Like the illusion of Wall Street, with its vast and powerful investment banks, now shuttered, China too is an illusion perpetuated by the Globalists that gave us the 15,000 mile Caesar salad, poisoned cat food and lead based paint on babies' pacifiers. Like the illusion that money would come from thin air to always push housing prices higher, China has spent a generation pursuing its illusion. Pursuing an unattainable dream to be like the West, while 6000 years of its carefully shepherded top soil blows into the sea.
Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2008 5:01 pm Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
ROCKMAN wrote:
Lowkey,
What's the current status of your natural gas reserves? About 20 years ago I understood NZ had huge NG reserves but so little market that it wasn't being exploited.
From your post I gather it's a lack of generating stations more than a lack of NG. But they do go hand in hand. The industry won't develop the NG if there is no market and the plants won't be built unless they are certain of a fuel source. This is one of the few areas I would support gov't intervention in the free market.
Natural gas - production:
4.35 billion cu m (2004 est.)
Natural gas - consumption:
4.349 billion cu m (2004 est.)
Natural gas - proved reserves:
33.36 billion cu m (1 January 2005 est.)
So yeah, there's a bit left. Estimates seem to range from 7 to 15 years worth of gas to keep us going, depending on consumption and new finds. Of course, if we start using CNG for vehicles (as we once did) or build more NG fired power stations this number will drop off rapidly. Hence some of the unwillingness to build more NG power stations. That and the whole knee jerk "climate change" issue which is bought into hook line and sinker (urgh). Of course, it should allow us enough time to start properly utilising geothermal and other alternative sources of energy. Unfortunately NZ simply tends to take a ridiculous amount of time to do....well anything really. Being a primarily socialist nation means that the government does happily intervene in every damn thing, but rarely for any useful purpose......
Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2008 5:26 am Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
Thanks Lowkey.
Not a very good comfort margin when you're talking about a NG plant to take 7 or 8 years to recover it's construction costs. Does anyone have any beleivable estimates of undiscovered reserves?
Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2008 7:42 am Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
Thanks Matt. But I was focusing on New Zealand reserves.
As far as USGS reserve growth estimates the boys there have a difficult job. They do not have the data base that's really needed to develop even a rough idea of futrue reserves. Vitually all the data base is past preformances. This is handy for estimating recoveries from fields that have been producting for a while but of little use in analyzing new trends. As an example, the Deep Water trend in the Gulf of Mexico is much more significant than the industry had anticipate 10 to 15 years ago. But the industry had the data to evaluate the potential. The boys with the Survey didn't have the data so they were essentially blind to thew upside.
Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2008 8:04 pm Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
I am always had one main problem with the Olduvai theory, that is the concept of the "cliff event" where essentially the light go out and never come back on or severe electricity shortages occur in the developed world within 5-10 years.
First off, very little oil is used to run the electricity grid in the developed world, so peak oil will NOT be a cause of this. NG shortages I do not forsee as a major issue in the near future, although we will need a significant percentage by say 2025 to safeguard against potential rapid drop offs in NG supply.
Second, any severe PO induced recession will lessen strain on the grid, less economic activity means less businesses operated and reduces demand and as McMansions are abandoned as more people find apartments or live with relatives (or worse become homeless) residential energy use will go down.
Electricity will always be there I believe, anyone who has a place to call home will stil be able to turn the lights on. Having that job may be another matter.
Pretty staggering amount of $ and kw we burn up to keep the sky lit at night. That would be the first and largest hunk of fat to be trimmed. _________________ Cogito, ergo non satis bibivi
C'mon man, who're you gonna believe?
Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2008 12:35 am Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
Dan1195 wrote:
First off, very little oil is used to run the electricity grid in the developed world, so peak oil will NOT be a cause of this.
I encourage you to think outsid the box, er, oil drum. Ten seconds should be enough to come up with quite a few things that ARE dependent on oil that electricty production IS dependent on.
Like... vehicles. People. I large percentage of the material for building and running plant... and that was just one second's worht of brainstorming.
We really need to think of these thigns in wholistic terms... and holistic.
Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2008 12:36 am Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
ROCKMAN wrote:
DUDE
NO...I HADN'T SEEN IT. PULLED IT UP AND READ THE ABSTRACT. LOOKS LIKE PROBABLY THE BEST CURRENT ESTIMATE OF WHERE PRODUCTION INCREASE ARE GOING. I'LL STUDY THE DETAILS THIS WEEKEND.
HEY!!!! EVERONE....CHECK OUT DUD'E REFERENCE TO GIANT OIL FIELDS.....COULD BE A NEW THREAD ALL TO ITSELF
Maybe some of you folks need to spend more time on the oil drum. That thesis is nearly a year old.
Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2008 5:36 am Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
Yes ccpo...a year old. When oil was half the price it is now. Doesn't hurt to stay current in these rapidly changing times, does it?
BTW, I've been a petroleum geologist for ove 30 years and have been incorporation the PO issue ( we actually refer to it as "reserve replacement" issue) in my economic anaylsis model for the last 15 years.
But hey...glad to listen to anything you have to contribute to the conversation.
Posted: Tue Jul 15, 2008 5:47 am Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
Matt,
I thunk on it for a while and it's hard to come up with a percentage since its been something of a moving target. Also, most US exploration in the last 20 years have focused on natural gas. Actually most exploratory drilling isn't evaluated so much on price as probability of success. Exploration being what it is they can thow huge reserve numbers that can make it work at any price IF YOU IGNORE THE LOW PROBABILITY OF SUCCESS. A real life example: drilled a Deep Water Gulf of Mexico well for a client last fall: $148 million dry hole. When this prospect was developed and the drilling commitment made oil was probably around $50/bbl. But the well cost estimate at that time was probably around $60 million. (the actual cost should have been around $110 million but Sh__ happens, you know)
If I get your point, the economics of exploration drilling at $140/bbl are not that much better than they were when oil was $60/bbl. Life was very good for the oil patch back then. Cost have exploded and jump almost daily. Drilling rigs/personnel are another commodity just like oil: their cost rises with the price of oil. The oil service industry has been a much better investment the oil companies. They make the same profit on a dry hole as a producer. (p.s. basicly I'm also a service provider)
Posted: Tue Jul 15, 2008 10:18 am Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
ROCKMAN wrote:
Yes ccpo...a year old. When oil was half the price it is now. Doesn't hurt to stay current in these rapidly changing times, does it?
BTW, I've been a petroleum geologist for ove 30 years and have been incorporation the PO issue ( we actually refer to it as "reserve replacement" issue) in my economic anaylsis model for the last 15 years.
But hey...glad to listen to anything you have to contribute to the conversation.
Easy, there, Rocky. Don't get yer rocks jumbled. I was surprised that people would be having this conversation without that info informing their position. It was a huge story last fall. You're not the least bit surprised someone would post as if it was this great new thing?
There's a time issue here. We seem to be going round in circles wrt peak oil, climate change and getting some inertia going. Awareness is rising, but the level of ignorance out there is unbelievable.
It's like the story today on Saudi oil production capping at 12.5 sustainably. Well, duh! Al Husseini said that last October. But, hey, it's all speculators driving up prices...!
He-he...
The conversations at TOD are bit more informed, I guess, so perhaps I'm just experiencing culture shock. But that's surprising considering who runs this site.
Posted: Tue Jul 15, 2008 10:35 am Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
I was teasing with you ccpo. I do need to be careful, though: can't see me smilling when I type.
I just started to bounce around here and TOD and suffer the same problem most do: jumping into an ongoing conversation it easy to miss back stories and end goals of any one chat. I particularly like it when folks disagree with me. Any good idea can stand scrutiny. And if it can't then it needs modification. So far I've been very impressed by the level of efforts all here make. Some of the individual research efforts are truly impressive.
Joined: Oct 06, 2006 Posts: 1371 Location: East Texas
Posted: Tue Jul 15, 2008 4:31 pm Post subject: Re: Review of the Olduvai Gorge
Quote:
At what point will it all be nationalized and then we can cease with considering everything in terms of financial gain rather then EROEI...?
I'd bet never. Nationalization always creates less of everything at a higher cost. A more effective method of gaining control is what we do now; we micro manage with the tax code. _________________ Yes, we are. As we are.
And so shall we remain; Until the end.
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