[common_sense]

It's been 4 years and my opinion hasn't changed.

Oil is not going to run out.

Simple fact is that we've done mostly land drilling, with some offshore drilling.

Even in this insane scenario we completely run out in twenty years, there is still the fact we can drill in the oceans.

Oh, right, you forgot about the oceans.

Further, you fail to take into account that in the next six years we'll have viable alternative fuel sources.

Jesus Christ. I'm tired of this paranoid, end of the world crap. You folks are almost as bad as the nuclear war people.
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"I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat." ~ Sir Winston Spencer Churchhill

[shortonsense]

Jesus Christ. I'm tired of this paranoid, end of the world crap. You folks are almost as bad as the nuclear war people.
---
"I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat." ~ Sir Winston Spencer Churchhill

Who says that the posters here aren't also populating the nuclear war forums? Maybe the entire internet and its related blogs and forums are just 20-30 ticked off opinionated people running around torturing each other while the other 6 billion watch in amusement?

[diemos]

So why do you stay?

[Ludi]

Oil is not going to run out.

Very few people on this messageboard believe oil is going to "run out."

[Outcast_Searcher]

Common_sense, I think you may find that if you read some more, that although the doomer comments seem to dominate in the short run, there are a lot of folks with a much more (IMO) rational view.

There are moderates like myself, and even cornies.

My view, which I've stated repeatedly on various fora, is a rough echo of the Jeff Rubin scenario, but much more conservative on the timing. (Jeff Rubin's recent book and position including speeches are easily found via simple Google Searches).

In a nutshell -- he says there is PLENTY of oil out there -- running out is NOT a problem in the moderate term. The problem is, simply, with growth in demand from sources like Chindia, and relatively restrained outlook for substantial supply growth, especially in the next decade or so -- it looks like the global price for oil will likely escalate "soon" to a price that makes it UNAFFORDABLE for much of the world's population to continue to BURN it.

a). This will hit, once the world economic recovery gets solidly rolling and Chindia demand for Tata-nano like cars hits full force.

b). The resulting price spike in crude to perhaps $200 or much more in the next several years, will be REALLY hard on all but the rich. It will cause gobal economic shocks, in fact.


I actually think that in perhaps 30 years (or more), the globe could be much better off as far as energy. I am REALLY concerned, however, about how we get through the next 10 to 15, and keep the global economy going well enough to make the INVESTMENTS required to transition the world to a sustainable energy and pollution profile.

Now, if you think this position is also crazy -- fine. But before deciding consider that it will take a decade or more, MASSIVE investment, and HIGH prices to get meaningful oil production out of the deepwater deposits in general, especially as the average price of oil trends upward overall.

[Ayame]

Oh, right, you forgot about the oceans.

No we didn't forget the oceans. We are however firm believers in EROEI, which it appears you have forgotten.

Further, you fail to take into account that in the next six years we'll have viable alternative fuel sources.

Which are exactly? Tell me exactly which alternatives will be able to support our way of life and allow us to grow to use around 115 million barrels of oil equivalent per day plus. Or are you just saying that they will think of something?

[ian807]

True: Oil will not run out.
True: There are alternative fuel sources.

Also true:
The majority of the oil left in the world is going to be *much* more expensive to produce, refine and distribute. This is particularly true of deepwater finds - so much so that some of the major oil companies have ceased investing in exploration and are diversifying into non-energy businesses. Not enough profit.

The energy return from 1 barrel of oil in the 60s was 100 barrels of oil worth of energy. These days, 1 barrel produces 12 barrels. There is literally less bang for the buck in today's oil.

As so many people here will no doubt point out, we'll never "run out" of oil, but it will become an increasingly expensive energy source. We'll eventually switch more to natural gas, but natural gas fields deplete remarkably rapidly. Few are still producing after 5 years. Almost none after 10. We'll use it. We'll have to, but don't expect it to solve any problems.

The fundamental problem is that the world's transportation is still almost completely dependent on petroleum products and these products will become very expensive and/or unavailable far more quickly than we'll be able to adapt our infrastructure to use alternatives.

It's not the end of the world. It is probably the end of wealth for most people on the planet, and starvation for a rather large number as well as petroleum based fertilizers disappear and transportation of food over long distance becomes prohibitively expensive.

I would suggest you might review the opinions of that doomer organization, the US military (http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/apr/11/peak-oil-production-supply) for further details

By the way, I work in the oil industry. What do you do?.

[TWilliam]

It's been 4 years and my opinion hasn't changed.

Wow, really? Four years to learn about these issues in depth and your opinion still hasn't changed?

Methinks your nick is woefully inappropriate. Certainly inaccurate if intended to be self-descriptive to say the least...

[hillsidedigger]

Technically and economically recoverable oil will become scarce in far fewer than 20 more years.

[shortonsense]

Oh, right, you forgot about the oceans.

No we didn't forget the oceans. We are however firm believers in EROEI, which it appears you have forgotten.

We? I sure hope you got a frog in your pocket, and you have their proxy.

Which are exactly? Tell me exactly which alternatives will be able to support our way of life and allow us to grow to use around 115 million barrels of oil equivalent per day plus. Or are you just saying that they will think of something?

Why...all the OTHER ones of course.

[shortonsense]

The easy commercial stuff is close to shore and the remaining offshore petroleum is in deeper waters.

The "drill-baby-drill" crowd have not done their homework.

Of course they have.

Here's on-shore, near infrastructure, and enough to run the world for an easy decade or two.

http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2009/3028/pdf/FS09-3028.pdf

Its never been about not having enough, we have PLENTY ( THE P WORD!! OMG! ), its the tinpots sitting on top of the stuff who keep stealing all the equipment.

[shortonsense]

The "drill-baby-drill" crowd have not done their homework.

Sure they have.....you just don't pay attention.

One day the world had some trillion barrels in inventory, and the next? 1.5 trillion!

http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2009/3028/pdf/FS09-3028.pdf

Seems rather difficult for any rational person to get their panties in a wad when a few decades of global oil supply got dropped into the mix just in the 1st quarter of 2010. Who knows what plenty will arrive in the 2nd!

[shortonsense]

Here's on-shore, near infrastructure, and enough to run the world for an easy decade or two.

http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2009/3028/pdf/FS09-3028.pdf

Its never been about not having enough, we have PLENTY ( THE P WORD!! OMG! ), its the tinpots sitting on top of the stuff who keep stealing all the equipment.

The time for such unconventional reserves has come and gone.

The US is prototyping the sheer mind blowing size and consequences of developing unconventional natural gas here in the United States, as well as what has happened in unconventional oil. I'd say we prototype it for the rest of the world and when it rolls out into those resources, its WHIZ BANG. Certainly its completely capable of reversing Hubberts decline decades after peak, that means if peak oil really was 2005, we could have another one driven by unconventionals by 2035 or so.

Low-eroei reserves like Orinoco require so much extra resources, effort, time, money to process, and so will not be economic on a scale necessary to mitigate peak oil.

Exactly the assumptions about shale gas in the US. It didn't just mitigate, it created ANOTHER peak. I'm betting industry goes with what works rather than pretending EROEI somehow suddenly becomes relevant.

The "Law of Receding Horizons" tells us you need regular less-costly petroleum to access this difficult stuff. No profit from Orinoco without big-government subsidies

Might tell YOU that, certainly doesn't tell me anything. Any receding horizons argument could just as easily apply to the business in 1916 during a time when educated and experienced oil people thought we were going to run out soon. And again.

Shorty, you are dreamin' baby dreamin'

Once upon a time Ghawar was low EROEI and impossible and by extension unconventional. Amazing what even a little perspective can do for someone in this debate.

[shortonsense]

Let me guess? You are about to change the subject again: to Bakken?

And then I will tell everyone that Bakken will never be economic at $4 tcf but at higher costs is too expensive to drill.

The Bakken is primarily an oil accumulation, not gas. And if it costs $4 per TCF I will write a check for all of it that you can sell me to the tune of everything in my bank account, retirement account, and any other money I can beg, borrow or steal from friends and relatives.

And it is not sustainable without a new group of clueless investors because the wells deplete so fast.

What does "deplete so fast" mean to someone of your vast expertise in the field? Is it closer to "bunches" than it is "alot"?

That old-eroie buggaboo comes back to bite you in the rear.

You have not yet provided a single industry person who has ever provided a go/no-go decision on exploring for, drilling, completing, producing or abandoning a single well in the history of the world based on EROEI.

Maybe if we wait through another couple peak oil's someone will step forward to claim its happened...once....out of millions of wells and millions of decisions to drill those wells?