Saudi Arabia - opening the tap?
Posted by Heading Out on June 20, 2008 - 10:00am
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: aramco, horizontal wells, saudi arabia [list all tags]
One wonders, sometimes, why folk would want to get into political office these days, given the pervasive problems starting to arise from the end of cheap and easy to produce oil and natural gas. The rising costs of providing fuel for everything from school buses to emergency responders eats away at one end of a budget. The demands for wage increases to help employees cope with rising fuel and food prices nibbles away both at another part of the budget, but also at public and labor relations. And then there is the cost to repair and maintain the existing infrastructure, let alone make provision for future alternate choices for power and transportation. Sectors of the population, such as truckers, are becoming less shy in complaining about their problems, as unemployment bites into their numbers.
Fortunately there are legislators and candidates for office that do understand both the problems and the complexity in finding answers where options are not immediately responsive or popular. For the rest it often becomes easier to try and unify a constituency by invoking an enemy –someone who can, by their actions, be blamed for constituents’ problems. Sadly the world’s history has been filled with stories of such scapegoats, as an easy way of switching attention. Today it is possible that as oil prices rise, both OPEC and Saudi Arabia may become the villain in articles and political slogans. Given the possible outcomes of such positioning, it is perhaps not surprising that, as another American election swings into the beginning of the end game, that oil suppliers, perhaps sensing this, are indicating the chance of a greater flexibility in supply.
Categorizing the response of Saudi Arabia and OPEC to market pressures is not an easy undertaking, and has been the subject of considerable debate here and elsewhere. To begin there are the different grades of crude that are available. And while the initial impression of the latest Saudi offer is that this will be sweet, light crude (i.e. easy to refine) that has been the historic quality Saudi product, this is not necessarily the case. Bear in mind that the Kingdom also produces a heavier crude, that is frequently sour (i.e. having a high sulfur content) and this has not been easy to market .
Asian refiners want increased supplies of the lighter grades of crude to produce more expensive cleaner-burning fuels while Saudi Arabia is offering more of the heavy, high-sulphur grades. . . . . Saudi Aramco is understood to have only more of the heavier grades at its disposal.Iran’s state-owned National Iranian Oil Co has been unable to offload about 25mn barrels of crude stored in tankers in the Arabian Gulf, mostly of heavy sour Soroosh and Norooz, despite steep OSP cuts.
The question therefore that needs to be resolved is as to whether the Saudi’s are going to make more of the lighter oil available (which is suggested by the reference to the new production from Khursaniyah which is Arabian light.)
The problem is compounded by reducing levels of production from existing fields, which, in large measure, have been also the lighter crudes, and which decline must be made up either by increased production from within those fields, or by adding new production from fields such as Khursaniyah, if the overall mix that is offered for sale is not to start to swing heavily towards the heavier and sourer crudes that are less popular in the marketplace.
We have been fortunate here at TOD to have had quite detailed analyses from folks such as Euan Mearns , Stuart Staniford , Khebab, Ace and JoulesBurn , to name but a few. Much of the recent discussion has been focused on the state of Saudi reserves, rather than the amount that can be produced at one time (the size of the tap). Yet it is in the short term size of that tap that allows the potential increase in Saudi production, and a possible consequent drop in the price of oil (Not that such a drop is a certainty).
Back when Matt Simmons debated Mahmoud Baqi and Nansen Saleri of Aramco at CSIS in 2004, one of the solutions that Aramco put forward was the increasing use that they were making of horizontal wells, particularly in new fields, and also of the introduction of the Maximum Reservoir Contact (MRC) wells where the initial horizontal well is supplemented by secondary laterals that are offshoots from the main initial drive. Further, with the introduction of down-hole valves that allowed segments of the well to be closed down, while segments on either side continued to produce, as a way of overcoming localized water breakthrough, smart wells were developed that would allow production to continue from wells that historically would have closed. In 2004, however, this was a technique that was being widely used in new fields, but not yet used exclusively in older ones. The difference is fairly significant, since a horizontal well can produce thousands of barrels a day, over the hundreds that can come from a vertical well in the same place. (The reason is that the length of the well in the productive rock that holds the oil controls how much oil can flow into a well at a given time, and the horizontal wells can run kilometers through oil-bearing rock, while vertical wells rarely run even a hundred meters.)
The consequence of change from one to the other is therefore the equivalent of opening a larger tap into the field, and one of the issues that we have debated at this site has been the limitation on tap size that goes along with the other debate we have on the absolute size of the resources. Leaving aside that latter debate at the moment, I would suggest that, in the short term the increasing use of horizontal and MRC wells in the older fields will give some little leeway to Aramco to potentially reduce the drop in production by changing to the MRC wells (Saleri quoted a gain from 3,000 bd to 10,000 bd with the change from horizontal to Maximum Reservoir Contact, since in the latter case the use of a number of side horizontals or laterals running out from the main horizontal well, can increase the exposure of the well to the rock to more than 12 kilometers).
The first horizontal wells were drilled in 1991 in the KSA, and. by 1993 there had been a total of 21 completed. It was then anticipated that horizontal drilling would take half the Aramco drilling budget for the next ten years. (But it should also be noted, as was commented in the post on shales, that such wells can cost ten times the price of a conventional vertical well – and Aramco were not drilling that many new wells a year (only around a couple of hundred – almost sounds like a puzzle from Car Talk!)
When the debate over Saudi production began, probably with the CSIS presentations, there may have been a tendency to over estimate the relative number of these wells. Horizontal wells installed in new field developments, such as Shaybah, Harradh III and Kursiniyah and integrated into sophisticated water flooding programs, were needed to obtain the high individual well production numbers that the program called for in these new areas. At the same time these wells minimized the problems of water cut in the oil produced. There was, however, perhaps too much of an assumption that this also applied to the existing production from existing fields and that they too had switched to the same technology. This is not likely to have been true however. As demand rose, and existing well production declined, Saudi Arabia realized that it could no longer get by with the 30 – 40 rigs that it had, historically, been using. It was willing to competitively invest so as to get the number of rigs, for both exploration and development, up to about 120. Now initially not all of these would drill horizontal wells, in fact for some purposes such wells are both unnecessary and not desired (water injection for example). And in the historic plan for in-field development the initial means for holding production declines to target levels had called for vertical wells.
What I would like to suggest is that as production demands have continued to rise, so what we are now seeing is a greater switch from vertical wells in the old fields to the use of horizontal ones. As the switch is made one can anticipate not only that individual well production rates will, at least initially, substantially increase over vertical, particularly as Aramco learn to drill longer wells. One should also expect that the water cut in the older fields should also decline somewhat as the overall percentage of vertical wells declined, and horizontal becomes paramount in all fields.
Changing from vertical dominant to horizontal well dominance in older fields has short term benefits – a gain in the amount of oil that can be recovered from a given number of wells in a shorter time interval, and a longer term down-side in that declines (as we have seen in the North Sea, Oman and other places where horizontal wells now have become common) which come earlier and at faster rates.
My concern therefore, as Saudi now has made a sufficient number of well changes to give the greater percentage of horizontal wells in the their historic fields, that it will meet the short-term need for higher production, but that this will, concurrently mean that when their production does peak, that the decline will be much faster than the 4 -5% that folk now talk of, and instead will exceed 10%.
It has been some time, for example, since Aramco admitted that their decline rate from existing wells was at a level of around 800,000 bd/year, and increasing the size of the tap will have an impact on that value also – making the target production increase each year increasingly higher (and thereby more difficult to attain) . Thus I worry a little that should there now be an acceleration in the production from the older fields that this will in turn shorten their productive lives and steepen the decline curve later - but then that gets me into a discussion on reserves and resources and that is the other debate we have.
Good morning America and this message board as the first to post! Isn't it amazing how the more they extract, the greater their reserve count becomes? Almost as if the gooey nougat people are right - the Earth giveth ever more oil. However, the reality is the descent has to come sometime for the Saudi's. Seems like their living the last of their great position as the supplier capable of filling increase world demand. Ahh, but the ego must give way to inevitable declines. Enjoy the world's attention while you can Saudia Arabia. The clock is ticking...
The expectations of oil producers are critical, when it comes to evaluating incentives. If I expect oil prices to keep rising, it may make sense for me to pump less. After all, I can earn more per barrel for it later. All the oil that got pumped at $10 a barrel a few years ago could have contributed a lot more to consumption and investment at today’s prices. Conversely, if I expect this to be a short-term shock, my interest is to pump as much as I can and sell it for sky-high prices.
Producer incentives thus create both a positive and a negative feedback. In situations where oil is running short (and producers know it), the incentive is to cut supply even further to take advantage of higher future prices. In situations where producers consider present prices to be an aberration, the incentive is to glut the market and thus depress prices even more when they do start to fall.
Another aspect of expectations would be access to the field. This is not a criteria for KSA, but for IOCs exploiting a lease. If they don't expect to be able to renew a lease before a field is drained, or perhaps even risk having their finally-profitable installation "renegotiated" away (as in Venezuela), their rational plan would be to exploit a field as rapidly as possible, regardless of the current market price, expectations of future price, or even long-term recovery rates.
This would be another way in which above-ground factors will keep us from realizing the geologic limits.
I don't think if rising price is expected, that "the incentive is to cut supply," if by this you mean to not open the spigots further. That only serves to create the emerging recriminations and invites trouble. Rather, the best way to take advantage of rising price is to slow down current decline mitigation by slowing down the pace of bringing new discoveries online and causing an early peak but with a less precipitous decline rate. Something very much like the Oil Depletion Protocol. I actually think this might get proposed, which is why the Saudi's wanted heads-of-state to attend. Consider the advanatage to OPEC for them to announce Peak and simultaneously as a solution to the problem suggest the Protocol. Think about it good. It puts the game into a whole new perspective. Think how the users response must be Yes. What else can they say? Abdullah simply states that T. Boone Pickens is correct, that 85Mbpd is tops, and its going to slowly subside. He should further say that in order to keep the price from spiraling out-of-control, it should be made permanent at $150/bbl, and adjusted bi-annualy to the inflation rate of a basket of currencies, commencing at the start of 2009. It would sound like a proposal instead of an edict. It would be the most important act of Statesmanship of the 21st Century.
Freezing the price is, in my opinion, a very logical solution. I'm sure the Saudi's are concerned that if the price goes into a prolonged superspike the impact won't be a slide into global recession it will be global economic collapse and the demand on oil will plummet. I'd expect the Saudi's objective is to take advice from Goldilocks and not let the price get too hot or too cold. Make it just right and maximise profit for as long as possible. Locking in a price would keep the economies going a bit longer but I'm not sure how that would be achieve other than by rationing and then who would get to decide who should have oil and how much.
How would you freeze the price? Without excess supply there is no mechanism to do it, and is west texas's ELM is halfway correct it will simply be blown out of the water.
You don't get a 4-5% reduction is export capacity for a very valuable resource and have anything other than rapidly escalating prices.
You might transfer some of the profits to a middleman, or otherwise have minor marginal effects, but the basic conditions for stability do not apply.
Even the modest aim of a regular escalation f prices, by, say a couple of percent every six months to counteract a 2% fall would not hold, partly due to inelasticity of demand and partly because the decline would not be smooth - a sudden outage, say a strike at a Nigerian platform, would destroy it.
How would you freeze the price? Without excess supply there is no mechanism to do it,
Coupons - you, as a citizen with X needs, gets these many coupons for Y gallons of gas at Z price.
So long as you do not leave the coupon system the price will be fixed.
I'm refering to the price of oil on the international market being capped thorugh treaty. The price of transport fuels in individual countries would vary due to their tax/subsidy regime, having their own resorces to add to imports, and their refining capacity. Setting the price is easy; establishing an allocation agreement will be harder, but the Protocol as proposed sofar states that importing countries will have their import allocation reduced by the rate of decline. This would allow for a managed decline rate that arrives at a soft landing for the global economy, and would be far more equitible to the poor and poor countries. Those unfamiliar with the Protocol can read it here.
A simple way to look at the Protocol is to see it as Sane, while the opposite can be seen in the Neocon strategy as Insane.
Fixing the oil price brings us peak oil sooner.
If you fix the oil price, then either the oil producers make losses on the difficult fields like Brazil's Tupi, or else they decide they don't want to give charity to the West and just stop producing.
So then you have a fixed price with a declining supply. Every day becomes a race to the pump to use your coupons before the pump goes dry.
Fixing the oil price means many fields will never be developed, and the peak comes sooner. Since I'm concerned about climate change, I'm fine with that - but you might not be.
I fail to see where oil production becomes uneconomic when the price is $150/bbl and indexed to inflation. There only "becomes a race to the pump" if efficiency gains combined with lessened demand lag the declining supply. Fundamentaly, the idea of the Protocol is to provide a cushion to economies over-reliant on oil and others from becoming completely priced out of the market. I don't think it will do much to mitigate Climate Change, as all the fossil fuels there are to burn will be burned, perhaps spread over a few more decades.
Fixing the price acknowledges that there is no point in producing stupid oil such as tar sands. Given the EROEI of renewable aleternatives, any oil that costs more than about $15/barrel to produce is stupid oil.
In order to fix the price, we pretty much have to control demand. That means that issuing more coupons than supply makes no sense. Thus, gas pumps will have gas. They will just be used less.
Chris
You mean a few more incidents like this?
It would be folly to assume that everything goes smoothly, that there's no insurgency, and that equipment never breaks down.
Since my recent post on the Drumbeat thread seems pertinent, a version of it follows:
We have had a fair amount "inside baseball" discussions of monthly production data and peaks versus annual average, which of course is pretty much irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, but a lot of cornucopians want to use monthly data to show that the Peak Oilers are wrong about a near term peak. BTW, as a near term peaker, who supports Deffeyes' logistic (HL) estimate, I have been accused of "Killing the Peak Oil Movement" all by myself. Who knew I wielded such vast power?
In any case, one point that is easy to overlook is that the HL method is best used to estimate the area under a production rate versus time curve, i.e., the URR for a region--and not the production rate for a given year. For example In the following article (linked below), I showed how the HL method was quite accurate in predicting the respective post-1970 and post-1984 cumulative production for the Lower 48 and Russia, despite wildly different looking curves, but the point is that the models accurately predicted the areas under the respective curves (using data through 1970 and 1984 respectively to generate the models). The Lower 48 was relatively smooth, Russia had a sharp decline, followed by a rebound, and now their cumulative production has "caught up" to where is should have been, and their production decline has resumed (and exports are falling at a pretty brisk rate).
So, what about Saudi Arabia?
I don't have the projected HL based C+C decline rate for Saudi Arabia, but the P/Q intercept suggests that the decline rate will be less than Texas (-4%/year). Khebab shows a middle case of -2.7%/year for C+C+ NGL, so let's assume -3%/year.
The observed versus predicted C+C rates (assuming -3%/year) are as follows:
2005: 9.6 mbpd
2006: 9.2; 9.31 (predicted)
2007: 8.7; 9.03 (predicted)
2008: 9.2 (to date, EIA); 8.75 (predicted)
Through 2008, the cumulative difference between 9.6 mbpd and the predicted annual production rate for each year should be about 621 mb. The actual shortfall at the end of 2007 was 475 mb, which suggests that the 2008 shortfall (between 9.6 mbpd and actual) should be about 400,000 bpd, which suggests an annual production rate of about 9.2 mbpd. We shall see what happens in the second half of the year, but I expect to see annual average Saudi production in 2008 come in below their 2005 rate, and then resume a production decline in 2009.
BTW, this is not an ex post facto argument. In March, 2007, in response to a comment by Stuart that the Saudi production decline was below what the HL model predicted, I responded that I had been speculating about a rebound in production for that very reason (and I did say a sharp decline followed by a rebound to a level "well below the 2005 rate").
Finally, the monthly versus annual record keeping needs to be put in some kind of economic perspective. Let's assume a country that does 10 mbpd in January, and then 5 mbpd for the rest of the year. From the point of view of the oil consumers in the country, which number is more meaningful, the monthly peak of 10 mbpd or the annual average of 5.4 mbpd?
In Defense of the Hubbert Linearization Method (June, 2007)
http://graphoilogy.blogspot.com/2007/06/in-defense-of-hubbert-linearizat...
Westexas:
I think that the problem one always has in defining curves comes in the short term when there is some indication that the producer is holding back some supplies. In this particular case we know that the Saudi's have some problem in the short term in selling their heavier, sour crude, because of refining problems. This may well go away in the intermediate term (say around 2013) as they build their own refineries (for dealing with the oil from Manifa) and work with others to build other capable refineries elsewhere. There are thus some artificial factors that play into the game, and make accurate models of short-term capabilities difficult.
No argument from me (although I would argue that "difficult" is not the same as "impossible"), but we can also say that it is a near certainty that Saudi Arabia will show three straight years of annual production below their 2005 annual rate, at about the same stage of depletion that the prior swing producer, Texas, started declining.
Meanwhile, their consumption is currently going to "infinity and beyond," on track to double to 4 mbpd in 2015, from 2 mbpd in 2005, against a recent total liquids production rate of about 10 to 11 mbpd.
How much of the ~9 mbpd do you think is allocated to maintain the income of the Saudi upper class? Can they actually let the internal consumption go to 4 mbpd?
I have suggested Phase One and Phase Two declines. In Phase One, cash flow from export sales increases, because oil prices go up faster than net oil exports decline. In Phase Two, oil price increases can't offset the export declines. We would expect to see a positive feedback loop in Phase One.
Perhaps "Phase Two" should be split:
Phase 1: Revenues increase as prices rise faster than export declines.
Phase 2: Revenues decrease causing rate of domestic consumption increase to slow, but overall domestic consumption still increases; net exports decline at faster rate than geologically-driven decline.
Phase 3: Revenues decrease rapidly enough to cause overall domestic consumption to decline; net exports decline at a slower rate than geologically-driven decline.
I think that Phase Three would be the point at which a lot of remaining world trade consists of net energy exporters trading energy for food and other essential goods.
At what point do we think the UK will get to Phase 3?
The UK still has oil for a while, we could export again if we stopped consuming so much.
Maybe food is more important than oil - we might have to export oil just to get enough to eat if other countries won't loan us the money?
WT,
Howmuch of that 2MBD goes inot industrial production rather than consumption. I assume they produce most of there eelctricty with oil and have some sizables desal plants but aren't they also ramping up aluminimum production to value add to the oil? Is the expected exapansion of KSA consumption more to do with industrial growth rather than private consumption?
I would suggest that much of the KSA internal consumption that is for industrial purposes fuels economic growth in the Middle East and Asia. Therefore, the oil taken off the export market largely does not displace oil used elsewhere like OECD. US's problem caused by ELM is fueling the auto/truck/airplane based transportation system which consumes 3/4 of all oil and liquid fuels.
HO
This leads me to the most compelling reason for the oil price rise - the decline of light sweet. This is oft wrongly expressed in the MSM as a shortage of refinery capacity (It defies logic that the shortage of the ability to process a commodity would drive up the price of that commodity), so it is the shortage is of the "right" type of refining capacity.
Which then raises the question, how fast can "they" build/convert heavy sour capable refineries?
Because this in the medium term is going to be the driver of price, how fast the refining industry can adapt to the sweet/sour product mix. Of course this raises another issue, ie the refiners are not making any money as they are squeezed between supply misinformed govt/public, so why invest?
If as I suspect its will be an ongoing race and as the overall production cannot significantly rise (it will decline IMHO) one could characterize this behavior as "riding the submarine all the way to the bottom"
Neven
Different countries and companies have different regulations and permitting processes. But in most cases the lead time is several years, and then you have to be sure that there will be enough supply for a sufficient number of years to give you an acceptable return on the investment. For example if countries in the Middle East are building their own refineries to ship final product, rather than crude, then there is less economic incentive to build new refineries to handle lower quality crude in, say, the United States.
Also you have to be convinced that the spread between light and heavy will be large enough, long enough, to justify the investment.
You could at least use your vast powers to heal Ghawar. Or to give George Bush boils. Whichever is more convenient.
Well, since I--singlehandedly--have the power to kill entire movements, I was thinking of earning a living as a hired gun, a latter day Internet Paladin, so to speak, hired to kill Internet "movements."
Great!!! Could you kill PETA? I love munching on our furry friends.
"On December 14, 2001, Bush had four noncancerous skin lesions removed from his face. The Press learned of this only when Bush appeared before cameras with dark red spots on his face.
Commment: These are most likely actinic keratoses, as were the lesions removed from his face in August 2001, or perhaps basal cell carcinomas. Bush's father, George H. W. Bush, had a similar procedure 8 months later." http://www.lilith-ezine.com/articles/bushpads.html
http://en.rian.ru/business/20080620/111460751.html
Russian oil export falls 4.2% in Jan.-April, to 81.4 mln tons
Updated Saudi HL annual and monthly plots are both predicting Saudi Arabia URR of 185 Gb (Crude oil and lease condensate, excluding NGL; includes half of Neutral Zone). Saudi C&C production to Jun 2008 is estimated to be about 115 Gb, 62% URR depletion, and 70 Gb remaining.
Saudi Arabia (incl half of Neutral Zone) Annual HL Plot click to enlarge
Saudi Arabia (incl half of Neutral Zone) Monthly HL Plot click to enlarge
The URR prediction of 185 Gb is almost the same as the URR prediction of 186 Gb, made by Westexas and Khebab in March 2007.
source http://graphoilogy.blogspot.com/2007/03/could-saudi-arabia-be-more-than-...
Hubbert Linearization on Saudi Arabia (Crude oil + condensate) click to enlarge
For more info
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/4159/365498
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/4153/362113
Hello Ace,
Huge thnxs for all your work!
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aMTWS1Pzs0Jc&refer=h...
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Saudi to Raise Oil Output 2% in July, Al-Naimi Says (Update1)
June 21 (Bloomberg) -- Saudi Arabia, which convenes a meeting of government and business leaders tomorrow to discuss world energy markets, will raise its oil output by 2 percent in July, the country's oil minister said.
The kingdom will add 200,000 barrels of oil to its daily production next month, taking its total to 9.7 million barrels a day, Ali al-Naimi told reporters in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia today. State-owned Saudi Aramco will soon add 500,000 barrels, or 4.6 percent, to the kingdom's total production capacity with its Khursaniyah field.
Saudi Proposal
A Saudi proposal, to be discussed at the meeting in Jeddah tomorrow, will seek measures against market speculators, Prince Abdulaziz Bin Salman, the kingdom's deputy oil minister, said in an interview published today in the Saudi newspaper Asharq al-Awsat.
``The governments have a role to play in regulating and restructuring the markets so that the speculators are forbidden from actions that caused oil prices to reach the current level,'' bin Salman said.
Saudi Arabia will present at the meeting a work document that outlines the reasons for the surge in oil prices, prepared in cooperation with the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and the International Energy Agency, the Saudi official said. ``It will be the only document that will be discussed.''
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I sure hope this document will be released to the general public! Could we be in for some shattering news?
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
I just don't see what kind of measures they can take against the supposed 'speculators'.
How would OPEC punish them? What can they threaten to do? Will OPEC counter-intuitively cut their export output to a country where it feels speculators are too dominant, then not restore the flow until these 'speculators' are publicly identified and/or criminalized [alluded to by Westexas's earlier postings]? Or is this just another convenient cover for OPEC to hide declining production?
They are saying that governments around the world need to "temporarily" freeze capitalism on a product that has historically been allowed to be traded freely. That is what they will ask. In my opinion, if part of what causing escalating prices of crude is due to "speculators" (my opinion is perhaps 5-10%) then those "speculators" (who are smart, rich people) are making a pretty decent bet and are just speeding up the inevitable.
For KSA and other government leaders, they were somewhat blind-sided and unprepared for how fast the price jumped recently and want to slow down the escalation in price.
This post is for Carolus: You debunked my idea for solar arrays deployed in Nevada and Arizona connected to the grid. Well this link is for you:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20080619/sc_livescience/inventorssol...
It's ok, you can admit you were wrong.
Who ever Carolus was, he/she must be chewing his or her fingers in shame now...
A few facts:
1. Peak oil won't be solved by generating more electricity.
2. The world runs on OIL not electricity.
3. The demand for electricity is going to slow down as we are hit by an economic downturn caused by inflating oil prices. At the same time all alt.energy solutions will climb in price as their resources, transportation and manufacturing will get ever more expensive.
4. Most solar company stocks are hyped to the roof now. And rightly so with the enormous investments they need for their feeble sub-gigawatt projects, and with the technologies and projects which they base their projected profits way behind schedules... for example we have been waiting for these for how long now - since 2005?: http://stirlingenergy.com/projects/default.asp
If you can come up with something more interesting then a couple of spotty MIT students hacking up a parabola of mirrors at their back yard, producing a small quantity of steam, please let us know. And that thing can't even support the weight of a stirling engine. Better designs have existed for decades now. Where's the hype in this? Sorry for debunking your hype but you really have to try harder than that at TOD...
I feel I must disagree with ransu here.
1.) Yes, peak oil won't be solved by generating more electricity.
BUT
2.) The world runs on oil AND electricity. Our developed economies are now managed by computers. Computers for finance, for running business, for government, for all the background stuff you seem to be taking for granted. Perhaps things could go back to paper ledgers, but I don't think so.
3.) Hence, th