 | Remember Where the Offshore Rigs Are and What They Can Take? | The Oil Drum | The Energy Balance of Ethanol versus Gasoline |  |
DrumBeat: August 27, 2006
Posted by threadbot on August 27, 2006 - 9:11am
Topic: Miscellaneous
Matt Simmons and Jim Kunstler were interviewed on November 1, 2005 by Glenn Mitchell on KERA 90.1, the local PBS station in Dallas, Texas....This was a fairly remarkable interview, partly because Matt Simmons and Jim Kunstler, coming from vastly different backgrounds, had basically reached the same conclusions regarding Peak Oil. It's also interesting to see how events have unfolded since this interview.
Well, the experts at The StormTrack turned out to be correct about Ernesto: it became a hurricane last night, much earlier than the NHC predicted. They may be wrong about the track, though. Rather than the Dennis-like path they expected, Ernesto is now predicted to hook east toward Florida. Of course, it's early yet, and the path could change, particularly after crossing Cuba.
Oil-driven energy era coming to end?
The era of oil-driven energy is coming to an end, says Jim Fischer, a senior technical advisor with the U.S. Department of Energy.
Seattle firm warned BP about pipeline
SEATTLE - An engineering firm raised a red flag more than four years ago about BP PLC's monitoring of its Alaska oil pipelines, documents show.
Chad president orders Chevron, Petronas to leave
Chad ordered U.S. energy giant Chevron and Malaysia's Petronas on Saturday to leave the country within 24 hours for failing to honor tax obligations, a move apparently aimed at increasing control over its oil output.
Canada: Oilpatch faces long list of multibillion-dollar decisions in next four months
With the price of oil showing no signs of departing from near-record highs, nearly every major Canadian energy company is going flat out to complete expensive long-term new operations, acquisitions and strategic partnerships.
Australia: Bracks urged to think ahead as 'oil runs out'
Remote Island Provides Clues On Population Growth, Environmental Degradation
"Rapa is a compelling story," Kennett said. "To me, this is an example of what's happening on the planet today in terms of expanding populations, environmental degradation and increasing warfare. Rapa is a little microcosm of our planet. There are lessons about the consequences of population growth to be learned there."
Hurricane Ernesto
It's a work in progress, I'm planning to add more NDBC buoys (just two for now) and refinery positions. Any comments or suggestions are welcomed.
So if this happens: will each American proactively drive 5% less to keep the gasoline price the same, or will the price/gallon rise to force some more people to unhappily pedal and/or use shoe leather? I think we TODers already know the answer. MPP is really difficult to overcome.
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
No one was eager to pay a higher price "proactively" to pay for reserve capacity. No one was eager to disempower the NIMBYs and BANANAs "proactively" in order that there would be a place outside the hurricane zone to put reserve capacity. That means the system - any system - always gets stretched to its limits. Pay now or pay later, but always pay in the end.
There is no free lunch, even though politicians on all sides promise free lunches and feckless fools happily vote accordingly. Then again, none of this is new. So what?
Is there any way you could add rig locations, like RigZone does?
http://gom.rigzone.com/rita.asp
Thanks.
to a description of subway routes in England.
How about plotting just the areas in the Gulf with largest densities of rigs (shaded boundaries with general locations)?
Don't forget to plot the Cuban rigs in the Florida Straits--Hurricane Ernesto is headed right for them! Hopefully, the rigowners have a high level of tech: so that if a platform is wrenched off its location by high seas that the Florida coastlines are not flooded with crude. That would make Jeb & George Bush declare war on Castro. Here is an article and photo of a Cuban rig.
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
I'll go first.
For full page printable image. (Which I suggest everybody do, since you want to be able to takes notes on this. It makes the best peak-oil stationary.) click on image. Then hit "Other Charts" on the right side of page. Then follow Flickr directions. If you can't do it, just ask, I'll clarify.
What is this chart trying to tell me?
That's what it's telling me.
I would rather be wrong, but what is gained by posting this in advance of an explanation? Following the directions leads nowhere.
First of all, I just want to say that I'm a super big fan of your work.
Your posts are so clear. So concise. So focused. And so easy to read.
That's why I was surprised that someone like you would be capable of making a chart like that.
It's the opposite of your writing style.
When you write, you have such rhythm. Such class. And you always add emphasis with italics. Not CAPS.
You know I love you either way, but putting all those pink bubbles, random arrows, and multi-colored rainbows in your chart is just like WRITING AN ENTIRE POST IN CAPS.
And I know you would never do that.
Chart, the way you write, brother.
You could be someone.
Sincerely,
Margaret Thatcher
The dark-green line is historical monthly oil production. The data comes from the EIA. The lighter green line is the centered 13-month average of these numbers. This is the same data Stuart uses in his monthly update, except this goes back to 1995.
The red line is the corresponding price of crude oil. This much I would hope by now people would be familiar with.
Obviously, we're in 2006, so what happens past this point is anyone's guess.
The first pink-bubble shows where some people think the peak is. As in "now." Like Matt Simmons and T.Boone Pickens. The purple line pointing down is the path production will probably follow according to Matt Simmons. He has mentioned production dropping from 85 to 80 million barrels per day in the next few years.
The slanted line moving up and to the right and changing slope in 2010 is the upper bound of "production" capacity as expected by CERA. CERA is of the opinion that historically spare capacity has averaged about 3.5 million barrels per day above actual production/demand. They have forecast this gap to be as much as 7 million bpd out to 2015. The "rosy" scenario. The orange and yellow bands are about 3.5 mbpd wide each to give you an idea of where CERA believes actual production could occur, but probably won't.
The pink bubble at the far right at about 110 mbpd in 2020 is about where a peak might occur at the earliest according to CERA.
The blue line which connects the end of the current production line to a point in the center of the middle pink bubble is where CERA believes actual production will move. They expect production of 94 mbpd in 2010.
The middle pink bubble also indicates the approximate area where a peak is expected according to ASPO.
The right hand scale for the price of crude goes up to $140. This was arbitrary to simply allow for the possibility.
BTW, if you do a Google web search for oil exports, there are about 22 million listings. The "Net Oil Exports Revisited" article (based on Khebab's work), is in the top 10, just down from the CIA wesbsite (as of yesterday anyway).
Global Warming is getting worse than I thought I guess... ;-)
Defending geologist Jeffrey Brown from a crazed gorilla, Tarzan faced mortal danger. As the huge beast charged forward, Tarzan braced for the attack. His knife was his only hope! Tarzan knew he had to win for his jungle friends (TOD denizens) who depended on him for safety.
Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle, has devoted his life to keeping peace in the vast wilderness known as Canada. Animals obey him, peaceful men honor him, and evil-doers fear him. All men respect the famous name of Tarzan.
(Must be the GW)
http://www.tarzan.com/comics/banner4.html
If you do want to try to influence friends and family regarding Peak Oil (especially if you are trying to talk a spouse into downsizing), the CD is a great, low-key way to do it. They can listen to the CD on their way to and from work (a little irony there--listening to a CD about how your suburban commute is doomed while driving to and from work).
BTW, I have commented before about the slow but steady increase in the number of restaurants closing in the Dallas area and the increase in the empty storefronts. One of our favorite restaurants just closed. One other item, I have started noticing a pretty significant increase in the number of panhandlers asking for money. All in all, kind of scary--but not unexpected.
I just sent you an edited copy of the interview. Check the second email entitled Simmons Kunstler interview (edited copy) - in the first one I accidentally pasted in the original. The original was pretty bad - full of typos and trancription errors. It took me a while to fix it, so I thought I might as well send you a fixed copy. I'll send one to the TOD editors too. Editing was done for grammar, spelling, transcription errors where possible and minimally for clarity.
e-mail from the EB:
Hello Jeffrey,
I replaced the old version with the edited version (Stoneleigh's):
http://energybulletin.net/19686.html
Additionally, I corrected "creamy nugget" to be "creamy nougat" in two places (a-biotic oil reference).
Thanks!
Bart
EB
How much is Dallas dependent on oil and gas for its economy in comparison to Houston and how is Houston doing? I keep going back to Andrew McKillop and wondering what the breaking point is.
One of my sons is a manager at a very upscale restaurant in Philadelphia. They figure $150.00 average per person for dinner. I spent $18.00 there for a scotch. They are doing better then ever but some of the lower priced restaurants in the group are down year over down. He is peak oil aware. Last year he and I went to hear Roscoe Bartlett, Simmons, Deffeyes, etc. in Md. In his Prius. So far I haven't gotten him to change jobs to satisfy a need they sure are wants now, but I don't think it would go over very well with his fiancée.
I live across from Philadelphia in Nj. So far they are building restaurants like crazy. I have noticed the large diners we have here are not as good as they used to be but they still seem to be busy.I am seeing more men (mostly) riding around on bikes and looking like they are living on the edge. I think one is living in the woods near by.
.
Don't be impressed, this does not AT ALL mean that there are 22 millions pages mentionning oil exports.
This number is a fake estimation of the "popularity" of the keywords, it only matches the true number of pages when this number is below some threshold (which value I don't know).
This likely comes from technical constraints in the query software, no way that you can maintain such huge counts with some accuracy.
Note that the large numbers are always rounded to thousands or millions.
I mean, it's not hard replacing natural gas power generation with other generation (nuclear, coal, wind) and natural gas heating can be replaced with electricity or electrical heat pumps. Maybe the natural gas pipes that go to homes can be converted to (non-natural gas powered) district heating systems?
It's a lot harder to think up easy alternatives to oil powered transportation.
I don't see natural gas as an existential question. I mean, my country does excellent without it. The few places where it is used is either because of political reasons (replacement capacity for a prematurely shut nuke plant) or gastronomical reasons (steak taste better on the propane grill than on the electric stove).
- If you say so.
- That is true, and to me it seems the best idea is not to use natural gas at all - except for grilling steaks. Coal is good for this too.
- 270.000 MW's believe it or not. Now, capital costs for gas fired poweplants are low per MW, but 270.000 MW gas plant is still a hell of a lot of money to waste.
Fertilizer can be made from any source of electricity (the energy part is just nitrogen pulled from the air and hydrogen pulled from water). The Norwegians used to do it with hydro power.Natural gas is a non issue which could be solved by a little state intervention. Like building 100 new nuclear reactors (or wind or coal).
http://www.iea.org/Textbase/stats/PDF_graphs/USELEC.pdf
It's not in any way physically or economically impossible. The French built 1 kW nuclear per capita, Sweden built 2 kW per capita. The US only needs 0,3 kW per capita to deal with natural gas.
And then we have heating on top of that, but insulate and then switch fuels. It shouldn't increase demand that much, especially if there is some serious conservation. And if that doesn't help you can always build another 100 reactors.
The only thing needed is political will.
So anyway, to me oil is like 100 times more problematic than NG. It's rather hard to run cars on wind and atom splitting.