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30 comments on More "peak oil navel gazing..." (or, let's just publicly ignore the lessons of the last few months)

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Stuart Staniford on December 5, 2005 - 12:37am Permalink | Subthread | Comments top
So, I just don't get it. As far as we can tell, the oil majors have 8%-10% annual decline rates on existing production, their total production is dropping in the last few years in most cases, they have been having difficulty replacing reserves causing some (Shell) to cheat. How can they possibly be so sanguine? Bubba - help us out here...
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OregonCoast on December 5, 2005 - 12:56am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
They are worried about a worldwide economic slowdown.
They probably see that "good ole" cunsuming keeping the money in their pockets for a month or 12.
Looking at some of the economic data it's tough for me to disagree with them.
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OregonCoast on December 5, 2005 - 12:57am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
consumer...spellcheck is my buddy..
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Dave Cohen on December 5, 2005 - 1:18am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Well I think I may have a handle on it, Stuart, which is to say that Lee Raymond hasn't been in touch with certain realities--even his own company's production numbers--for some time now. But right now their quarterly profits are huge and Lee's a bottom line kind of guy who has no vision of what the longer term energy future looks like or the implications for climate change--none--and he doesn't care either. He is a dinosaur though I say this without any attempt to disparage our long lost friends from the Cretaceous.
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Khebab on December 5, 2005 - 8:19am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Remember Enron? WorldCom? CEOs will blame their accountants for manipulating the numbers! denial is more profitable in the short term.
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p on December 5, 2005 - 8:23am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Management Blindness: See below. It simply doesn't fit their corporate bureaucracy hence it doesn't exist.

"Sorry sir, you problem doesn't fit our templates"

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TJ on December 5, 2005 - 9:33am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
  1. They are going to keep doing what they are used to until they are forced otherwise.

  2. They really only deeply care about the short term, and that looks rosy to them right now.

  3. If three years from now their profits plunge, they are counting on their Republican friends to save them.  It is much cheaper for them to invest in Congressmen and Senators than actual projects.
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Halfin on December 5, 2005 - 1:35pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
"They really only deeply care about the short term, and that looks rosy to them right now."

But TJ, the point he was making was precisely the opposite, that the oil business is a long term business. By its very nature, every decision they make has to look ahead decades. An oil company which only cared about the short term would not invest in oil development and would not be in business.

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wkwillis on December 7, 2005 - 7:50am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
The company is in the business for the long term, the CEO is going to retire in four years.
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Raid on December 5, 2005 - 10:40pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Hi everyone.

This being my first post, i'd like to express gratitude admiration to those individuals - the community - doing an serious effort to raise the debate on oil and gas production.

Well, there is an explanation that i've would like to have comments on. The exec are mostly sanguine, which they wouldn't be if they "knew" about any kind of shortages, bad news et cetera the next couple of months. That is, bad news on the western hemisphere.

Clearly, one could argue that demand destruction at prices in the range of 50-80 $/B would "free" a lot of oil resources for the benefit of those who can afford it. That could explain their attitude. Perhaps the obligatory optimism among execs, combined with some distorted pragmatic view on handling the coming challenges (relying on demand to materialize solutions), could serve to be some sort of an explanation.  

From my superficios knowledge, there has been reports on problems relating petroleum supply in africa and countryside china, which i suspect could persist and evolve without major persistent attention in europe and us.

Beeing a person who know very little about the oil business, my questions is: The oil bourses are in NY and London, soon also in Teheran. How much of the oil&gas produced worldwide are made availeble on the bourses? Are there some global trade regulations making all oil flow trough a bourse? Are there a lot of oil beeing traded in national unilateral argreements?

My point: an effective global marked on oil will mitigate effects of depletion for a period. In the meantime, those who are wealthy and informed will enter a potential time of crisis financally well prepared.

Greetings from Norway.

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