I second that. Unfortunately, we only get free data for 3 months of estimates, from the IEA. From the data so far, we have:

October: 86.51 (the last revision that was available for free)
November: 86.08 (second revision)
December: 86.45 (first revision)
January: 87.2 (initial estimate)

This is not reflected in Rembrandt's graph.

Also, the first paragraph under the initial graph is wrong. The IEA figure of 87.2 is for January, not December, and that was an increase on December, not October.

Furthermore, in that first paragraph, Rembrandt says, "For the third consecutive month world production has increased significantly." Again, this is wrong, given the revised figures. Production actually decreased in November, and rose only 375,000 bpd in December, which I suppose could be thought of as significant. What is true is that the IEA initially reported significant increases for the last four OMRs, but this was only possible because of significant downward revisions for the previous month.

Edit:

Spotted more potential errors in the article. It says that the IEA reported production of 87.20. This implies a precision of two decimal points. If the article's figures are based only on the OMR summary, the precision there is only 1 decimal point, for the latest production. For example, in the January OMR, they reported 87.0 mbpd, but the full report had 86.95. That may be a small reduction but it would be good to publish accurate quotes, rather than slightly misleading ones, since there is no reason not to.

In the figures given for yearly production for 2005, 2006 and 2007, those numbers seem to be at odds with the figures that were published in the January OMR, with the figures being higher than Rembrandt gives here. The January OMR gives figures of 84.6, 85.4 and 85.5 for 2005, 2006 and 2007 (though the last figure may have been revised down in the latest OMR; we'll have to wait and see). Rembrandt has these figures as 84.10, 85.00 and 85.26, respectively. Is he somehow removing some liquid category (e.g. ethanol)? If so, why not remove it from the monthly figures?

I bet I can guess what will happen to prices.

Next two factors need to be taken into account. For OPEC/KSA we need to see production increases for up to 6 months to ensure its not coming from spare storage or over production that cannot last. Spare capacity is defined as only lasting for 90 days.

http://globalpublicmedia.com/transcripts/2647

CS: Yes, certainly. There is a definition of spare capacity which is used by the IEA, which is that capacity which can be turned on within 30 days, and which can be sustained for 90 days. In other words, turned on within the month, and you can sustain that for at least 3 months. It sounds very precise, but of course it isn’t nearly that accurate, so when we’re looking at spare capacity what we’re trying to establish is the amount that can be turned on relatively quickly and can be sustained for a useful length of time.

I could dig out the exact one but this link is pretty good.

Next we have error bars on the actual numbers. In many cases these numbers are taken effectively on faith from producing nations no controls exist to ensure that the reported numbers are backed by real oil production. Tanker tracking is about the only way to get at least a reasonable check on the numbers.

Overall and this has been discussed before or measure of global production has error bars of about +/- 1-2mpd. So until we see oil production move either up or down by about this we can say for certain that we have left the platuae region either up or down. How ever until we see a real movement we can watch the price signal and adjust it for growth. So far it looks like the price is increasing in line with effectively flat production and growing potential demand.

We can look for anomalous price signals which should precede the real data on oil production so if we suddenly spike to say 120-130 then see a drop we can be pretty sure oil is headed down. The current strong pricing signal even as the US economy weakens makes be skeptical of the currently reported numbers.
I think we will see downward revisions. However as I said until we see a obvious move either in price or real changes in reported production or both we are effectively at plateau.

And thus its not obvious whats going on and probably won't be until end of 2008-2009. But once we are down 2mpd from peak production the changes of attaining a second higher peak or effectively zero. Thats when its obvious.

Yet no new record was established for crude production. And just as interestingly, despite record prices, despite a near trebling since $38 per barrel April 2005 prices, production remains flat. And that compares to prices doubling from 2002 to April 2005 yet production increasing by roughly 7 mbpd during that prior doubling in price.

There's evidence there but that's a camel's nose in the tent that some people refuse to acknowledge.

Apparently the rise in all liquid fuels production has not kept pace with increasing demand, for the price to still be rising. Chindia is firing on high, that is unless we get a protracted recession.

Interesting to note though that crude production is still flatlining. Are we at peak/plateau or is there just a lag between high prices and the response from oil companies to extract more?

The answer to that question would be of high importance to me.

why the significant discrepancy between IEA and EIA numbers?

Nobody's really sure.

For the last five months of data (Jul-Nov), the IEA has averaged 740kb/d higher. Of that, 75% (550kb/d) has been the IEA's higher values for OPEC production.

Oddly, though, the IEA figure for OPEC crude production is substantially lower than the EIA's - 1,080kb/d lower over those five months. The difference is due to the respective NGL values, which average 4,860kb/d for IEA and just 3,100kb/d for EIA.

OPEC's own production figures for the latest data point - November - are 31.45Mb/d for crude (last page), which is substantially closer to the IEA's 31.13Mb/d than to the EIA's 32.17Mb/d, and 4.61Mb/d NGLs (p.32), which again is much closer to the IEA's 4.89Mb/d than the EIA's 3.1Mb/d. OPEC's total for their liquids production - 36.06Mb/d - is almost identical to IEA's 36.02Mb/d, and substantially different from EIA's 35.35Mb/d.

It's not clear what the reason for the difference is, although differing definitions of what counts as crude vs. NGL is likely a factor, conversion ratios between tons and barrels could be another, and different data sources and estimation methods are likely to be a third. It does seem like the IEA's figures are at the moment much closer to OPEC's, though, and, since OPEC accounts for the large majority of the difference right now, it's possible that at the moment the IEA numbers should be preferred. Overall trends ought to be generally the same in each, though.

yes, thank you for asking that, I was about to ask the same thing...

My favorite is BOE. Barrel of Oil Equivalent.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barrel_of_oil_equivalent

Cow farts work for this one.

Re-cycled cooking oil is next

Seismobob,

This is where the concept of EROI becomes very important. For example the current 87mbpd output includes abt 1.5mbpd of biofuel (ethanol and biodiesel)and abt 1 mbpd of oilsands production. Be generous and give biofuels an EROI of 2, the net benefit of these is then only 750kbpd. With oilsands the scenario is even worse, some would suggest that the EROI is about 1, if so then all the tarsands production is "used" by the tarsands operation itself. Even if we generously use an EROI of 2 again we loose another 500kbpd of total liquids production.

Net effect just looking at these two items alone is we have lost 1.25mbpd of total liquids production. This doesnt even begin to take into account the declining eroi of all our major energy supplies and the assorted other damages incurred in the the production of the tarsands and biofuels.

My gut feeling would be we are well past peak energy, the next step will be continuous simplification of all human systems.

To give KSA some credit they have had spare capacity in heavy sour crudes for some time. They claim 2mbpd. Recently they have lowered the price of these crudes and its documented that they are shipping more of the stuff. This is crude they could not even sell till now. So it might not be all tanker farms.
In either case it seems the new production is a mix of tanker farms and previously unsaleable crude. Neither bodes well for future KSA production.

http://www.nytimes.com/cfr/world/slot1_20071210.html?pagewanted=2

There was a discussion on TOD about 2 years ago about how much storage SA has. From memory, the estimate was about 100m barrels. This figure included storage in places outside SA such as the Caribbean.

With that kind of buffer SA can vary their production figures for quite a while. Your post refers to 'output'. It depends how you/they define production - at the well head or released to market or exported from SA into storage elsewhere.

Numbers can be revised for years afterwards, I understand. However, the revisions seem to be rare after a few months. The EIA revisions are visible for ever. The IEA revisions are only visible (without payment) for 3 months.

If you look at crude oil discovery data the situation is exactly the reverse. We have better data on estimated crude oil discovery volumes, which is continually backdated to account for reserve growth. On the other hand, the discovery data for total liquids does not really exist except for a chart by Shell Oil describing "Barrel of Oils Equivalent" discoveries (see upthread).

I agree that categorizing the data would help immensely in understanding what is happening.