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DrumBeat: March 19, 2008
Posted by threadbot on March 19, 2008 - 9:15am
Topic: Miscellaneous
Peak oil theorist goes mainstream in Cape Town
It takes a confident person to stand up in front of a hall packed with oil investors to talk peak oil theory. But it’s an indication of the extent to which peak oil has captured the public imagination that a proponent of the theory was invited to present his views to the Oil Africa conference in Cape Town.
EasyJet shares slump as oil surges
Low-cost carrier easyJet has become the latest victim of the turbulence in financial markets after warning that soaring oil prices will hit profits.
UAE oil pumping at full tilt of 2.5mbpd
Opec member the United Arab Emirates is pumping at full tilt at around 2.5 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude and is powerless to bring down record oil prices, the head of the state oil company said.
UAE plans mega projects to lift oil capacity
UAE is pushing ahead with mega projects to lift its oil capacity above five million barrels per day within six years and maintain its position as one of the world's top crude suppliers, an official report said on Tuesday.
(thanks SamuM for the above links)
Mexico Pemex CEO: Proven Hydrocarbon Reserves Fall 5.1% to 14.7B BOE
DOS BOCAS, Mexico (Dow Jones)--The chief executive of Mexican state oil monopoly Petroleos Mexicanos, Jesus Reyes Heroles, said Tuesday Mexico's proven hydrocarbon reserves fell 5.1% last year to 14.7 billion barrels of crude oil equivalent. Speaking at an event to mark the 70th anniversary of the expropriation of the Mexican oil industry, Reyes Heroles said Pemex replaced proven reserves at a rate of 50% last year, compared with 41% in 2006, but that it was still short of its goal of reaching 100% replacement.
Mexico's proven reserves as of Jan. 1, 2008 were equivalent to 9.2 years of crude production, and 8.2 years of natural gas production, Reyes Heroles said. Pemex produced an average of 3.1 million barrels a day of crude oil last year, and 6.058 billion cubic feet a day of natural gas.
An Early Thaw: Venezuela Beats Freeze in Court, No Appeal to Come
We have defeated Exxon," said Venezuela's Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez in a Tuesday television address after a U.K. court reversed the decision and lifted a $12 billion freeze on assets in the South American country.
"The injunction granted against the defendant, Petroleos de Venezuela, should be discharged," said Justice Paul Walker of the Royal Courts of Justice, lifting the freeze.
ExxonMobil moved to have the assets frozen in an international court in January when Venezuela chose to exercise its sovereignty and nationalize the oil and gas assets within its borders.
The court's decision is a "100% victory," said Ramirez.
Alan Jeffers, a spokesperson for ExxonMobil, told reporters Tuesday that Exxon has no plans for an appeal following the U.K. judge's ruling. Jeffers added that while Justice Walker's decision came down to jurisdiction, he did not question Exxon's "underlying claim," according to Dow Jones.
(thanks Will Stewart for the above links)
Shell will dig deeper for oil in tar sands
Anglo-Dutch giant Royal Dutch Shell said it plans to quintuple tar sands production. The company announced it will significantly increase its oil production in the controversial Canadian tar sands in an attempt to stop falling production, the Independent reported.
Refusal to drill impacts gas prices
With a unanimous vote the Santa Fe County Commission, with the governor's full support, laid down a moratorium of at least one year on the granting of any drilling permits in the Galisteo Basin. The 100 people in attendance stood and cheered the Commission's decision. It was another victory for "NIMBY" (Not In My Back Yard) and energy obstruction groups who pretend to be solely concerned about environmental protection. The loser in this "victory" was you, the New Mexico taxpayer and America at large.
Kansan Stokes Energy Squabble With Coal Ruling
Rod Bremby doesn't have the star power of Al Gore or Arnold Schwarzenegger, but his decision to block a permit for two big coal-fired power plants in Kansas has put him at center stage in the national debate over energy and the environment.
(thanks JoulesBurn for the above links)
We have had a cold snow winter here in the Great White North.
So What?
Arctic ice link below.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7303385.stm
I'm curious to see what our, campus, weather station summary says in a few days.
I found the winter - WIMPY. Skiing in the heart of winter wasn't as bad as the past 2 years - but not what I've come to expect for most of the past 40 years.
We had a late blast of snow - unusual but going fast with the rain today. I'm usually on my summer bike right now - but it'll be another week.
My judge of winter is how much the furnace runs. We never really hit any cold weather. It only dropped to about -20C; far from the -30C that I consider to be "cold". When the furnace is on 50% of the time and when it's coming on at night to keep the house at 14C then I consider it cold. We didn't hit either of those conditions this winter.
I see natural gas prices are going up.
A friend is moving from a gas furnace to geothermal. $28k to drill a handful of wells (ultrasonic) in the driveway or $21k to trench the yard into a mess. Sure there are $7k in government incentives; and I'm not sure how they expect an 8 year payback on an outlay of about $14k. Ok they're assuming that they'd otherwise have to spend about $5k replacing the furance/AC - so that's $9k to pay back. But saving almost $1k/yr is unimaginable. Heating my home is $350/yr in gas (and about $35 in electricity for the #@$#@$ energy gobbling furnace with A/C motors) and this friends home is 3x larger; but still ..... It'll be interesting to see what happens to their electricity bill. At my home the connection fee for natural gas is something like 30% of our total bill right now.
Don't know where you live, but here in the US Midwest it's been a long, cold winter. My last monthly gas bill was north of $300 for my 2500 square foot house.
It was a hard winter for heating oil users in the northeast too. Next winter could see a full-blown crisis where gas and oil are used for home heating.
Your heating costs are extremely cheap. Here in Texas, during the winter, I spend $300-$400 a month for natural gas to heat my home at
70 deg. F. Granted I have an old home but this is similar to what others pay in the area. In the summer, the electric bill can get up to
$600 for air conditioning.(78 deg. F. on the thermostat).
We pay 16.9 cents per kilowatt.
Here in Texas, during the winter, I spend $300-$400 a month for natural gas to heat my home at 70 deg.
70 huh? 45 degrees. All winter long.
(Why? Don't like sending money to the energy company)
Go read some historic documents about room temp. 70 would have been considered warm.
We spend about $2,500/yr on heating oil. I can ceratinly see how a $14,000 investment would pay itself back in 8 years. It would probably be even faster than that with oil as expensive as it is. I think the last oil bill we got was listed at $4.00/gallon. At 150+ gallons per delivery, that's over $600. We get 5-6 deliveries a year.
We've had a remarkably warm winter. Maximum NG bill has been $89 (heat and hot water). Electricity has been up to $95/month. I installed a new timer thermostat last year and have seen the energy usage drop (therms, less so on kWh). Overnight temp 65°F, daytime allowed to float down to 62°F on the days when I'm not home. Otherwise, occupied 67-68°F.
That combined with less hysteresis in the thermostat (old mercury bi-metal coil versus thermistor) has helped cutdown both the temperature swings when the furnace is running and the amount used in the off hours
My wife and I just put in a ground-sourced heat pump in our Michingan home. You are right in that the payoff is on the order of 20 or so years, which is true for us since we do not get a subsidy.
However, we put the unit in for two reasons. First I work on environmental issues and it is the most responsible thing to do. Second, I expect that energy prices will double and then triple within the next 5 to 10 years. Thus, the payoff time will decrease to well under 10 years if energy prices increase we expect.
Our unit has 4 wells 150 feet deep each (a four ton unit) and it cost us $23,000 total. Our heating bills decreased from a high of $225/month (with an old 65% efficient natural gas furnace) in mid-winter to $75/month today with this new system. I don't know what the savings would be for air conditioning since we did not have an air conditioner before.
Retsel
Well here in Oz we have had another summer that is the hottest on record according to the met bureau. It doesn't feel like it here near Sydney, it has been a cool wet summer. Thankfully the rain has brought the dams up to 2/3 full (up from 30%).
I read the BBC article on arctic ice. Astonishing. I would have thought that it would have substantially recovered this "cold" winter.
Jografy, Interesting link. I remember reading an article several decades ago (circa 1974-78) regarding observations by US submarines in the arctic. They used sonar to measure ice thickness so they would know if the ice was thin enough for the sub to break through. Their information indicated that Artic ice in the 40's-50's was mostly around 20 feet thick, but in the late 70's it was closer to 9 feet thick. I wondered at the time what the long term prognosis would be with that much thinning. I guess now we know.
First supersonic swingwing synthi-fuel flight tomorrow
Global capitalism teeters on the brink
All my previous reading of Homer Dixon has always shown some guarded optimism. I don't see any silver lining in this article.
It's difficult to be optimistic, even guardedly so, when the lights go out and we're left gropping around in the dark.
Re: The Soviet Union, 1980-1990.
That line is a reiteration of what JM Keynes said in the 1930's. He likened it to pushing on a piece of string. That's why he thought fiscal policy should take up the slack.
Why DC Metro Extension to Tyson's Corner and Dulles was killed
Several weeks ago I was upset at the abrupt cancellation of a project that took a decade to put together and will save 20,000 to 25,000 barrels/day once built out. Physical construction would have started last week, helping stimulate our economy. The Washington Post helps explain why.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/16/AR200803...
And the WaPo gives insight into where the Bush Administration finds expertise to deal with this nation's issues, such as our "addiction to oil".
Best Hopes for Leanan accepting the long quotes this time, the Washington Post article is 5 pages long,
Alan
"Friend of a friend of a friend...." Life goes on and we who have half a brain wonder where their brains are. Oh well, if you really like that kind of friend of a friend kind of stuff, Randy over at Economicrot.blogspot.com has food for thought on powers that be and "manipulation." Not too bad of a read for a Wednesday morning. John
Alan:
Sad story. This is why I think it is a mistake to place the operation of toll goods (which is what all public tranport systems inherently are) in the hands of EITHER the government or corporations. The corporations will just cream off the most profitable part of the business and leave the public to suffer. As for the government, your article illustrates exactly what ends up happening all too often - wrong decisions end up being made by incompetent and corrupt public officials.
What is the alternative? Public ownership need not mean the same thing as government ownership. Imagine a public authority, run by trustees that are elected directly by the people who live within its service district. Because they are ultimately answerable directly to the people, the incentives are there to run the system in a manner that will best serve THE PEOPLE. Those trustees that try to cater to their corporate pals could quickly see themselves booted out of office. Governments wouldn't be able to use these systems as milk cows or patronage tools. The problem of striking the right balance between low fees on the one hand and higher quality service on the other hand solves itself through the combined feedback mechanisms of ridership and elections.
What I describe is neither capitalism nor socialism, but something else which doesn't really even have a name yet. "Cooperativism", maybe? It hasn't really been tried anywhere. We've got to figure out some way of bringing this idea from the wilderness into the mainstream, though, and quickly. Otherwise, I am afraid that your sad story will continue to be the rule to how things are done, and that does not bode well for your EOT vision.
I tend to agree.
Many municipal transit agencies have their own taxing authority (usually sales taxes) and board members appointed by local mayors, etc.
Direct election of a majority (if not all) of the members would be a good thing.
Ed Tennyson has stated that an ideal board would have at least one seat restricted to Professional Engineers, another to CPAs, etc. with 6 year terms that rotate (1/3rd up every 2 years)
There is no doubt that governance can be improved !
Alan
There is no doubt that governance can be improved !
*clap* *clap* *clap*
George Carlin on Voting (YouTube)
You may substitute "American" for your country of choice, and it still largely applies.
The optimist believes this is the best of all possible worlds. The pessimist fears this may be true.
Is that not analogous to the (in theory) local school boards?
While I'd prefer the ascent (or more accurately, the return) of private rail, your approach may be workable too.
Currently, my region's transit system is run by a board that is made up of government officials from other elected offices... and it suffers IMO because of it. The layering and interconnectedness of it all appears to drive the system into making choices that are palatable to the political machine but doesn't always meet the real needs.
Case in point, I was speaking with a bus driver the other day - the drivers are contract drivers, the regional transit system contracts to a local company for bodies - who informed me that when some of the drivers wished to pass on suggestions for making changes in the system at a regular board meeting, they were told explicitly that the board didn't want to hear input from the drivers. Who else to give reasoned input on how to improve a system than those who operate it every day?
( Note that I was speaking with this driver as he was baby-sitting an empty bus, which was waiting (and causing all the wanting to board riders to be late) for its scheduled shift replacement driver to show up for work, who hadn't shown. )
If government bureaucracy is a millstone, then interlocking government bureaucracies are certainly the death of any innovation.
It does have a name - several. It could be a corporation chartered in the public interest - as the Blues were before they got privatized. Many towns are corporations. It could be a "community investment trust" or a muni. It depends on what is in the charter and the rules by which it has to play. The vanilla corporate charter is designed to suck out of the community; that is the engine of our own destruction. The charter for something like this has to be written to serve the community interest. Ownership has to stay local. Operations bounded. That sort of thing.
cfm in Gray, ME
Amen. Every time I see some down-on-its-luck community go to the mat over a proposed big box store, I want to say to these people, "Look you guys, if Maxi-Mart weren't expecting to get more out of this community than they plan to put into it, they wouldn't be knocking on the door."
Something of an over-simplification, yes, but not much of one.
Same way I feel about insurance companies. They've done all the research. On average, the insurance company is going to get more out of you than you will out of them. Add on to this that most of us don't want the event to happen that would cause the insurance company to pay out (e.g., an auto accident, house fire). So when you buy insurance you are essentially placing a bet that you don't want to win.
So when you buy insurance you are essentially placing a bet that you don't want to win.
Or the law requires it.
Indeed. Another superb argument for the "free market" - entire industries legislated into existence.
Rest assured that it will be labeled "socialism" or "communism" if it threatens the profits of a corporate special interest. Even publicly owned water companies are "communist" according to the Fox News set.
Reminds me of the work in community land trusts to protect ag land in the face of development pressure by having a non-governmental public interest board oversee long-term leases to farmers who can only live on the land as active farmers using certain methods and providing food to local communities. In the CSA model, the board is elected by the farm members who also eat the food.
I like your idea.
Where is an engineer and developer like William Wilgus today? Radical vision without public funding or disruption to daily commuter service.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/grandcentral/program/
Manhattan Bans Steam Locomotives (12:24)
We need a new directive: America bans Internal Combustion Engines ... probably not gonna happen, though. Thanks for the link, cool story.
Alan, I worked on the Metro Rail system for seven years for a signals company. You now have an inkling of how convoluted the politics surrounding the building of the system is and has been...I know from first hand experience that it is a chaotic situation.
One of my responsibilites was to write reports for and attend the Council of Governments meetings to answer technical questions regarding signals/atc, track and way, comm., and power. No one on the council had a clue. Waste was rampant, major equipment was never installed but was signed for, large numbers of people were hired to work on the system and maintain it for political reasons...many were totally unqualified. As just one example when a S Korean leader was assinated, metro suddenly had an influx of S Korean workers that new nothing of hs rail and could not speak English. Anyone that was remotely qualified was promoted far beyond their abilities and little or no qualified support staff was provided for the newly promoted 'managers'. Most of the top managers hired by metro that I delt with were ex military and not from hs rail or railroad backgrounds...many of these 'managers' had postings at the Pentagon prior to military retirement, and, literally, did not know how to run a railroad.
In summation I will say that the metro system is a typical example of what passes for governance in and around DC at many levels.
Don't say that I didn't warn you, for I did some months ago.
One of my assumptions is that Americans will learn to operate with the speed and efficiency of French bureaucrats post-Peak Oil (or at least 80%). Many competent managers give public transit a wide berth today, unfortunately. With "economic contraction" that could well change.
The new WMATA (DC Metro) GM is getting "good marks" so far.
Best Hopes for semi-competent Management,
Alan
So many issues in the US seem to have this common theme, where private profit outweighs the common good; healthcare, daycare, building trains, etc. Maybe this is what Hillary Clinton meant when she tearfully uttered "I see us slipping"....
When the private equty co. sells investors pieces of the road to generate future returns, they will come up against peak oil: the number of toll-paying drivers will surely be slowly declining. These investments will lose money. More bad debt!! Not to mention that maintenance probably won't be a priority anymore, safety simply will be cast aside in favor of profits. So short-sighted. Sigh.
I understand Leanan is out for a week of spring training. Other TOD personnel have agreed to cover some days, but this is a day that didn't get covered. Maybe readers can help by posting stories of interest.
Gordon Brown has announced a National Security Strategy for the UK. Despite mentioning global warming and placing it on a par with terrorism, it misses entirely the area of energy security and the implications of reduced access to oil, gas, etc.
http://www.number-10.gov.uk/output/Page15102.asp
Talk about elephant in the room...
God, can that man talk.
I suppose it comes under 'competition for natural resources' - about two thirds of the way down this dense text.
Lull your listeners to sleep and maybe they won't notice how dull you really are.
Note this line: "Climate change and competition for natural resources"
Blink and you miss it.