real world" data.
Can I now get a cookie?
You're quite wrong. Theories become more or less plausible; they never become "proved".
Newton's Laws, for example, were very well-supported and very plausible...but turned out to be wrong. Similarly, the theory that black holes exist is very well-supported and very plausible, and hence we believe that it's likely to be right, and use it as the basis for further theories.
By contrast, the theory that neutrinos have no mass has become "debased" - strong evidence says it's not correct, although there's no proof per se.
More importantly, though, "oil is peaking" isn't a theory, it's a prediction. The difference is that a theory is general - meaning the theory itself can be discredited - whereas a prediction is a statement about a future event, and hence the credit or discredit when it's shown to be right or wrong is accrued to those who made the prediction and to their methods.
Accordingly, the repeated failures of the "oil is peaking" predictions have discredited ("debased") the entire peak oil crowd, and all of their methods. That's not to say they won't be right eventually - a stopped clock is right twice a day, after all - but it does mean they'll have to work extra-hard to overcome the memory of those failed predictions.
No, you just failed to understand it.
There was a wolf - i.e., the problem was real. By making false claims about the immediacy of the problem, however, the boy desensitized his community to the problem, and ultimately that led directly to disaster.
Of course, it's even worse in this case, since instead of crying "wolf!", the boy should simply be saying "wolves will come along eventually, so why don't we keep them out by building fences?"
Making predictions of a peak date serves very little purpose other than garnering attention, much of it negative. It's possible that attention is worthwhile, but it doesn't seem like it.
Disagreeing is not being combative. But neither, frankly, do I see any need to baby people along. Anyone whose arguments are sound should be able to defend them easily enough.
By using the word "never," you've "debased" yourself.
and
The real problem says the WSJ, here and elsewhere, is "restricted access" and a lack of will and various other political/military problems to which the U.S. military and the companies that support it have a ready solution.
Interesting to see that "peak oil" or whatever they want to call it is basically just an opportunity for U.S. global intervention, and not, say, an opportunity to change the global or national energy economy itself, or to work on energy together with climate change. Nope... just try to get "access." and solve the "security" problems. When all you've got is a hammer the whole world looks like a nail, and when you are the propaganda mouthpiece for an empire... the whole world and all the problems in it look like one big "security" problem.
Really, this article is exactly what you'd expect from the WSJ.
Copy of my post on the WSJ energy blog:
Link to the WSJ energy blog ? (I forgot to bookmark it earlier this year).
Thanks,
Alan
http://blogs.wsj.com/energy
Yes that is it :
http://blogs.wsj.com/energy
Did anyone notice the Landrover ad touting TaxBenefits of 35K for buying a 77K LR3 based on GVW.
The very definition of Irony. That Audi sportscar buying neighbor(on a different thread) needs to look at this ad quick.
At least some of the restricted access is in this country. Oil companies would like to drill in the Gulf of Mexico near Florida, other places on the US outer continental shelf, in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge, and on other Federal land.
If oil companies have oil platforms and other equipment available for reuse, and pipeline infrastructure at least partly in place, an argument can be made to drill sooner rather than later.
It takes a very long time to get the new fields into production, so if we plant to use infrastructure currently in place, it may make sense to start reasonably soon. If new drilling is delayed too long, the infrastructure may be deteriorated, so it may be difficult to use the oil that is produced. There may also be a problem with geologists and engineers leaving the industry, for lack of work.
That might be the meaning in the second quote, but not in the first, and not in other places in the article, eg.
Throughout the article there is a constant theme that the real problem ("especially") is a political and security one, not a geographic or geological one, and in most of the world that is code talk for a reason to impose the kind of order that the U.S. military sees as its prime mission.
I really don't think it is particularly radical to point out that the WSJ is a mouthpiece for the U.S. "military industrial complex"... although there are those who may find those words, first spoken by and warned against by a Republican, the former General, President Eisenhower, to be somehow ideological.
This article is doing what many future articles in the WSJ and the mainstream media will do. They will argue that while there may or may not be a geophysical issue, we can't do anything about that, but we can do something about the geopolitical dimension and they will use the oil production leveling and decline argument to build the case for military spending, intervention and empire.
Just you watch.
Here is Eisenhower's farewell warning to America
We are well past the point of a "rise" in such power. I judge the silent coup d'etat to be all but complete.
If oil companies have oil platforms and other equipment available for reuse, and pipeline infrastructure at least partly in place, an argument can be made to drill sooner rather than later.
To Gail's comment.
I agree from an infrastructure stand point but argue that we should not drill those areas until we have a comprehensive Energy Policy in place. If we were to drill those areas now in a few short years the energy produced would simply wind up in the fuel tanks of SUV's (and my little pickup truck). If we have an energy policy in place prior to drilling those areas we may have a chance of mitigating the most extreme effects of a post peak environment for some time to come.
Thanks, rude crude,
re: "...we should not drill those areas until we have a comprehensive Energy Policy in place."
I would say, definitely - energy policy as *minimum* requirement. And, even then, perhaps it is not the best thing to do.
We could have a comprehensive energy policy today. To take effect immediately and devote our "energy savings" to mitigation.
How can you possibly say the world sees "Iraq's oil production is stalled because it's a security mess" as "the US military should go stomp around in even more places!"
Iraq's oil production is lower than it was before the US invasion, and much lower than it was before the first war with the US and the following sanctions. It seems pretty obvious at this point that invading another country is a very poor way to increase the rate at which it pumps oil.
You are assuming that the military serves the government in order to serve the people. You are only half right.
indeed, it appears the US military, the world's foremost
consumer of oil, is just occupying oil fields.
They were NOT trying to do anything but secure the
oil fields, possibly for their own military use.
That's how bad this situation is.
The US military plans to be the LAST user of petroleum.
This is an interesting possibility, and I don't disagree, but I offer an alternative perspective in my post below. I don't believe that the military is driving policy, but rather that the profits available from military spending are leading to the hyping of the security dimension of the supply problem. See my post below.
No.
I'm assuming that the goal is to raise oil production.
Recent history shows us that invasion and occupation are unlikely to raise oil production.
Ergo, my conclusion is that a group intending to raise oil production is unlikely to invade an oil-producing nation.
You're supposing entirely rational actors in the US government and military. When a country's facing defeat, rationality ends and rationalisations begin. "Well, we're not really losing, we could still win... and if we do lose, it's not my fault, the generals stuffed it up, the government made us fight with one hand tied behind our back, the people didn't support us, we were stabbed in the back," etc.
"Next time we'll do it right. Really. We'd never make the same mistakes in two wars in a row!"
Better leave that oil in the ground, at least for now. We have no idea how global warming will develop as the Arctic summer sea ice is disappearing fast and maybe gone altogether already in 2013 as predicted here:
Causes of Changes in Arctic Sea Ice; by Wieslaw Maslowski (Naval Postgraduate School)
http://www.ametsoc.org/atmospolicy/documents/May032006_Dr.WieslawMaslows...
If we get some kind of nasty climate change event as a result of the decline of this global airconditioner, we may be forced to go for large scale projects very quickly to reduce CO2 emissions and that will require oil as an energy input for these projects. It would be a drama of the 1st order if these projects got bogged down in diesel shortages.
Matt,
That paper does not coincide with the latest from NASA on why the sea ice is disappearing. The paper you link to says wind cannot be responsible for more than 50% and that ocean warming must be the cause of the rest according to the model.
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2007/10/03/nh-sea-ice-loss-its-the-...
This quietly released NASA report says that GW is not the cause of the ice melt, it is a natural cycle, and ocean currents and salinity are a major player along with wind currents.
If one looks at the posture of the US military one can clearly see that it is developing strategies and tactics specifically designed to protect and gain access to the energy it and the United States consumes so readily.
The other day I read somewhere that the US military is the single biggest consumer of oil on the planet. Using around 350,000 barrels of oil a day. Without this oil the army simply stops moving like fossilized dinosaurs. Clearly the military is making plans to safeguard its access to this vital raw material, anything else is unthinkable and absurd. So the game ahead is, follow the soldiers following the oil.
oregon7, I don't agree with your interpretation. The WSJ is doing far better than the vast majority of major U.S. newspapers. Case in point: their ongoing coverage of the Cantarell decline. Their energ roundup is also peak-oil aware and doesn't shy away from the topic.
I think the authors did attempt to thread the needle between the peak oil positions and the CERA positions. I didn't view this as an attempt to debunk geologic peak oil. Rather, I viewed it as a clever way to introduce the topic into the mainstream media dialog. By leading with the production plateau/ceiling concept, they establish it as the thesis to be disproven instead of EIA's 140 mbd by 2030 as shown in the graph accompanying the article. From this point forward, the onus will be on the no-imminent-peak-or-plateau crowd to show how and why production can be increased until 2030.
Nor do I. I view it as an attempt to frame peak oil as a 2 part problem, 1 part being geophysical the other geopolitical (unrest, lack of access, strife, unwillingness to increase production.) That framing supports a certain relationship of energy consumers to producers and that relationship is a military/imperial one.
There is a third framing which is completely absent. It might present the interests of potential oil producers in delaying development, the interests and rights of potential producers to extract oil at their own pace and when they are ready to do so. Don't expect to hear that framing from the WSJ.
There is a fourth framing which is also absent. It might point out that because military intervention (dealing with all that "strife" on top of "our" oil) makes the U.S. hated around the world, and costs an enormous amount, burdens our children with debt, and so on we should pursue energy conservation, oil energy taxation and alternative energy development Don't expect to hear much of that framing from the WSJ either.
A fifth framing might emphasize the alternative energy investment opportunities created by these problems. You might hear a little of that... but not much.
Instead there are 3 or 4 mentions that half of the problem, the larger half perhaps, is political and security related.... because when you've got a hammer the world looks like a nail... and when you've got the biggest fattest military on the planet, the world's problems look like security problems.
Is it too cynical to say that the value of even discussing this subject at all for the WSJ editors is primarily that it helps make the case for military spending and military intervention? I don't think it is cynical to say it. I think it is a fair and reasonable explanation of the fact pattern.
Yes, they are reporting the facts better than some... but that's because they have an agenda and a policy prescription related to those facts.
In contrast, frankly, I suspect that most of the other MSM don't know yet whether they want to double down on imperialism or not, and thus haven't figured out what agenda the facts about peak oil should be used to advance.
Just my two cents. Reasonable people may differ!
Yes, I think your analysis is correct.
That brand of reporting "both sides must have some equal truth" is clearly based on the irrefutable fact that the Earth is halfway between being flat and being a sphere. ^_^
This line of argument as presented in the WSJ is, of course, precisely how Dick Cheney thinks, ans is the primary reason the American army is in the Middle East, to open up the region and its untapped and vast reserves by using military force.
I entirely agree with your comments.
Hello orgeon,
I would just encourage you to write this up, and expand upon it - especially your sentence:
"The real problem says the WSJ, here and elsewhere, is "restricted access" and a lack of will and various other political/military problems to which the U.S. military and the companies that support it have a ready solution."
Example: To WSJ:
"The position of "new adherents", as you describe it, appears to be one that avoids the hard fact of finite oil resources. Thus,it leaves the impression that our energy crises can be solved by invading countries who have oil. Or, that "resource nationalism" is a one-way street.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Given a finite global supply, access to oil outside the US is only a temporary measure, until that, too, is gone."
Oh well...never mind ( so much for me). I guess what I was thinking is: perhaps you can point out more specifically the problem with reducing "peak oil" to an issue that appears to invite a military solution.
Aniya, Thanks for your support. I blogged a response over on the WSJ energy blog in which I tried to express this more clearly.
http://blogs.wsj.com/energy/2007/11/19/to-peak-or-not-to-peak/
Search for comments by "Miles". Oh, I'll just reprint it here:
I would add to this, because perhaps folks here are used to thinking of oil as the driver of politics, that this analysis argues that it is actually the military industries of the U.S. and their profit interest that I'm arguing leads to the acknowledgement of the peakoil issue as a policy problem worthy of discussing on the front page of the WSJ. I would (in a friendly way) disagree with those that say the US military machine needs the oil... and that's why we'll launch the next war. No, it's more like "the corporate industrial/military/media complex" needs the military spending and profits, and declines in oil production set the stage for wars which lead to spending on military hardware and services. Consistent with Naomi Klein's (http://www.naomiklein.org/main) thesis about disaster capitalism, the shock of high prices and oil price related economic problems makes people willing to look for strong leaders and military solutions. So there is no real interest in solving the supply problem. The supply problem rather is useful because it creates a sellable need for military spending and intervention that the public can be persuaded will help to solve the problem.
Yet of course that geopolitical solution is only marginal... it cannot address what appears to be the underlying geophysical problem.
I also found it interesting how few people responded to my comment. Not that I have any right to people's attention here. Everybody has his or her own interests, and perhaps some people prefer that "politics" not be discussed on The Oil Drum. But the politics of how we will respond as an empire to the realities of oil production declines are spot on target in my view. The WSJ has fixed on a military solution to the problem (and/or is parroting people who have fixed on that) and that is WHY they are able to report the issue. If fits an agenda. I don't think the larger mainstream media knows what its agenda is yet around peak oil which is why it can't decide how to report the issue or to report it very deeply at all.
Hi Miles,
Thanks, also, for the acknowledgment.
This is a crucial point, one that also applies to the history of the nuclear arms race, (and no doubt to much else):
re: "it is actually the military industries of the U.S. and their profit interest..."
The point being "What drives what?"
re: "it's more like "the corporate industrial/military/media complex" needs the military spending and profits,..."
Yes, this is a cycle that appears difficult for the participants to break out of:
1) The scientists design - and perceive themselves to have no responsibility
2) Manufacturers manufacture - and perceive themselves to have no responsibility
3) Manufacturers (and designers - in separate compartments) - lobby the political entities - copy above WRT responsibility.
4) People w. political power respond to both those acting in step 3 and those who might have other agendas (different political agendas, say) - copy above WRT responsibilty.
5) Taxpayers pay taxes - law-abiding citizens that they are - Same as above WRT responsibilty.
6) etc. - i.e., same goes for other segments of the population, in their various roles, and with their varying degrees of the following: education, opportunities for taking action, and/or thinking about what it means to exercise responsibility.
re: "...the US military machine needs the oil... and that's why we'll launch the next war."
So, could you talk about this in terms of something like "proximate cause" and "underlying cause" or chain of causes?
I'd also like to add something, and perhaps I can think about this further (I just wanted to respond while I have the time before this is too old a thread)...
One thing: My experience tells me that people acting in any capacity in this kind of compartmentalized system, (or what we might call "specialization"), rarely - if ever - perceive themselves to be in any position that implies a personal responsibility, with the possible exception of what is in their immediate purview. Each sees him/herself as "having to" act because of his/her position.
Sometimes because it's too hard to think about - one's livelihood may be on the line.
Which is all to say...I'd like to see yet another version. (My 2 cents, and I'll even give it a try) - to include a less judgmental view of the persons (separate from their actions) and with many more questions, perhaps some of them directed toward the reporters directly.
It could be that the implied military agenda is not one they subscribed to by actively thinking about it - perhaps it is/was just the easiest one to pick up.
Because the real problem is harder to come to grips with emotionally, (as well as perhaps "intellectually").
re: "I think that’s the real reason the WSJ has come round to peak oil."
As an aside: I'm not so sure they have, really. To me, "peak oil" is comprised of pieces, and putting them into a whole can be difficult, in different ways, depending, in part, on one's position in the above description, for eg.
Just responding to part of what you say here...
I am comfortable asserting that at the editorial or business level of the Journal there are people who make conscious decisions about how to present the news.
Their bias is toward a strong imperial United States. That bias is consistent with their belief in capitalism and their personal and philosophical connections with American corporations. In that context they probably cannot help but see the commercial potential in a lack of security and so it is natural and unsurprising that they should emphasize certain facts which suggest a business opportunity for military industries in their reporting about peak oil.
I agree that most people are just focussed on their small part of the system... but at the upper echelons of the WSJ, and of corporations and government, there are people who are thinking things through and making decisions about how they believe the world ought to solve various problems. I don't think you can relieve the editors of the WSJ of the moral responsibility for the implications of their choice about how to report peak oil. They may believe it, but at a certain point they are making a choice about the world they want to live in and how they want to define and solve the problems they see.
So, I agree, they haven't come around to peak oil as a moment of change in the history of the planet in which we reverse our direction as a civilization. They have come around to it as a potential business opportunity for military industries. And why not? The Cheney Energy Task Force history has already established that an analysis of energy futures can lead to enormous amounts of profitable military expenditures.
Thanks for your reply!
Miles
My impression of the WSJ article:
It was very carefully worded to dance around the facts. Like some timid underling trying to tell his boss some really bad news.
The mainstream can't handle the full on peak oil message, which at its core is one of limits to growth, and major change, while they juggle mortgage crisis, global warming, and the onset of college bowl season.
This is how it starts. A watered down, but reasonably respectful article on front page of WSJ. More will follow, I assure you.
You mean like long lines at the painfully priced pumps?
You mean like blaming big bad oil for the fact that our planet is finite and not created in six days for the benefit of a broodish breed of irrational baboons who prefer to go by the appellation of homo sapiens?
Yes. More will follow. Very funny. Not so funny.
_____________________
We're not what we think we are.
Copy of my e-mail to the authors, in which I invited them to join the debate, follows. Russell Gold replied to my e-mail this morning, thanking me for the information about Yergin. As I noted below, if they show up, let's try to play nice.
If I were the authors, I would be here all night reading this site. Where else would they get such objective discussion of their piece?
So I say to them: Welcome and make yourself at home. Pick a nice pseudonym (if you dont have one already) and participate!
Francois
This thread may not be very useful to the WSJ reporters though.
They gave their readership a "peek under the kimono" of Peak Oil Theory and analysis. And we can discuss their daring/timidity here, but the two most recent articles of The Oil Drum (just underneath) have substantially more "meat".
Article #2 should discuss the rate of decline in available oil IMHO.
Lengthy debate here has come to a rough consensus that the rate of decline post-Peak Oil is substantially more important than "when" (2005 to 2012 seem to be the bounds for that among responsible analysts IMHO).
Article #3 should be on mitigation strategies. I would recommend my own retrospective on the Year 2034 as a good starting point.
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/3140#comments
Best Hopes for Step by Step Analysis & Disclosure,
Alan
PS: Another story is the VERY high caliber of people attracted to the Peak Oil issue, and the tremendous pro bono publico effort they/we put out.
Yes...I was wondering how many folks after reading their article today...no matter what they believe about it...went to Google and typed in those two little words that will change their lives forever.
Why bother with two words?
Google results for "oil." First hit is Wikipedia, second is LATOC, third is PO.com.
TOD gets a respectable showing, after CNN and howstuffworks and the like. I find it pretty astonishing that everyone who wants to know a bit more about that black stuff is hit right off the bat with Savinar's monstrous wallop of bleak outcomes.
Heh, the day I first saw end of suburbia I came home distraught, googled peak oil. I'd thought to myself "those people are awfully pessimistic." I ended up at Matt's site and realized, "those were the optimists."
:)
Hey! No peeking under the kimono!
This is a family-oriented kinda' site! The kids are in the room!
End of attempt at levity. :)
Our kiddos need this kind of analysis and discussion so very much! It would kindle a fire in so many who feel adrift in a world that manipulates them into mindless, passionless consumerism as a substitute for real true-life challenges and real decisions.
Jeffrey Brown:
Amen, Brother Brown!
In terms of communicating the peak oil message, courtesy is much more effective than being "mad as hell and not going to take it anymore."
There will always be disagreements, and it's much better to be able to turn opponents into friends. I've had this happen to me time and time again with peak oil. If you listen to people and act with respect, 90% of the time they will respond in kind.
A couple of years from now, we will forget the intellectual reasons why we disagreed with someone, but we will remember clearly if they acted like a jerk towards us.
Besides, I have to say that the WSJ article was good journalism - given the worldview that the reporters were coming from.
Bart
Energy Bulletin
Dante e-mailed them and asked what they meant by "debased." He got this reply:
It may be pointless to pursue this, but it is really irking me. Does anyone know about this 1991 book, or this 1995 peak call? I couldn't find any such book on Amazon, wikipedia could provide no citation, yet PO theory has become 'debased' by this in the eyes of MSM. I'm just not aware of there being a conspicuous record of failure by prominent peak-oil theorists or any fundamental flaw exposed in PO premises, methodologies, or conclusions..."debased"...Rrrrrrrgh
Those dates surprise me - although there may be an element of crude vs c+c or something going on there...
at oilcrisis are Campbell predictions for peak made most years 1989 thru 1999.
According to those, in both 1990 and 1992 he was predicting 1998, with th caveat: "It has been stressed that all numbers, which are quoted as computed, are to be generously rounded. No one should imagine that this is an exact science.
(ahhh oilcrisis.org - the first PO site I stumbled upon, no idea how or why....)
--
Jaymax (cornucomer-doomopian)