Comments | valuesystem: Peak Oil Now? New Data Leads to Speculation

valuesystem

Peak Oil Now? New Data Leads to Speculation

May 11, 2007 19:00

New data from the U.S. government shows something disturbing. An analysis of the data suggests that we may be looking at the peak of oil production, right now.

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resources, peakoil, oil, oil depletion, deflation, supply, gas, peak oil, gas prices, oil crisis, gasoline prices, oil supply, energy supply, economy, demand, fossil fuels, gasoline, energy demand, economics, inflation, energy crisis, stagflation

Comments 30

sir_bissel May 12 2007, 01:45:33 UTC

I'm no good at this new fangled "math" thing that seems to be all the rage these days, but wouldn't that mean that in the 1970s, at the rate it was/is going, at about 10 million per 5 years, there were 10 million barrels being produced? Or in 1950 there were less than 1 million being produced? Just wondering how the graph would look if extended from the 1900s or so...

valuesystem May 12 2007, 03:55:47 UTC

( ... )

sir_bissel May 12 2007, 09:43:24 UTC

I think another question, though, would also be, is the change in growth necessarily from ... something... environmental reasons? What I mean is, could the change in the growth rate be related to a group of men in a dark board room saying "Mwahaha let's only produce X barrels this year, that way the prices go up and we get rich, rich rich!"? I dunno. It's 6 and I'm tired and have been up for 19 hours so anything I say is going to sound very... silly.

valuesystem May 12 2007, 14:56:41 UTC

Well, that certainly seems to be what happened in the oil shock of 1973-1974, so it certainly should be something to look into ( ... )

Thread 18

a long peak? magicgravel May 20 2007, 18:10:16 UTC

It is sad it is coming to this. I don't want to be vindictive about how our country has squandered its wealth and its oil. Hopefully the peak is a long nearly-horizontal line. Even if that means rising prices for increased extraction costs.

I've read "oil on the brain" recently. It goes in to how much deeper they drill in Texas these days to find oil. Have they tried drilling that deeply in Ohio or Pennsylvania? That is where the oil industry started, and the region was once a shallow ocean. Just like the Texas oil fields.

Re: a long peak? valuesystem May 20 2007, 20:33:22 UTC

I don't know about the depth of drilling. My understanding is that if oil is found at a certain level, then it usually isn't found in a much deeper level. In any event, the USA is only extracting 5 million barrels per day, compared to about 10 million barrels per day in 1970. Even if there were additional oil to find in the states, it would not prevent peak oil. I suspect that if the oil companies thought there was oil to find in Texas, Ohio, or Pennsylvania, then there would be crews drilling for it ( ... )

Below 20,000 feet, oil cooks to natural gas magicgravel May 22 2007, 18:59:37 UTC

Hi,

Go read Kenneth Deffeyes book "Hubbert's Peak" for a primer on oil formation. Generally, sedimentary rocks containing keragin that are lowered to between 20,000 and 25,000 feet "cook" into oil from the extreme heat and pressure. Below 25,000 feet, oil breaksdown into natural gas. So when you hear folks say "We'll drill deeper.", it assumes that there IS oil much father down. And that violates the laws of physics.

Also, as you alluded to, if the oil companies thought there was oil in Texas, Ohio or Pennsylvania, there would be crews drilling for it. This country has an EXCELLENT USGS which has surveyed the country for energy resources. We have been intensely studying US geology for the past 175 years for coal and oil. We know the landscape, we know the geology underneath the landscape. The big ones are all gone. What's left are little ones here and there. We'll get them but they will be too expensive to burn. What will we use them for? One word: Plastics.

Charles

Re: Below 20,000 feet, oil cooks to natural gas valuesystem May 22 2007, 20:29:48 UTC

Hi Charles,

Thanks for the reminder. I believe I have Deffeyes book on the shelf. Sounds like time for me to freshen up on it. I personally have a difficult time staying focused on peak oil, and holding down a full time job, family, etc. which requires a totally different kind of thinking.

I agree with your post, and am intrigued by your plastics comment. It may very well be that hydrocarbon molecules from petroleum will eventually be used only as feed stocks.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroleum#Uses

I am curious if there are substitute sources of those hydrocarbon molecules that might be easier to get at -- perhaps from biological products?

ocschwar May 22 2007, 18:15:49 UTC

Any reason why a binomial fit is appropriate to this case?

A binomial fit will predict an early decline, and will trail off the sides on the early part of the graph, and doesn't reflect any attempt at modeling oil production (logistic curves, error curves, et cetera).

A more fitting tool is a low pass filter that does away with trends on a shorter scale than a year.

valuesystem May 22 2007, 19:09:29 UTC

I chose a binomial fit because of the various fits available in Excel, it was the one that most closely followed the trend ( ... )

just what i needed anonymous November 5 2007, 13:13:48 UTC

i'm eric. joining a couple boards and looking
forward to participating. hehe unless i get
too distracted!

eric

Re: just what i needed valuesystem November 5 2007, 13:29:31 UTC

Welcome!

There are good levels of distraction, and bad levels of distraction. Such is life.

just what i needed anonymous November 6 2007, 04:07:22 UTC

i'm eric. joining a couple boards and looking
forward to participating. hehe unless i get
too distracted!

eric

Re: just what i needed valuesystem December 16 2007, 16:20:10 UTC

Yes, distraction is a problem. It is part of the "cultural trance". Try to keep it real.