Plateau update
Posted by Stuart Staniford on December 6, 2006 - 11:52am
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: peak oil, plateau [list all tags]
At any rate, there's little doubt that the record month is now July 2006.
Expressed as growth rates, the difference between the two agencies is about half a percentage point. This next graph shows the year on year growth in the two moving average lines above (which themselves are thirteen month centered moving averages recursed once).
As you can see, the EIA is seeing annual growth of 0.1% - essentially zero - while the IEA is seeing growth at around 0.7% annually. There are two points worth noting about this situation.
Firstly, if it were to continue, even the IEA's growth rate is very low by historical standards. This next graph shows growth rates in production for various data sources. The growth rate here is the average growth over the decade prior to the year in question (for the mathematically oriented, it's (P(n)/P(n-10))^0.1 - 1 ).
As you can see, in the heyday of world (and US) economic growth in the 1950s and 1960s, annual growth in oil usage ran around 7-8%. Then, following the 1970 peak in US oil production, came the 1970s oil shocks in which oil usage actually contracted. In the last couple of decades, economic growth has been slower, but steadier, and oil usage has been growing at around 1.5% a year. For reasons that aren't clear, both economic and oil usage growth tends to come in "eras" of relatively constant growth marked by sharp "paradigm shifts" between them.
So, if we are now in for an era of sustained zero or sub 1% growth in global production, that would be a new thing, and require more conservation on an ongoing basis. In particular, with growth in consumption in oil exporting countries and high growth Asian economies, it's likely US and European oil usage would need to contract slightly even if there is slight growth in overall production (a point discussed at greater length here.
The other point, is that there's not likely to be too much "sustained" about growth when a huge fraction of production is coming from the Middle East, where the wheels seem to be coming off the truck. Hard to say whether a crisis will come this year, next year, or later, but the odds of, say, a decade of steady Middle Eastern oil production uninterrupted by major shocks seem discouraging at this point. For example, see Andrew Sullivan on the possibility of a major Shiite-Sunni regional war. Such a war would utterly transform the world economy in very short order and in a very brutal manner.
Let me put up two other graphs of interest. The first is OPEC, which in November allegedly cut production. We'll have to await November/December statistics to see if that creates a noticeable step in the production history. However, here's the data available at present (which goes through September or October depending on source) and shows OPEC production already declining ahead of the planned cut).
Finally, during 2001-2004, when global production increased healthily, the bulk of that increase came from Saudi Arabia and Russia. With Saudi production declining, at least for the last year, Russia becomes of particular interest. Here's the latest picture:
As you can see, the Russian revival has not peaked out yet, though it has slowed to only around 1/2 mbpd in additional production each year over the last two years (about half the pace of production increases in the early part of the decade).
Again, see here, for more background on these plateau posts if you haven't been following them.
These posts are a lot of work, and the authors appreciate your helping them get more readers for their work however you can.
Also, most people are lazy and don't mind clicking to vote for the article, but don't want to spend the time to create the summary.
I actually think the part of world production you didn't separate out is pretty telling. If you look at global supply ex-former USSR, ex-OPEC, it rose steeply till 1997, and then stopped dead. Still within 1% today of where it was 10 years ago. There just isn't any new source of growth out there on earth.
But in Yergin's case, you would be wrong. Unless he speaks with forked tongue.
Cognitive Dissonance. I predict that the more in error Yergin's predictions turn out to be, the more vigorous his attacks on Peak Oil will probably become, ditto for Michael Lynch, Peter Huber, et al.
As I said the other day, "Who are the true cultists?"
Those who believe that a physical world has physical limits, or those like Peter Huber, who believe that we can essentially increase our rate of consumption forever?
He never said there would be oil for all.
Only for those who truly believe.
You are not a true believer.
No oil for you.
Go ahead and cry Texas boy.
No oil for you.
Boo hoo.
Oil only for those who truly believe in the Power of the Invisible Hand, blessed be its name and praise onto our magnificent priests, Yergin ala Huber. For the true believers, the oils will flow forever and beyond. Over hill. Over dale. Over plateaus that never fail. As the barrels go rolling along.
Still the peak in CO + NGL is probably local; barring world economic recession we'll see major production hikes in the South Atlantic offshore (probably only in 2009) that will adjourn the final peak to circa 2012.
Apart from politics and economic cycles, only a production collapse in KSA or Russia (or a simultaneous mild decline) might make 2005 the final peak epoch.
My prediction for 2007 is confirmed permanent production declines for both KSA and Russia.
Or at least that one of our predictions will be wrong.
Tony
"Just a clarification, here. Biofuels are only potentially renewable."
How true, and only patially renewable. If you count out the imput of natural gas (or coal or bitumen from tar sand, never mind CO2 as nat gas gets too expensive) I have never considered the major bio fuels (ethanol, bio-Diesel) as 'renewable" in the old sense of that word. They are more in the nature of a "fuel switching operation" than a renewable energy program.
The only added "renewable" energy in the bio fuels is the sun that shines on the crop, then has to be converted to bio-mass, which then has to be dehydrated and processed, and then carried to the sale point.....well, you get my point I hope...why not use the sun directly, burn the natural gas in the vehicle, or better yet, work to direct conversion of water to hydrogen by solar...ohh, that's right, it can't be done because it is not efficient enough, somehow it gets efficient when you add a half dozen extra conversion steps, and thousands of pounds of waste matter and CO2 per potential gallon in a centralized plant, so all the raw material and all the waste now and all the final product has to be shipped about....
Never mind. As Virginia Woolf once said, "It's like talking with your face pressed a closed door."
Roger Conner known to you as ThatsItImout
The only reason they appear efficient is because we chuck in a bunch of fossil fuels hidden as part of the process.
If fossil fuel is removed from the equation then logically, due to laws of conservation of energy the most efficient method should be the most direct.
No energy is "renewable".
The sun's fusion output rolls in.
It pauses for a moment here on Earth.
Then it radiates out into space.
Gone forever.
Renewability is a fairy tale.
One way flow is reality.
It has a funny other name: "entropy".
This distinction is made by calling the former power source renewable. No one who uses the term is under any delusion that the sun contravenes the conservation of energy.
Which is the least grown up, to use a common term with a well understood meaning even if not technically precise or to quibble over irrelevant linguistic distinctions that confuse no one?
We use words to define the map, they never truly fully represent that to which we assign them. It is simply common consensus that allows us to agree upon a definition. I believe I used it correctly.
Take a look at Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy
This is a poor definition. Energy is never "replenished", this is confusing energy and the potential energy inherent in matter. e.g. filling a tank with gasoline does not "replenish" the energy in the tank, but it does provide a liquid which can be involved in an exothermic reaction from which some energy can do things we find useful. Likewise, solar energy is never "replenished", it is simply a continuous source.
Contrast the problematic definition of renewable energy with
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_source
This is a good definition, at least from the point of view of humans.
Having said all the above, it is mostly useless because most people who use the term "renewable energy" understand these distinctions, and we can wave away the whole issue by simply defining the term to mean the right thing. Trying to promote the adoption of a more accurate term is not likely to work - see, for example, "hydro" to mean electricity when in fact it means water (see, e.g. Ontario Hydro, Manitoba Hydro, BC Hydro - all of which are or were electric utilities) or "America" to mean the United States of America.
Please.
Linguistics is vitally important.
One word in place of another does make a difference.
So if we, as supposedly scientific TODder's keep reinforcing the false concept of a "renewable" energy source, what chance does the lay public have to finally come to grasp with the truth of the situation? Suppose they vote to kill R&D in fusion because they believe "we" are instead developing "renewable" energy sources? Makes perfect sense in their mind. Renewable means renewable, doesn't it?
We need to be careful about what false delusions we unwittingly ingrain into the minds of the lay voters. It is their vote that counts, not ours.
With the exception of nuclear and geothermal, every other energy source we talk about here is a solar sourced one.
Wind is solar sourced.
Hydroelectric is solar sourced.
PV is solar sourced.
Oil is solar sourced.
Even "coal" (a.k.a. non-hydrogenated carbon) is solar sourced in the sense that the oxygen used to combust coal is a byproduct of photosynthesis.
Something I was thinking about in regard to KURT COBB's latest post regarding Copernicus, Darwin and .. Autistic Economics
I was less than thrilled with the concept of an "Un-Autisitc Economics" (an oxymoron IMO --no, it's dyslexia when you transpose your letters :-) ).
So I posted the following, linguistically directed comment:
Renewable is a word used to describe those sources of energy for which the amount we may use tomorrow and in the years ahead is not reduced by a significant degree by using that energy source today in the amounts that it is practical to use them and over the future time spans over which it is sensible to plan human activities.
The amount of solar, wind, wave and tide energy that we could practicably use today will not noticeably affect how much we can use tomorrow or over the next 200 years and thus fits within that definition. Oil clearly does not.
Talking about oil as being solar derived may be pedantically true but is likely to cause unwise choices by those of the general public who have not considered the problems and are only too ready to accept ideas that will avoid having to change immediately.
Talking about photovoltaic and wind energy as renewable may be untrue in the strictest pedantic sense but the difference is not going to cause any false decisions.
Fusion energy, if it proves practical, sits on the edge of being renewable by this definition. We cannot noticeably deplete the planet's deuterium by any reasonable future use.
Lithium is rarer but there are thousands of years worth of it that can be extracted using only a small fraction of the energy it will produce. Beryllium, used as a neutron multiplier in the blanket may be a problem in the long term with very heavy use.
The question of whether we can drop nuclear fusion research
because we are developing photovoltaic and wind energy does not rest on whether they are truly renewable or not but whether we can develop them in sufficient quantities and
in the right places and for an acceptable price and overcome such problems as intermittency.
Renewable energy is useful concept and is usually construed
correctly by the public in ways that are meaningful to choices about energy sources
You are assuming that the only time we will "truly" need fusion is when the sun finally runs out of fuel and implodes.
Not true.
What if we have extreme climate change and perpetual clouds ... meaning no sunlight gets to the surface?
Do you ever listen to politicians talking about that there "energy" stuff? Many of them are totally clueless. And they are the ones who cast the important votes --like whether to fund basic R&D or not.
Where do you get this idea from? In fact I support fusion research but the quite the silliest reason for doing so and the silliest reason not to install photovoltaic systems would will be that we might get perpetual cloud cover. If that happens agriculture will collapse and we are dead.
In fact the two do not complete on the medium term. Even the proponents at ITER do not see the first prototype commercial fusion power reactor delivering power for 50 years even with their fast track programme.
It will almost certainly be at least 70 years before fusion has developed to become a major part of the worlds energy supply. Build up cannot be much faster than this because of limitations in tritium supply. Deuterium/tritium fusion reactors use over 55kg per year per GW thermal. Reactors will be designed to breed their own tritium from lithium but will not produce much more than their own needs and the magnitude of the spare tritium will limit the rate of growth of new reactors.
Most of the world`s present supply of tritium is from the CANDU reactor which will have accumulated just 27kG for ITER from now to start-up in 2027.
2076 is well past the point at which all but the most starry eyed optimists think the oil production will have suffered major decline.
It is a major topic of this forum as to how we get over the intervening period. Wind and other renewables will be installed at increasing rates and economy and efficiency will be forced on us. Nuclear fission will see a revival and although they should not be used, filthy tar sand and shale will be used. Coal will be used in horrifying amounts with very little of the CO2 sequestered. Will this see us through? A range of opinions have been expressed here, Will renewables be cost competitive with fusion when it is available? Very difficult to judge at this point. Will fusion be practical even then? Far from certain. Will advanced technology and the budget surpluses to support it survive till then? There are many that doubt it.
However the prospect of generating multi-gigawatt power from one compact site near where the power is needed with fuel available for thousands of years from friendly areas and generating no CO2 in actual running, zero chance of a nuclear explosion and limited short lived radioactive waste is a prize so tempting that even at fairly long odds it is worth the price of research and development costs.
Oh and yes, the sun will swell up as a red giant and engulf this planet before finally settling down. It won't implode.
One could also build more CANDUs (perhaps using burned fuel from LWRs) and produce more tritium that way.
Best Hoeps for fusion,
Alan
According to this source nuclear weapons use about 4g each and it has been suggested that the latest designs do no use any. This makes it unlikely that military tritium production is much more than a kilogram per year.
10's of kilograms of tritium will be needed for each new start up and the only practical commercial way of getting to grow the number of reactors to substantial numbers is from existing reactors. If the tritium breeding blanket produces only 10% to 15% more than it needs for self sufficiency it will take 2 to 3 years to fund a new start up. Given a few months commissioning from delivery of the initial charge to full power, the doubling time will be 3 years or more. This means it will take about 20 years to go from 1 reactor to 100.
Total U.S. tritium production since 1955 has been approximately 225 kilograms, an estimated 150 kilograms of which have decayed into helium-3, leaving a current inventory of approximately 75 kilograms of tritium.
This was almost a half-life ago (12.3 years), so 37 kg or so left today.
Inserting Li6 into existing nuclear reactors for neutron bombardment seems the easiest/best way to produce tritium in quantity. Perhaps, slip one zirconium covered rod of Li6 into a fuel bundle and adjust the control rods slightly (or use slightly more enriched U in the other fuel rods).
IF fusion reactors are seen as our salvation, and tritium is the bottleneck for "more", then "ways will be found".
Best Hopes for Fusion,
Alan
Yes US military tritium production was about 7 or 8 kg per year up to 1988 when they closed down the last of the dedicated reactors but I suspect it it is now about the 1kg/year mark I suggested. It was produced at a staggering cost.
World production of uranium in 2004 was about 40,000 tonnes. Of this 0.7% or 280 tonnes was U235. Enrichment usually leaves about 0.2% of the U235 in the depleted uranium so only 200 tonnes a year of U235 finish up as reactor fuel
The fission of one atom of U235 produces an average of about 2.4 neutrons. To maintain the reaction an average of one of these must cause a new fission event. The others being lost or absorbed naturally or by control rods.
Commercial reactors are built to a fairly tight neutron budget and although there are some spare neutrons that could be released by pulling the control rods out further it is unlikely that, in such reactors, more than 10% of the neutrons could be diverted to tritium production without problems.
This leaves an average of about a quarter of a neutron per fission event or four fission events to produce one spare neutron which can produce one tritium atom. Four uranium 235 atoms weigh 940 atomic mass units and one tritium atom weighs 3 atomic mass units. Thus 313 tonnes of uranium 235 produce 1 tonne of tritium and the world's 40,000 tonne per year production of uranium could ideally produce 630kg of tritium per year if every reactor in the world were switched to maximum tritium production.
At 20kg initial charge for a 2GW(thermal) 1GW(electrical) that is a absolute maximum of 32 reactor start-ups per year if we rely on fission generated tritium. To put this in perspective china is at present installing an equivalent to 50 1GW(electrical) coal fired power station a year
This analysis ignores all sorts of factors that would reduce even that yield much further such as that much of it would decay and leak away in the reactor and the sheer improbability of converting every fission reactor in the world to tritium production.
As to the blind faith "ways will be found", I doubt you would be able to show your face on this forum if you said it about oil.
Tritium is a major bottleneck in the future widespread use of fusion and is widely recognised to be so.
I will not live to see the widespread use of fusion energy but I may, and hope to, see enough to know it will become so after my death.
However, if fission reactor produced tritium were able to seed 10 (not 32) 1 GW fusion reactors/year and each one of these went on to seed another within a decade (relatively conservative #s) AND some tritium reactors were built optimised for tritium production, then we could scale up to fusion power as the dominant energy source within a generation or so.
Tritium from commercial reactors would provide a larger base to start the exponential growth from.
And then there is the possibility of accelerator production of tritium.
Given the other many constraints on fusion reactor build out, even an unlimited source of tritium would result in a generation to "build out". Likley tritium is the "critical path" constraint, but far from the only one.
Best Hopes,
Alan