When the oil runs out?
Discussion
I was chatting to my kids today on the way to school. I said that, in all probability, the oil may run out within their lifetime. I also saw on the news today that within 10 years The UK will only be able to produce 80% of its electricity supply - because of a lack of fossil fuels.
It got me thinking. I remember a few years ago during the fuel blockades, that panic buying caused mayhem. Shops were running out of stuff because they couldn't be supplied and the whole country ground to a halt. And this was the result of a "fear of lack of fuel". I can imagine that a lot sooner than 50 years oil prices will increase and their could be panic buying on a global scale. As such, it wouldn't surprise me if within, say, 20 years (which is well within my lifetime) there are global distribution problems caused by "speculation".
It also made me think that the atmospheric rise in CO2 (due to fossil fuels) must be a short-term problem because fossil fuels will shortly be running out!
It got me thinking. I remember a few years ago during the fuel blockades, that panic buying caused mayhem. Shops were running out of stuff because they couldn't be supplied and the whole country ground to a halt. And this was the result of a "fear of lack of fuel". I can imagine that a lot sooner than 50 years oil prices will increase and their could be panic buying on a global scale. As such, it wouldn't surprise me if within, say, 20 years (which is well within my lifetime) there are global distribution problems caused by "speculation".
It also made me think that the atmospheric rise in CO2 (due to fossil fuels) must be a short-term problem because fossil fuels will shortly be running out!
I thought it was a complete fallacy the projection of oil stocks.
Drilling technology has allowed us to get to oil stocks we previously couldnt
I dont think there is any reason to believe that drilling technology will not continue to move forward. Obviously its going to come to an end at some point but how many generations have been told 'its going to run out in 30 years'?
Drilling technology has allowed us to get to oil stocks we previously couldnt
I dont think there is any reason to believe that drilling technology will not continue to move forward. Obviously its going to come to an end at some point but how many generations have been told 'its going to run out in 30 years'?
read somewhere on the BBC Website that we have used up approximately 15% of total oil reserves, so there is some way to go before it all runs out - though the last X% may be incredibly expensive to extract (e.g. oil shale in rocks).
i suppose that continually rising fuel prices, will make it more economically-viable to find alternative energy sources i.e. market-forces will help us find a solution.
Plotloss said:
I dont think there is any reason to believe that drilling technology will not continue to move forward. Obviously its going to come to an end at some point but how many generations have been told 'its going to run out in 30 years'?
Oil had 20 years left when I was at junior school. The fact is that hunting for oil costs money so oil companies are hardly going to spend a fortune checking for new sources and opening new fields when they have sensible stocks to hand.
Well it would only be a couple generations that have worried about oil running out. Even if we only used up 15% over a 100odd years perviously, global demand is increasing so much that it will take much less time to use up the rest, sort of like the way the population takes 50000 or however long to read a billion and only a few more to make 2 billion and so on.
wolves_wanderer said:
I dont think there is any reason to believe that drilling technology will not continue to move forward. Obviously its going to come to an end at some point but how many generations have been told 'its going to run out in 30 years'?
Oil had 20 years left when I was at junior school. The fact is that hunting for oil costs money so oil companies are hardly going to spend a fortune checking for new sources and opening new fields when they have sensible stocks to hand.
I spoke to a geologist the other day, who is employed by an oil company to explore for new sources of oil. It was a sobering conversation, he said there's barely 20 years left, INCLUDING all the reserves, which have been untapped. He said that the oil companies have massively overstated their supplies.
Srebbe...
I don't know about the rest if the world, but I can tell you what the problem is in the US - Politics
Drilling Politics
1. ANWR ("Anwar"
has a huge wealth of untapped oil but is being opposed by environmentalists. Environmentalists support a certain political party and their support is catered to. Even the Alaskans want the oil to be drilled for. It would be a boom to the State economy.
2. The US Gulf of Mexico and coast of California does not allow drilling and there are huge resources out there. The reason? No - not environmentalists like most people think. It's because nobody wants to look out of the window of their 30th floor beachside condo and see a drilling platform. Politics again, but this time of the real estate developer/property value type.
Refining Politics
1. Refineries are big ugly things. There has not been a new refinery built in the US in over 30 years. Most of the refineries are located in coastal areas. The politicians have backed themselves into a corner with environmentally friendly legislation.
2. People don't like the idea of big ugly refineries popping up in their back yard (NIMBY politics).
New Sources Politics
There are more sources of oil in certain western States than in all of Saudi Arabia through exploitation of tar sands and oil shale (Colorado, Utah, etc, etc). This is being stopped by a combination of NIMBY and environmental concerns over the "greater spotted - insert animal name here".
Additional Energy Issues
Coal mining (of which the US has some of the largest reserves in the world) has been severely curtailed. Enviro concerns are disallowing new Nuclear power stations. The Kennedys won't allow wind farms on the Nantucket sound (NIMBY). Therefor we are left with oil driven energy sources.
---
Worldwide don't forget about Russia and other untapped reserves. Conoco and BP are already investing heavily.
---
By the time fossil fuels run out, we will be converted to an alternate form of energy. Probably Hydrogen.
Just MHO
ErnestM
I don't know about the rest if the world, but I can tell you what the problem is in the US - Politics
Drilling Politics
1. ANWR ("Anwar"
has a huge wealth of untapped oil but is being opposed by environmentalists. Environmentalists support a certain political party and their support is catered to. Even the Alaskans want the oil to be drilled for. It would be a boom to the State economy. 2. The US Gulf of Mexico and coast of California does not allow drilling and there are huge resources out there. The reason? No - not environmentalists like most people think. It's because nobody wants to look out of the window of their 30th floor beachside condo and see a drilling platform. Politics again, but this time of the real estate developer/property value type.
Refining Politics
1. Refineries are big ugly things. There has not been a new refinery built in the US in over 30 years. Most of the refineries are located in coastal areas. The politicians have backed themselves into a corner with environmentally friendly legislation.
2. People don't like the idea of big ugly refineries popping up in their back yard (NIMBY politics).
New Sources Politics
There are more sources of oil in certain western States than in all of Saudi Arabia through exploitation of tar sands and oil shale (Colorado, Utah, etc, etc). This is being stopped by a combination of NIMBY and environmental concerns over the "greater spotted - insert animal name here".
Additional Energy Issues
Coal mining (of which the US has some of the largest reserves in the world) has been severely curtailed. Enviro concerns are disallowing new Nuclear power stations. The Kennedys won't allow wind farms on the Nantucket sound (NIMBY). Therefor we are left with oil driven energy sources.
---
Worldwide don't forget about Russia and other untapped reserves. Conoco and BP are already investing heavily.
---
By the time fossil fuels run out, we will be converted to an alternate form of energy. Probably Hydrogen.
Just MHO
ErnestM
srebbe64 said:
I was chatting to my kids today on the way to school. I said that, in all probability, the oil may run out within their lifetime. I also saw on the news today that within 10 years The UK will only be able to produce 80% of its electricity supply - because of a lack of fossil fuels.
Well we got 2 choices really build more nukes or open up the coal mines again and tap into the 300 year supply we allowed the worlds most stupid bitch to close. Perhaps we could sequestrate her assets to help make ammends.
Nuclear power. Wind farms out at sea, remote coastal dams and hydro electricity.
Loads of viable alternatives, leccy powered cars are getting better, just look at the Fetish for example.
They all cost alot, but as demand for oil/gas rises (the two most easily used up fossil fuels) then costs will rise, and as they do, the cost of renewable will slowly become more comparable to the "cheap" fossil stuff.
Think it'd be a good idea to start now to be honest, why speculate and let our economy be pushed and pulled by oil prices. Sooner we get out the better in my opinion, shame there are so many powerfull people with money in oil that prefer we keep using it till it runs dry to keep them rich!
Isn't this one of the reasons Bush doesn't want Iran to have nuclear power, so he can sell them his new oil he's found while liberating Iraq?
Dave
Loads of viable alternatives, leccy powered cars are getting better, just look at the Fetish for example.
They all cost alot, but as demand for oil/gas rises (the two most easily used up fossil fuels) then costs will rise, and as they do, the cost of renewable will slowly become more comparable to the "cheap" fossil stuff.
Think it'd be a good idea to start now to be honest, why speculate and let our economy be pushed and pulled by oil prices. Sooner we get out the better in my opinion, shame there are so many powerfull people with money in oil that prefer we keep using it till it runs dry to keep them rich!
Isn't this one of the reasons Bush doesn't want Iran to have nuclear power, so he can sell them his new oil he's found while liberating Iraq?
Dave
968 said:
I dont think there is any reason to believe that drilling technology will not continue to move forward. Obviously its going to come to an end at some point but how many generations have been told 'its going to run out in 30 years'?
Oil had 20 years left when I was at junior school. The fact is that hunting for oil costs money so oil companies are hardly going to spend a fortune checking for new sources and opening new fields when they have sensible stocks to hand.
I spoke to a geologist the other day, who is employed by an oil company to explore for new sources of oil. It was a sobering conversation, he said there's barely 20 years left, INCLUDING all the reserves, which have been untapped. He said that the oil companies have massively overstated their supplies.
But surely they haven't searched everywhere in the world? My point was that there is always about 20 years left including all known reserves but then they go out and find more reserves. If they have then I'm off to stick some Optimax in the bath
968 said:
I spoke to a geologist the other day, who is employed by an oil company to explore for new sources of oil. It was a sobering conversation, he said there's barely 20 years left, INCLUDING all the reserves, which have been untapped. He said that the oil companies have massively overstated their supplies.
I'm not sure why he told you that, perhaps he enojys being a doom forecaster, bit like someone saying Credit Derivatives are going to bring down the global financial system, this coming from a risk manager I know.
Anyway what your mate said, just isn't true. Odd that someone employed by an Oil Co should go on about 'massive' reserve over statement, the Saudi's are probably over stating their reserves and Shell got into trouble, but that's about it.
Btw there are massive shale deposits that are economically viable over $28 pbl. Though not at $18 where we were a few years ago. A sensible future price prediction seems to be around $40 pbl.
wolves_wanderer said:
But surely they haven't searched everywhere in the world? My point was that there is always about 20 years left including all known reserves but then they go out and find more reserves. If they have then I'm off to stick some Optimax in the bath
No, but they have scouted a lot of these places and estimated quantities of oil, therein. I don't claim to understand how they do this, but he seemed pretty adamant about it. Bring on hydrogen cars.....
968 said:You can keep your hydrogen car, I've got a bathful of Optimax
But surely they haven't searched everywhere in the world? My point was that there is always about 20 years left including all known reserves but then they go out and find more reserves. If they have then I'm off to stick some Optimax in the bath
No, but they have scouted a lot of these places and estimated quantities of oil, therein. I don't claim to understand how they do this, but he seemed pretty adamant about it. Bring on hydrogen cars.....
This is a repost from another thread ...
I came across this Peak Oil presentation recently, which made some very interesting points about the situation in Iraq. I don't know much about the ASPO and I don't take everything they say at face value, but it was clear that the guy giving this presentation knew an awful lot more about the situation than I did and I couldn't find any fault either with the facts he's starting from, or his analysis of them. It certainly shows the dealings between the western world and the oil producing states in a very different light to the view we get in the national news.
Amongst other things, it suggests that for most of the last century the western world has positively discouraged democracies and promoted dictatorships and price-fixing within the oil producing nations in order to keep the price of oil artificially low. It seems that the 'natural' price for oil is about four times higher than the current price, and likely to rise substantially as demand outstrips supply.
I came across this Peak Oil presentation recently, which made some very interesting points about the situation in Iraq. I don't know much about the ASPO and I don't take everything they say at face value, but it was clear that the guy giving this presentation knew an awful lot more about the situation than I did and I couldn't find any fault either with the facts he's starting from, or his analysis of them. It certainly shows the dealings between the western world and the oil producing states in a very different light to the view we get in the national news.
Amongst other things, it suggests that for most of the last century the western world has positively discouraged democracies and promoted dictatorships and price-fixing within the oil producing nations in order to keep the price of oil artificially low. It seems that the 'natural' price for oil is about four times higher than the current price, and likely to rise substantially as demand outstrips supply.
968 said:
.... Bring on hydrogen cars.....
Where does the hydrogen come from? It takes a lot of energy to produce Hydrogen, which has to be produced somehow!
All this talk of electric/fuel-cell cars is all good and well, but it just moves the need to combust fuel from the car to the powerstation with all the low efficiency that brings.
Gassing Station | The Pie & Piston Archive | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff