No ASPO updates in a month

by **John_A** » Fri 15 Feb 2013, 22:37:15

In a world so heavily impacted by all that peak oil has brought us, is there any reason why these guys, sponsored by those of us who know and believe, haven't updated their website in a month with anything more than a "test"?

Lars accepted a position advertised at $75G's a year or two back, aren't out lobbyists in Washington supposed to be doing SOMETHING for us?

http://aspousa.org/

by **Buddy_J** » Sun 17 Feb 2013, 15:07:50

A month without activity isn't a big deal. Currently, they are in the unenviable position of trying to refute the obvious. Maybe quiet is the best policy until the worm turns, as it were.

by **John_A** » Mon 18 Feb 2013, 01:24:58

A big deal? Well, that would depend on your perspective on what the lobbying group, funded by someone who I assume actually believes and worries about peak oil, should be doing to sound the alarms, waken the citizens, basically make sure that the entire country doesn't stumble off into a mad max looking future.

So sitting around resting on their relatively new laurels (peak oil lobbying being a relatively new concept as far as ASPO's history is concerned) is hardly the most likely configuration I would expect of their "can see the capital from here" offices, the salary they pay Lars, and in general the level of fuss some of us expect from them.

As far as refuting the obvious, that is a big deal, and undoubtedly an interesting topic of conversion when dealing with the muckity mucks of Washington. Sounding scarcity alarms in the midst of multi-decade highs in oil production is certainly not a job for newbies.

by **Buddy_J** » Mon 18 Feb 2013, 19:59:41

You sound pretty heavily invested in this ASPO thing. So they aren't doing a particularly good job sounding the alarm, according to you, how hard do you think is reasonable to sound the alarm? Screaming about the wolf coming on a daily basis does tend to have a putting off tendency, but sitting behind a strict peak oil definition in a country not only past its own peak but reversing it faster than any other country on the planet can be one hell of a hard sell. Maybe they are working harder than ever, selling some version to someone, and we just can't see it yet?

by **Tanada** » Mon 18 Feb 2013, 23:38:45

Buddy_J wrote:You sound pretty heavily invested in this ASPO thing. So they aren't doing a particularly good job sounding the alarm, according to you, how hard do you think is reasonable to sound the alarm? Screaming about the wolf coming on a daily basis does tend to have a putting off tendency, but sitting behind a strict peak oil definition in a country not only past its own peak but reversing it faster than any other country on the planet can be one hell of a hard sell. Maybe they are working harder than ever, selling some version to someone, and we just can't see it yet?

Many people have not caught onto it yet, but only peak oil makes it viable for the USA to be increasing production.

The simple fact of the matter is back in the 1980's when the USA got serious about developing syncrude from coal and from kerogen rich shale (oil shale the media calls it) Saudi Arabia bided their time. They waited until a large sum of money had been invested in hundreds of projects based on Oil selling for $25.00 or more, and then they flooded the world market with cheap crude oil, dropping the price to $10.00 bbl. A lot of small operators went bankrupt and a lot of big ones took a major loss. On top of the synfuel debacle every drilling project for conventional oil had to be reconsidered based on the new $10.00 benchmark and hundreds of thousands of oil field workers were let go over the next two years.

Today Saudi Arabia and most everyone else is already pumping near their top sustainable rate, they can no longer flood the market with cheap crude to gain control of the market. Whatever increases of supply on the world market have been created by less demand and more supply in the USA have been absorbed by the growing demand elsewhere. Very little actual cutting has been done by anyone because oil is close to $100.00 and staying in that range, more wealth than OPEC ever dreamed possible a decade ago is flooding into the Middle East.

While the USA has made remarkable gains in supply from tight oil it still has a long way to go to get back up to 10 M bbl/d of the 1970 peak, and even though demand is lower than it was five years ago the USA is still importing lots of oil from OPEC as well as Canada and Mexico.

by **Subjectivist** » Tue 19 Feb 2013, 11:55:00

When I first read up on Peak Oil back in 2005 there were a bunch of charts showing when each country or region peaked, but they all stopped about 2004 and projected the future from then on to about 2030.

I would love to see those 2004 charts compared to 2012 reality and see how close they were to the truth and what the 2012 charts show as the likely future. I thought they would be on the ASPO website but had no luck finding them. Does anyone have them? Even just a 2012 set would be helpful.

by **ralfy** » Tue 19 Feb 2013, 12:38:31

"Commentary: The Export Capacity Index"

http://aspousa.org/2013/02/commentary-t ... ity-index/

by **Keith_McClary** » Tue 19 Feb 2013, 22:40:13

Subjectivist wrote:When I first read up on Peak Oil back in 2005 there were a bunch of charts showing when each country or region peaked, but they all stopped about 2004 and projected the future from then on to about 2030.

I would love to see those 2004 charts compared to 2012 reality and see how close they were to the truth and what the 2012 charts show as the likely future. I thought they would be on the ASPO website but had no luck finding them. Does anyone have them? Even just a 2012 set would be helpful.

I found this using Google --> Search Tools --> Any time --> Custom range

EDIT: search terms were:
oil production countries aspo

http://www.peakoil.net/Oil_tsunami.html

I would be interested to see a side by side comparison.

BTW, is their a name for those charts? Rainbow slug?

by **Tanada** » Tue 19 Feb 2013, 23:18:45

I found a list on one of the ASPO sites, not sure if it is the one you are looking for.
http://aspousa.org/peak-oil-reference/p ... y-country/

Millions of barrels per day
Country 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 Peak

by **Keith_McClary** » Wed 20 Feb 2013, 01:06:53

Subjectivist wrote:I would love to see those 2004 charts compared to 2012 reality and see how close they were to the truth and what the 2012 charts show as the likely future.

You can see one example of optimistic 2005 predictions (Alberta tar) on page 129 (as the PDF is numbered, page 117 of the document) of the "drill baby drill" link on the thread:

two-groundbreaking-reports-on-shale-gas-oil-supplies-t67941.html#p1143338

Seems to me we should be looking a current predictions and scaling them down according to how past predictions have turned out.

by **John_A** » Wed 24 Jul 2013, 20:44:14

In this new world of increasing American oil production and the problems associated with just trying to get rid of the stuff, and now the closing of TOD to what in the MSM appears to be more than the occasional snicker:

http://business.financialpost.com/2013/ ... =76a6-53cf

but the much more critical question is, what is the lobbying organization known as ASPO-USA doing about it? Once upon a time they regularly reported to their legions of fans, we are now months behind the latest update. Is it possible that as goes TOD, so goes ASPO-USA?

http://peak-oil.org/

Last Peak Oil review, May 6, 2013.

Has Tom Whipple gone missing? Where is Jan when you need him? Why haven't we heard from Tad? Surely not everyone got up and walked out, all upset over just a splash of oil here or there? Come on guys, it can't be that career killing to be associated with this stuff, surely there is some new way to vigorously fight back against the oil production reality/predicament the US finds itself in right now?

by **eastbay** » Thu 25 Jul 2013, 00:45:00

pstarr wrote: You are a troll.

Count your blessings, Pete. At least Shorty's no longer mindlessly babbling on and on about Chevy Volts.

by **ralfy** » Thu 25 Jul 2013, 01:12:17

Updates will have to come from skeptics, as they try to counter what is inevitable. An example includes increasing U.S. oil production that is affected by financial bubbles, lower energy returns, and decline curves, coupled with increasing energy and resource needs globally and problems with conventional production.

See also,

http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/take/pe ... at-way/963

by **AdamB** » Mon 15 Jan 2018, 13:52:14

Quote of the Week “Just like Florida, our states are unique with vibrant coastal economies. Providing all of our states with the same exemption from dangerous offshore oil and gas drilling would ensure that vital industries from tourism to recreation to fishing are not needlessly placed in harm’s way.” Letter from 22 Democratic US senators to Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, after Florida was granted an exemption from the opening of 90% of US federal offshore areas for drilling Graphic of the Week Contents 1. Oil and the Global Economy 2. The Middle East & North Africa 3. China 4. Nigeria 5. Venezuela 6. The Briefs 1. Oil and the Global Economy New York oil futures closed up 4.7 percent last week despite a ten-rig increase in the number of active US oil rigs. London and New York futures closed with biggest weekly gains since October. On Thursday Brent crude briefly traded

Tom Whipple: Peak Oil Review – 15 January 2018

by **AdamB** » Mon 15 Jan 2018, 13:54:14

ASPO seems to have dried up and blown away, with only Tom remaining. He titles his work "Peak Oil in Review" but almost never discusses peak oil anymore. I dropped this news into this thread because it appears that members here spotted the demise of ASPO around the same time TOD was imploding, and thought I would review some of the posts in this thread to see who might have spotted what was up, before it was up, and call them out for accuracy, while at the same time noting any of the usual suspects who obviously fall just into the "endless cheerleader" class.

by **AdamB** » Mon 15 Jan 2018, 13:58:11

Tanada wrote:While the USA has made remarkable gains in supply from tight oil it still has a long way to go to get back up to 10 M bbl/d of the 1970 peak, and even though demand is lower than it was five years ago the USA is still importing lots of oil from OPEC as well as Canada and Mexico.

Apparently, less than 5 years is now a "long way" at po.com!! :-D

And if what the US had done by 2013 was remarkable, would you characterize what is happening right now as we speak (possibly more than 10 million a day...any time now?) as flat out......

by **AdamB** » Mon 15 Jan 2018, 14:00:58

Keith_McClary wrote:
Subjectivist wrote:When I first read up on Peak Oil back in 2005 there were a bunch of charts showing when each country or region peaked, but they all stopped about 2004 and projected the future from then on to about 2030.

I would love to see those 2004 charts compared to 2012 reality and see how close they were to the truth and what the 2012 charts show as the likely future. I thought they would be on the ASPO website but had no luck finding them. Does anyone have them? Even just a 2012 set would be helpful.

I found this using Google --> Search Tools --> Any time --> Custom range

EDIT: search terms were:
oil production countries aspo

http://www.peakoil.net/Oil_tsunami.html

I would be interested to see a side by side comparison.

BTW, is their a name for those charts? Rainbow slug?

Okay, now we know why you don't listen to physics professors when it comes to resource economic issues. But an excellent mindset of the time, prior to everyone figuring out that you don't listen to physics professors when it comes to resource economic issues.

by **AdamB** » Mon 15 Jan 2018, 14:05:23

pstarr wrote:
John_A wrote:In this new world of increasing American oil production and the problems associated with just trying to get rid of the stuff, and now the closing of TOD to what in the MSM appears to be more than the occasional snicker:
Kidding? The issue among struggling unemployed Americans, hungry Egyptians and Haitians, struggling Portuguese, Italians, Irish, Syrians, et. al. is not "trying to get rid of" excess petroleum, but getting enough to farm and work. You are a troll.

Apparently not. John appears to be suspecting what later was to become the reality that we live in now. Folks like you happily burning cheap liquid fuels because there is plenty of them.

pstarr wrote:
John_A wrote:Has Tom Whipple gone missing?
Perhaps. Whipple might inspire you.

He is an inspiration. He titles things "Peak Oil review" and guess what....can't talk about anything peak oil within it!! :lol:

by **AdamB** » Mon 15 Jan 2018, 14:07:45

eastbay wrote:
pstarr wrote: You are a troll.

Count your blessings, Pete. At least Shorty's no longer mindlessly babbling on and on about Chevy Volts.

Shorty is into EV's!! Where!! A link or reference!! He hasn't said a word about it that I've seen over the past year or two, in his headlong rush to welsh on losing the bet!! It has been random number generator and carnival barking, 24/7!!