What is Peak Oil?

Posted by deadmantalking at 7/21/2009 2:07 PM
Categories: uncategorized
Tags: oil energy crisis fossil fuels
   Peak oil is an important concept in the modern world, and one that doesn't get nearly enough attention or press.  So what is it exactly?  Peak oil is the concept that sooner or later, the supply of oil will peak and then gradually decline until we run out in 25 to 50 years.  Basically, it goes like this.  The world has 1 trillion barrels of oil in the ground at present.  However, 90 million barrels of oil are used by the world each and every day for various purposes.  This is much faster than oil is formed, since oil is a nonrenewable resource that is formed over millions of years.  So for all intensive purposes, the earth's oil supply (assuming constant rate of withdrawal) will be at zero barrels in a little over 30 years.  However, as oil supplies dwindle, it will be harder to pump any significant amount from the ground, which means that the rate of withdrawal will gradually decline.  Peak oil then, is the rate of maximum production before the rate of oil withdrawal begins declining.  Of course, once the rate of oil begins declining, the price of oil goes up, which means that gas prices follow.  And yet, despite this certainty, the United States government and the world at large have done little to address the problem of what our main source of energy will be in the future once the supplies of fossil fuels are exhausted. 

  This phenomenon known as peak oil is nothing new.  In fact, it has already occured in the United States.  Oil production in the United States in 1970 was about 10 million barrels of oil per day.  In 1975, oil production in the U.S was already down to 8 million barrels per day, and at present, oil production is around 4 million barrels per day.  Check out this graph and story at this url: http://www.theoildrum.com/node/4172.  Another interesting thing to check out on the attached site is how oil reserves in the Middle East have grown since the 1980s.  However, this is not a real increase.  In the 1980s, when OPEC formed, the rule was that you could only pump out oil at a rate that was proportional to your reserves (not sure what the proportion was).  So, the countries in OPEC had a vested interest in overstating the size of their reserves so that they could increase oil production.  Basically, even though the countries in the Middle East claim to have about 900 billion barrels of oil in reserve, the truth is probably closer to half that (or possibly less). 

    Here's a news article from Business Week that discusses the likelihood of Saudi oil production falling off over the next few years:  http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jul2008/db2008079_865368.htm

  Here's an excerpt of an article involving the IEA decreasing their predictions in oil production and getting an angry OPEC reaction (which, the article states, the IEA still predicts an oil supply of 106 million barrels per day in 2030, which I find to be very unlikely, but that is likely to be much higher than the supply in that year):  http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/natural_resources/article5141848.ece

  An energy expert for Raymond James and Associates believes that production peaked in 2008:  http://evworld.com/article.cfm?storyid=1729

  Peak oil is no longer debatable (Business Day article): http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=76325

  And Forbes has an article on how peak oil will change our lives:  http://www.forbes.com/2009/07/14/20-dollar-gallon-business-energy-oil.html

  
  
Other interesting website to check out: 
http://www.oildecline.com/ 
http://www.theoildrum.com/
http://www.peak-oil-news.info/
http://www.energybulletin.net/node/49629
http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/

And then there are those who believe peak oil is just a myth:
http://peakoildebunked.blogspot.com/
http://www.prisonplanet.com/archives/peak_oil/index.htm
http://www.reason.com/news/show/36645.html

There are already local agencies dedicated to this reality:
http://www.portlandpeakoil.org/\
http://vtpeakoil.net/
http://www.seattleoil.com/

Some interesting books on the matter include (which I've already read, as an Environmental Science grad):
Powerdown
Fossil Fools (be warned that the author does have his nuclear energy agenda, which may or may not be a good idea)
The End of Oil

And of course, there are others on Amazon that look interesting, but that I cannot vouch for.


So what's the crux?  Oil supply will peak soon (if it hasn't already), and the prices in 10 to 20 years will make us wish that we had acted sooner on developing renewable resources.  Since we aren't currently dedicating nearly enough time or money to developing alternative energy to fossil fuels, we'll likely be caught off guard, and a major energy crisis will erupt when demand for oil becomes much higher than the amount that is in supply.  This will likely lead to a global catastrophe (likely) or an era where the entire world cooperates to resolve the energy crisis (unlikely).  Please do read up on this, and as with everything, keep in mind any possible agendas of the peak oil deniers as well as any agendas of the doomsday crowd.




 

 

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