Peak Oil?

[The Grand Nudger]

As if on cue, the ceo of yara international spoke to a fortune writer at cop26 about the possibility of a global food crisis in 2022. The pandemic has increased the cost of producing a ton of fertilizer ten times what it was last year. They've been giving it away, millions of dollars worth...but can't keep making it and giving it away at that price...and they're using hydroelectric to reduce their costs......

Governments are announcing export limits and import quotas on fertilizer in preparation.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

AS far as I'm aware, peak oil in the Middle East was reached decades ago. Fracking seems to be a reasonable indicator of oil reserves.

We WILL eventually run out of oil. It's not simply a matter of fuel, but the dozens of other things we make from oil.

About 20 years ago, I predicted that renewable energy, electric cars and such would be largely market driven. That such things would occur as soon a it was profitable. Didn't occur to me at the time that there would be massive government subsidies.

[The Grand Nudger]

Nope, they also hit record extraction numbers in the last few years until voluntarily agreeing to cut production to boost prices. They hit those record numbers, by the by, in an oil war against american shale producers..which had the effect of cutting our production.

The problem with oil is not that we're running out - it's that we're finding more of it and getting better at extracting it while simultaneously getting worse at using it. Can't stress this enough, narratives like these masquerade as climate facing but they've been sabotaging climate action from the inside. We're running out of oil...quick...gobble it all up for ourselves so we can be the last man standing atop of sea of oil. Except that's not happening, or, at least..not the running out part. The crazy investments and subsidies in more oil based on fears and worries of future shortages? Yup, that grift is alive and well.

---

More from cop26. KSA intends to increase it's production by a million barrels a day. UAE from 4m b/d to 5m b/d by 2030, and qatar..well, they only intend to increase their lng by a meager 2/3rds over current numbers to 126m mt by 2027.

[The Grand Nudger]

This threads got me going all the way down the borehole. I was wondering how it was that people came to believe that this place or that place had hit peak oil and as I was googling it I found no end of articles to that effect..and also, ofc, the raw numbers showing it to be wrong in each and every instance. So what gives? Then I found a study...about the peak oil movement.

Turns out it was largely the effect of a single organization, now defunct. ASPO. Founded by petroleum geologist Colin Campbell who, with Jean Lahererre, published an article in scientific american called "the end of cheap oil", in 1998. They were using a version of a model by a man named Marion King Hubert, produced in 1956, that predicted peak oil in 2000. They were using a pretty shoddy definition for oil (blamed on their editors but they later attempted...and failed..to make a correction) and it wouldn't really have mattered if they hadn't, since they massively underestimated the role of non conventional sources in both their initial and adjusted formulation. It went from gospel fact to prepper advertising copy to just plain wrong by 2012, with their last set of failed predictions..and it's been doa pretty much ever since. One thing that had killed the idea dead (before they reproposed it) was that the bell shaped curve used by the model was thought to reflect the underlying geology of oil production - but when the soviet union collapsed and the idea was floated that part of that had to do with peak oil and their production numbers -did- match the bell curve model.....russia inherited most of their oil fields and then blew through their numbers. Obviously, a change in politics doesn't change geology. The curve represents something else.

However, like so much else, it still lives on in our minds. It's sound in principle, and many of it's underlying predictions can be said to be accurate or at least not completely balls out wrong, and I have no doubt it was the earnest product of a great many well meaning people.

The next obvious question....why hadn't I heard it, why didn't it creep into my mind? Well, turns out, I was out of country and busy with other things at the time.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

Nope, they also hit record extraction numbers in the last few years until voluntarily agreeing to cut production to boost prices.  They hit those record numbers, by the by, in an oil war against american shale producers..which had the effect of cutting our production.

The problem with oil is not that we're running out - it's that we're finding more of it and getting better at extracting it while simultaneously getting worse at using it.  Can't stress this enough, narratives like these masquerade as climate facing but they've been sabotaging climate action from the inside.  We're running out of oil...quick...gobble it all up for ourselves so we can be the last man standing atop of sea of oil.  Except that's not happening, or, at least..not the running out part.  The crazy investments and subsidies in more oil based on fears and worries of future shortages?  Yup, that grift is alive and well.

---

More from cop26.  KSA intends to increase it's production by a million barrels a day.  UAE from 4m b/d to 5m b/d by 2030, and qatar..well, they only intend to increase their lng by a meager 2/3rds over current numbers to 126m mt by 2027.

 Interesting claim.  I heard about Middle eastern oil running out decades ago. Don't remember where, so this  may be taken as anecdotal evidence

If oil is so plentiful why is it so expensive?  Today here, petrol is $1.79 a litre.

Found this on line.

Middle East Oil Reserves: Who Has the Most Crude Oil? (thoughtco.com)

I'm also confused about the renewable energy industry.  It exists  because it's profitable.  Again back to the retail price of petrol. Why would it be so expensive except for supply vs demand?  Expensive petrol means commercial and domestic vehicles are slowly getting rid of the inefficient internal combustion motor.  If oil is so plentiful, surely a greatly  reduced demand for oil for fuel will mean prices should drop(?)  Not sure I'll live long enough to see that.

I'm not saying you're wrong, only that so far I haven't seen enough evidence to be able to accept your claims.

[The Grand Nudger]

We might start a war over here in the us if we had to pay that much for gas. The price of oil is intentionally and openly managed to ensure that oil producing countries don't lose their major source of revenue. Oil is plentiful, and cheap. It gets pumped out of the ground in units measured by millions of barrels a day. The cost of that barrel is nothing compared to the cost of the products made from it. That's what makes it such a useful input for..literally..everything we make. Price differences in gas between countries have nothing to do with the cost of production. It could be cheaper..but that would be a loss of revenue to oil producing countries..and it could be more expensive..but that would make people use less which would also be a loss of revenue to oil producing countries. Additionally, some countries hope to change consumer behavior by creating high taxes on things like gas. Here in the us the price of gas went up even as oil producers were paying people to shelve oil. Just not in our fuel tanks..we'd have to pay them for that. More supply, less demand...and higher prices.

The only evidence you should require for the fact that the middle east didn't reach peak oil a decade ago, though, is that they keep increasing their production numbers? You can't have reached peak oil before, if you're producing more oil now than you were before.

(our paying less for gas than pretty much everyone else is a big reason our bridges are crumbling..so..you know, in case you looked at the price with envy)

[Silver]

*shrugs*

I don't concern myself with oil since I don't drive.

[The Grand Nudger]

You eat it. You wear it. You play with it.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

*shrugs*

I don't concern myself with oil since I don't drive.

 Riiighhht.

I guess you take the bus or are driven? 

[Fake Messiah]

Maybe oil is about to end sooner than you think. For instance, it seems that MIT is unto making a very compact fusion reactor which would be the size of only 2% of the one in France called ITER, and should start working in only a few years.




But let's say they make it, and the whole world has fusion reactors all over so that electricity is dirt-cheap, how would people quickly replace gasoline cars? Maybe by making some synthetic fuel which is now too expensive to make?


And also there seems to be some new way to store hydrogen so that cars, trucks, and even airplanes can use it, but it seems to me that there are a few key questions this guy didn't answer.