Plotting The Coming Oil Shock

By Matthew Wild

28 August, 2010
Peak Generation
http://www.countercurrents.org/wild280810.htm

A study based on the Hubbert model of peak oil suggests a coming global oil shock may begin as early as 2014 – which ties in with the timeline suggested in a variety of other reports and statements.

Peak oil, the concept that geological constraints dictate a time must come when oil production reaches its natural limit, makes it clear a diminishing supply will soon be on a collision course with soaring demand. Despite getting a showing online, and in the occasional business report, it’s yet to break into the mainstream media.

I recently considered three major energy reports published so far in 2010 which take a number of different views on the issue:
• The Oil Crunch: a Wake-up Call for the UK Economy (published by UK Industry Taskforce on Peak Oil & Energy Security in February) that suggests oil is currently at or near peak and so output “cannot rise significantly above 92 million barrels per day;”
• The Joint Operating Environment 2010 (United States Joint Forces Command, published a little later in February), stating the world has vast reserves but has not invested enough to keep increasing supplies;
• Sustainable Energy Security: Strategic Risks and Opportunities for Business (published by insurers Lloyds with Chatham House, June), which manages to take both sides, stating: “Even before we reach peak oil, we could witness an oil supply crunch because of increased Asian demand.”

Three independent reports, one consistent prediction – the world will be entering into a period of oil supply turmoil sometime between the beginning of
2011 or 2013. These findings are based on subtlety different assumptions about oil production: it’s at peak, it’s underinvested, or that both are true.
(There's more about this in my original post, of course.)

Continued at link...

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Estimates of total remaining oil are rubbery because "oil" embraces a huge range of carbon-containing substances, each with their own extraction problems and opportunities. During its long anti-apartheid boycott, South Africa developed processes for producing a liquid oil product from coal. Alberta has vast reserves of tar sand from which an industrial grade oil product can be manufactured with the injection of substantial energy in the form of natural gas and large quantities of water.

The question with these "dirtier" grades of liquid hydrocarbon is the extent to which the world can afford the collateral damage. National Geographic published in March last year an article on the Alberta tar sands, accompanied by a gallery of photos showing the wide scale devastation that shale oil mining is generating:

Scraping Bottom
Once considered too expensive, as well as too damaging to the land, exploitation of Alberta's oil sands is now a gamble worth billions.

Here is a pretty decent (realistic) article about what is ahead of us. It is too long to be reproduced in full, thus, you should click on the above link if you want to read it, but at least, I wish to reproduce a graph from the article:

/yawn

These things remind me of the "End Times" hucksters that come around every 3-5 years and sell a bunch of books and then vanish before their prophesies are supposed to come to pass... only to reappear several years later after people have forgotten about their predictions.

I don't doubt that we'll eventually run out of oil, its a finite resource after all, but I really doubt anyone has the slightest clue as to when its going to happen.

Originally Posted by roadkill

Estimates of total remaining oil are rubbery because "oil" embraces a huge range of carbon-containing substances, each with their own extraction problems and opportunities. During its long anti-apartheid boycott, South Africa developed processes for producing a liquid oil product from coal. Alberta has vast reserves of tar sand from which an industrial grade oil product can be manufactured with the injection of substantial energy in the form of natural gas and large quantities of water. The question with these "dirtier" grades of liquid hydrocarbon is the extent to which the world can afford the collateral damage. National Geographic published in March last year an article on the Alberta tar sands, accompanied by a gallery of photos showing the wide scale devastation that shale oil mining is generating: Scraping Bottom Once considered too expensive, as well as too damaging to the land, exploitation of Alberta's oil sands is now a gamble worth billions.

The main reason people are going after that crap is because they're locked out of places like Venezuela and the Africas by 2-bit dictators and warlords. Not because we're running out of actual crude oil.

That said I think the process that goes into extracting and cleaning shale oil is totally not worth the end result. But cash is king... like how the Canadian government ordered a study on the environmental impact of this process, but after it was finished they then ordered it to be destroyed without it being released and no more talk was ever made of it.

For those who prefer their endings happy:



Or alternatively:



People got all worked up about the end of the Roman empire, but for most people life just went on as usual. I've got faith in us. I reckon we'll adapt without too many deaths.

Actually, I'd kind of like anarchy. Its what my skills are adapted for, I just don't believe in it.

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The premise would be more valid in a non-technical society. Foxes run out of rabbits, they're stuffed; we have conscious development of alternatives as a possible out. I just posted an article recently about solar cells that can reconstruct themselves like plants - work is being done and alternate strategies are bing developed.

Peak oil is not going to bring us down. Global warming might.

What AIS, Zichao and Contra said. We'll Muddle Through... We tend to...

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Originally Posted by Gilles

What AIS, Zichao and Contra said. We'll Muddle Through... We tend to...

Originally Posted by contra

Peak oil is not going to bring us down. Global warming might.

Good to know. I can sleep well o' nights