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- how long will it last?
This is one question that Practically Green is asked very often. Jay Hanson recently posted this analysis - we thought it worth reprinting - what do you think? Write to our Guest book with your comments.
EUR Oil
Jay Hanson, 12/27/97
"The days of the oil shortages are over," said economist
William Wilson of Comerica Bank in Detroit, adding that's
welcome news for truck owners. "Trucks are here to stay
because Americans like them."
-- Detroit Free Press, 12/13/97
As Wilson demonstrates, oil industry jargon has confused
economists for many years. Here is a typical quote from an
oil-economist:
"One thing I have learned over the years is to distrust
any projections of economically recoverable reserves."
If one persists in thinking of energy in terms of "money
price", then one simply can not understand the energy
issues. The key to understanding energy issues is look
at the "energy price" of energy.
The critical issue here is NOT "economically recoverable
reserves", it is in oil industry jargon: "Estimated
Ultimately Recoverable" or "EUR" oil. In fact, official
estimates of EUR oil have "varied little" over the last 50
years.
"For many years geologists and oil companies have published
estimates of the total amount of crude oil that will ultimately
be recovered from the earth over all time. Remarkably, these
assessments of Estimated Ultimately Recoverable (EUR) oil have
varied little over the past half century."
[ This is direct quote from a 1996 World Resources
Institute paper by James MacKenzie. Take a look:
http://www.wri.org/wri/climate/finitoil/eur-oil.html ]
________________________________________________
IN 1970, OIL PRODUCTION IN THE LOWER-48 "PEAKED"
40 years ago, geologist M. King Hubbert developed a method for
projecting future oil production and predicted that oil
production in the lower-48 states would peak about 1970. This
prediction has proved to be remarkably accurate. Both total and
peak yields have risen slightly compared to Hubbert's original
estimate, but the timing of the peak and the general downward
trend of production were correct.
[ See the graph for the lower-48 at:
http://www.wri.org/wri/climate/finitoil/productn.html ]
And contrary to a commonly held belief, rising fuel prices will
not create new supplies of fuel. Despite quadrupling prices for
oil and gas products, the "moral equivalent of war", and a 280
percent increase in drilling, the United States is producing less
oil today than it did in 1970.
Global oil production will begin to "peak" when approximately
half of the "Estimated Ultimately Recoverable" oil has been
recovered. The exact date is unknown, but it could be soon as
the year 2000:
"Two important conclusions emerge from this discussion. First,
if growth in world demand continues at a modest 2 percent per
year, production could begin declining as soon as the year
2000. Second, even enormous (and unlikely) increases in EUR
oil buy the world little more than another decade (from 2007
to 2018). In short, unless growth in world oil demand is
sharply lower than generally projected, world oil production
will probably begin its long-term decline soon -- and certainly
within the next two decades." [Again from WRI, please take
a look http://www.wri.org/wri/climate/finitoil/futuroil.html ]
"It is reluctantly concluded that there is strong evidence that
the restricted Hubbert Curve for the world's total EUR of oil
may first peak about the year 2000, Fig. 4, after which it may
fluctuate along a horizontal production line (restricted by
Saudi Arabia/OPEC) before inevitable decline ..."
[ from WORLD OIL, October 1995, FUTURE WORLD SUPPLIES,
by L. F. Ivanhoe, http://dieoff.org/page85.htm ]
"At the time of writing in late 1996, there are still three
more years to go until the end of the transition."
[p. 59, THE COMING OIL CRISIS, by C. J. Campbell;
Multi-Science Publishing Company & Petroconsultants,
1997; ISBN 0906522110
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0906522110/3088-4711339-639335 ]
________________
PETROCONSULTANTS
Petroconsultants is the world's leading provider of data and
analysis for petroleum exploration and production. With
headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, Petroconsultants maintains
offices in London, Houston, Sydney and Singapore, supported by
over 250 dedicated multilingual and multinational employees and
a worldwide network of correspondents and associates.
[ http://www.petroconsultants.com/ ]
"A new report on world oil resources, World Oil Supply 1930-2050
(Campbell and Laherre, Petroconsultants Pty. Ltd., 1995),
concludes that the planet's oil supplies will be exhausted
much sooner than previously thought.
"The report, written for oil industry insiders and priced at
$32,000 per copy, concludes that world oil production and
supply probably will peak as soon as the year 2000 and will
decline to half the peak level by 2025. Large and permanent
increases in oil prices are predicted after the year 2000."
[ from EARTH ISLAND JOURNAL, Spring 1997, THE DEATH OF THE
OIL ECONOMY, by Ted Trainer http://dieoff.org/page116.htm ]
__________________________________________________
ENERGY IS THE PRECONDITION FOR ALL OTHER RESOURCES
There is NO substitute for energy. Although the economy treats
energy just like any other resource, it is NOT like any other
resource. Energy is the precondition for ALL other resources and
oil is the most important form of energy we use, making up about
38 percent of the world energy supply.
NO other energy source equals oil's intrinsic qualities of
extractablility, transportability, versatility and cost. These
are the qualities that enabled oil to take over from coal as
the front-line energy source in the industrialized world in the
middle of this century, and they are as relevant today as they
were then.
Optimists tend to assume that the "quality" (e.g., liquid vs.
solid) of energy we use is not significant, that an infinite
amount of social capital is available to search for and produce
energy, and that an infinite flow of solar energy is available
for human use. Realists know that none of these assumptions is
true.
"If one considers the last one hundred years of the U.S.
experience, fuel use and economic output are highly correlated.
An important measure of fuel efficiency is the ratio of energy
use to the gross national product, E/GNP. The E/GNP ratio has
fallen by about 42% since 1929. We find that the improvement
in energy efficiency is due principally to three factors: (1)
shifts to higher quality fuels such as petroleum and primary
electricity; (2) shifts in energy use between households and
other sectors; and (3) higher fuel prices. Energy quality is
by far the dominant factor." [Cleveland et al., 1984
http://dieoff.org/page17.htm#ENERGY ]
__________________
ECONOMIC IMPLOSION
"The global price of oil after the supply crunch should follow
the simplest economic law of supply and demand: There will be
a major increase in crude oil and all other fuels' prices,
accompanied by global hyperinflation, rationing, etc. After
the associated economic implosion, many of the world's
developed societies may look like today's Russia. The United
States may be competing with China for every tanker of oil,
with the Persian Gulf oil exporters preferring Chinese rockets
to American paper dollars for their oil."
[ from THE FUTURIST, January/February, 1997, GET READY FOR
ANOTHER OIL SHOCK!, by L. F. Ivanhoe
http://dieoff.org/page90.htm ]
As energy prices increase, we become less "energy efficient"
with respect to imported oil. That is, we will have to burn
more energy in order to make more goods and services (to make
more money) to buy a barrel of oil. It's a positive feedback
loop. But there's a thermodynamic limit on how much we can pay!
If as a country, we must spend two barrels of oil to produce
enough goods and services to buy one barrel of oil, it is
impossible for us to pay our overhead -- it is impossible for
us to continue. At that point, America's economic machine is
just plain "out of gas".
For more, see: FOSSILGATE: http://dieoff.org/page122.htm
Jay -- http://dieoff.org/page1.htm
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