http://www.discover.com/issues/feb-06/features/energizer/

Article is free for now, but will probably be put behind a paywall in a couple of weeks.

http://www.prosefights.org/msd/msd.htm

Math modeling neat.

http://www.prosefights.org/nmlegal/supremecourt/cvpa.htm

Transneft's press service reports that Russia is projecting that 2006 oil exports will reach 265.5 million tons, a 9.7 percent increase over Russia's 2005 oil exports of 241.9 million tons. Following that, Federal Energy Agency official Sergei Oganesyan told reporters that Russia intends to boost output by 1 percent to 2 percent annually.

Russia may open up part of its strategic fuel reserves due to the record cold which has encompassed almost all of the country. This information was disclosed by Russia's Energy and Industry Minister Viktor Khristenko who spoke on Thursday, Jan. 19, at a regular government meeting.

If we need to buy gasoline or diesel to get to work or school and we can't; our choices are:

Propane
Natural Gas
Alcohol
Hydrogen
Electric

Any off the shelf propane or NG kits will sell out real quick.  With supply/demand issues, will there be enough propane to go around?  How will the additional load on natural gas fare?

What about the supply of 50 lb bags of corn to make alcohol?

http://running_on_alcohol.tripod.com/

You can buy or even have hydrogen delivered to your house(gas or liquid).  Or even rent a hydrogen generator!

http://www.airgas.com/

How many 12v batteries can you fit in your car or truck?  How many will it hold if they weigh ~40lbs each?  Need about six to eight thousand dollars to convert your existing car or truck over to electric... :( (at least you'll be able to drive!)

It's going to be quite a surprise when modern day civilization as we know it grinds to a halt...

http://www.cloudelectric.com/

http://digg.com/science/5_of_World_s_Oil_Reserves_DISAPPEARED_on_Friday

http://www.mosnews.com/news/2006/01/22/russiangas.shtml

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2006/01/15/do1502.xml&sSheet=/opinion /2006/01/15/ixopinion.html

Here is the NYT's article about that article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/22/weekinreview/22reading.html

Next up is today's NYT's Week in Review and David Sanger on military options for Iran:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/22/weekinreview/22sanger.html

OPEC vows to ensure enough oil in market
Jan 22, 2006 - 11:23

http://wam.org.ae/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?GXHC_JSESSIONID=996d55eabb64c927&pagename=WAM%2FWamLoc Enews%2FW-T-LEN-FullNews&c=WamLocEnews&cid=1137496620936&p=1041248621847

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5167208

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle.asp?xfile=data/business/2006/January/business_January286. xml&section=business&col=

"Iran cuts gas supply to Turkey"

Any other reports confirming it?

It seems like the resource wars are shaping up a little bit earlier than expected.

See http://www.nypost.com/business/61952.htm.  (Registration required)

Also, a recent LA Times article discussed a dustup with Mexico over trying to get them to lower cement prices and they want us to drop tariffs.  Cement becoming a scarce commodity?  Cement production is very energy intensive, I know.  But how much?  

I've tried an approach that many folks don't seem to see as necessary, but that I see as essential.

My approach is to design my life intentionally around the notion of reducing petroleum use as much as I can.  This is part of reducing my environmental footprint.

Doing this, I assume that I will need to live close to work.  Ideally, I will live at a walkable or bike-able distance from work.

I do all kinds of work from my Organicengines SUVs (Sensible Utility Vehicles) and can carry people or cargo up to 6, 7, or 800 pounds at need.

Usually I only need to carry 100 to 200 pounds of tools, but ride up hill and down through all weathers here in Minneapolis, MN, USA.

So I think that if we design our lives intentionally to use very little petroleum, we can do it.

Those who have invested heavily in housing and real estate designed around cheap abundant energy stand to lose an awful lot in terms of money or equity over the next few years, in my estimation.

But look at velomobiles.  Check out cargo trikes, work bikes, and quads.  There are many people who make and use these as tools for sustainable transportation and as "tools for conviviality" to quote a phrase.

We are bathing in petroleum.  We will not be bathing in petroleum so much in the next few years.

Yes.  We will smell different.

It is foolish to look at the way upper-middle class Americans now live as any kind of sustainable norm.  The petroleum-bathed lifestyle is passing away.

I think our imaginations are bound and need to be liberated.  Must extreme necessity and suffering be the only "mother of invention?"  It looks increasingly like that is the case.

Do check out the various HPVs online.  We can do more than we imagine with human power. Not everything, but many things.

I'm too tired to go hunting for evidence right now.  Please help me with it if you can, thanks.

China Will Strike
 An Energy Deal
 With the Saudis

By SHAI OSTER
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
January 23, 2006; Page A3

BEIJING -- China and Saudi Arabia are expected to sign a wide-ranging agreement today on energy cooperation amid Beijing's quest to secure more energy resources vital to fuel its fast-growing economy.

China, the world's second-biggest consumer of oil, has been seeking to tighten economic and political partnerships with its major oil suppliers across Central Asia, Africa and Latin America. Its quest has taken on added urgency since 2004, when the country's oil demand surged about 15%, helping underpin the biggest rise in international oil prices in a generation.

Although the pace of increase in China's oil demand slowed last year, the average price it paid per 11,000 tons of imported oil surged 38% from 2004 as global oil prices hit record highs. China needs vast supplies of energy to fuel its economy, which grew about 10% last year. A key supplier to the country's fuel needs is Saudi Arabia, which accounts for roughly 17% of China's oil imports.

The Sino-Saudi memorandum of understanding is set to be signed during Saudi King Abdullah's three-day visit to Beijing, a Saudi official said yesterday. It will call for increased cooperation and investment between the two countries in oil, natural gas and minerals, but it won't specify any projects or dollar amounts, another Saudi official said. Other details of the agreement weren't immediately available.

King Abdullah arrived in China yesterday in the first visit here by a Saudi ruler since the two countries re-established diplomatic ties in 1990. He is scheduled to meet today with Chinese President Hu Jintao and tomorrow with No. 2 Communist Party leader Wu Bangguo and Premier Wen Jiabao. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Kong Quan said last week that the Chinese and Saudi leaders are expected to discuss energy cooperation, fighting terrorism and telecommunications, among other issues.

King Abdullah's China visit is part of a four-nation Asian tour that will also include stops in India, Malaysia and Pakistan. Members of his delegation include Saudi Oil Minister Ali Naimi.

China's oil imports from Saudi Arabia have roughly doubled in recent years, from 12.5 million tons in 2002 to 22 million tons for the first 11 months of 2005.

Chinese and Saudi oil companies have already signed several deals. China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., or Sinopec, China's second-biggest oil producer by volume and its largest refiner, is drilling for natural gas in Saudi Arabia. The company also has signed a deal with Saudi Arabia's state oil company, Saudi Aramco, to build a huge refinery in the southern Chinese province of Fujian with Exxon Mobil Corp. as a partner. Aramco also has begun engineering work with Sinopec for a second refinery in China's northeastern port city of Qingdao.

The Saudi king's visit comes on the heels of a major diplomatic push by China in West Africa, including Nigeria, where Cnooc Ltd., China's largest offshore oil producer by volume, recently concluded a deal to acquire a large stake in an offshore oil field. Last week, Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing traveled to Cape Verde, Senegal, Mali, Liberia and Nigeria.

China also has drawn closer recently to other large energy producers, such as Venezuela, where ties with the U.S. have frayed.

The agreement comes as renewed political instability in key oil-producing countries in the Middle East and Africa has pushed oil prices back up toward the record highs hit in the summer of 2005. On Friday, oil prices hit a four-month high of $68.35 a barrel, as traders worried that militants in Nigeria were targeting oil facilities.

Meanwhile, a political standoff between Iran and the West has oil traders nervous. The U.S. and several European nations have been calling for Iran to be referred to the United Nations Security Council over its moves to restart a uranium-enrichment program, a process that is used in producing nuclear weapons. Iran is the second-largest oil producer in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, after Saudi Arabia. Some analysts worry that it could respond to possible U.N.-imposed sanctions against it with an oil embargo.

OPEC is scheduled to meet Jan. 31 to decide on its oil-production policy for the spring. A person familiar with Saudi Arabia's oil policy said Saudi Arabia and other OPEC countries don't support Iran's call for the producer bloc to lower the group's daily oil-production quota by one million barrels. Iran says the cuts are needed to prevent overproduction from glutting the market and bringing oil prices sharply down.

"At a time when energy prices and industry profits are soaring, the federal government collected little more money last year than it did five years ago from the companies that extracted more than $60 billion in oil and gas from publicly owned lands and coastal waters.

If royalty payments in fiscal 2005 for natural gas had risen in step with market prices, the government would have received about $700 million more than it actually did, a three-month investigation by The New York Times has found."

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/23/politics/23leases.html?hp&ex=1138078800&en=01638062a5dc8e2 b&ei=5094&partner=homepage

I've been looking at the Russian and FSU P/Q versus Q plots that Khebab did (under the Kuwait post on TOD), and at first they were a little confusing, but then it finally dawned on me.  

If you look at the Russian plot, oil production stopped growing at about 47% of Qt (I'm rounding off Qt at 160 Gb), around 1989.   Production was basically flat for about 10 years until 1999, out to about 59% of Qt.  Production then fell dramaticlly.  Everyone assumed that it was because of the breakup of the Soviet Union, and then production rebounded strongly.  However, the recent production is still significantly below the 1980's decade long peak.  It looks like production peaked as a broad plateau centered roughly on the 53% of Qt mark.  In my opinion, and several others have made this same point, the rebound in Russian production was just making up for the falloff in production during the political problems.  

The key point is that Russia is probably poised for a significant drop in production.  In fact, if you believe the plot, Russia has less remaining recoverable reserves than does the U.S.  

Following are the Hubbert/Deffeyes reserve estimates for the top four exporters, and the estimated life of reserve estimates, at current rates of production:

Saudi Arabia:  80 Gb & 21 years
Russia:  20 Gb & 6 (SIX?????) years
Norway:  9 Gb & 8 years
Iran:  60 Gb & 40 years

Total for all four:   169 Gb & 16 years.  These four countries account for the majority of net world oil exports.  

This is based on the top exporters in 2004:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/topworldtables1_2.html

IMO, the world economy is in deep doo-doo.

If I have made a mistake somewhere, could someone let me know?  If this is basically correct we are heading for one hell of a collapse in net exports.

courtesy of rogerlsimon.com, the conventional wisdom on middle eastern oil may not be all that it's cracked up to be. Roger J. Stern, of John Hopkins U, has written a peer-reviewed journal published on-line by the National Academy of Science that casts doubt on the notion of the "oil weapon" in a six page paper entitled "Oil market Power and US National Security".

Hyperlink to the PDF here

From a quick look it seemed daft, but I'm not a mathematician - perhaps one of the resident mathematicians could explain precisely WHY it's daft :-)