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Peak Cheap Oil
Submitted by Adam Taggart via Peak Prosperity,
Energy is the lifeblood of any economy. But when an economy is based on an exponential debt-based money system and that is based on exponentially increasing energy supplies, the supply of that energy therefore deserves our very highest attention.
But we need to be careful here because it’s a mistake to lump all types of energy together because they have very different uses in our economy and they are not interchangeable.
What we’re going to examine in this chapter on Peak Cheap Oil is transportation fuels. The liquids we put in our trucks and cars and airplanes. Why?
Because 95% of everything that moves from point A to point B across the globe does so based on petroleum derived liquid fuels. This makes petroleum quite special and unique.
And despite vastly increasing the global spend on oil operations, despite the shale oil "miracle" so loudly touted by the press -- global production remains nearly unchanged. In just a few short years, it’s now costing us double to extract roughly the same amount of oil out of the ground.
What’s clearly at work here is that we’re finding more oil, but it’s expensive. Yet total global demand for oil will climb as developing countries expand their economies and world population continues to grow. Competition for hydrocarbons will become more fierce than it has ever been.
I’m soft-pedaling this to an enormous degree. Let me be blunt. If we are already at peak, as the data suggest is possible, then we are all in trouble.
For those who simply don't want to wait until the end of the year to view the entire new series, you can indulge your binge-watching craving by enrolling to PeakProsperity.com. The entire full new series, all 27 chapters of it, is available -- now-- to our enrolled users.
The full suite of chapters in this new Crash Course series can be found at www.peakprosperity.com/crashcourse
And for those who have yet to view it, be sure to watch the 'Accelerated' Crash Course -- the under-1-hour condensation of the new 4.5-hour series. It's a great vehicle for introducing new eyes to this material.
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Then there is tbe other reason. The perpetual saudi welfare handouts needed to stave off revolution.
Peak oil, peak gold, and then a new technology is found and no lthen its no onger peak.
You're a hopey fucking moron, and Moore's law is NOT a law!
Technology continually moves the peak.
"... In his paper, Hubbert estimated that the “ultimate potential reserve of 150 billion barrels of crude oil for both the land and offshore areas of the United States.” Hubbert’s estimate was based on the crude oil “initially present which are producible by methods now in use.” Using the 150 billion barrel estimate he predicted US Peak Oil occurring in 1965. But to be cautious, he also used a slightly higher figure of 200 billion barrels which produced a peak in oil production around 1970—the figure that Hubbert advocates like to use to demonstrate that Hubbert was prophetic in his predictions. However, by 2006 the Department of Energy estimated that domestic oil resources still in the ground (in-place) total 1,124 billion barrels. Of this large in-place resource, 400 billon barrels is estimated to be technically recoverable with current technology.
This estimate was produced before horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing or fracking techniques were widely adopted which most authorities believe will yield considerably more oil than was thought to be recoverable in 2006. ..."
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/03/29/the-myth-of-peak-oil/
MORON!!!
Since you seem to be too stupid to even get started, I'll give you a couple of wiki links as baby steps to help your ignorant ass out. Here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exponential_function
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law
Do some real fucking research, or shut the fuck up.
Sooner or later, cold fusion/zero-point energy is coming out of the bag. (Google the phrase "breakaway civilization"). If they get their way, it will happen AFTER the great population culling. Pray that the cat gets out of the bag BEFORE that happens.
In the meantime, ignore the handwaving around the oil industry. It's impossible to sort out the reality from the manipulation anyway.
More hope! Fuck you too, Buckaroo! You're all a bunch of hopey retards destined to your "population culling" by your own shear stupidity! Way to go, humanity!
Give science enough time and resources and we will solve the problems of limited energy resources.
Unfortunately when limitless energy can be produced almost for free the magic of the market will make sure that only the wealthy will be able to afford it... ...
You mean the way only the rich could afford to drive cars in the 20th century?
The end of cheap oil will be due to currency collapse and not an oil shortage.
Peak oil was the big thing in 2004. Heard a Michael Ruppert lecture and boy, did I believe! Only, every year since has been peak oil, too. Here's the thing about oil, it's all based on lies. It don't come from dinosaurs and old rain forests. the Russians figured it out, but no one will listen to them. Abiotic oil is what's real, and is why there aint gonna be no peak oil. There's lotsa oil down deep. What do you think happened to BP in the gulf? They went too far (for their technology) and got into deep abiotic oil. Very hot and very high pressure, and it blew up on them. The Russians offered to fix it, but not allowed.
It's gonna get more an more expensive, but we probly aint gonna run out. How do you think the Russians got to be number 1 producer (oil and gas)? It's because they really figured out what's going on down there.
Riiiight. If abiotic oil were real, every nation in the world would be drilling deep wells in granite formations for it. The Russians and the Swedes tried it and both failed miserably.Or if you want another drink of the koolaid -- if you drop a microphone to the bottom,you can hear the screams of people in Hell! Please, do some elementary research next time you're tempted to peddle this story.
It's become political, especially now that Putin is the new boogeyman. If you care to look, there is a lot of data out there.
http://www.rense.com/general58/abioticoilscience.htm
http://www.viewzone.com/abioticoilx.html
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/on-energy/2011/09/14/abiotic-oil-a-t...
http://peakoil.com/geology/abiotic-oil-and-gas-a-theory-that-refuses-to-...
http://www.wnd.com/2008/02/45838/
http://www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net/Geopolitics___Eurasia/Peak_Oil___R...
"Because 95% of everything that moves from point A to point B across the globe does so based on petroleum derived liquid fuels. This makes petroleum quite special and unique."
1. Soon a much lower % of things will be moved by oil.
2. Much of the movement is unnecessary e.g. suburban commuting, the military, global product shipments, airplane traffic.
The age of oil is ending.
Electric vehicles and vehicles that run on natural gas.
The age of oil is in its final decade.
Electric vehicles are coming whether you like it or not. I'm not talking about the useless Volt or the expensive Tesla.
The affordable Nissan Leaf is already being driven, and all of the Japanese and Korean automakers will be introducing fully electric models in 2015. They are economical and they work.
So as I said, the days of oil are numbered and Peak Oil doesn't mean shit.
"You're all a bunch of hopey retards destined to your "population culling" by your own shear stupidity! Way to go, humanity!'
I think you may have hit peak intelligence there, but the good news is you won't have too far to fall.
THE FALLING EROI - ENERY RETURNED ON INVESTED gets everyone in the end.
The Roman Empired collapsed due to a falling EROI. Hunter Gatherers had a nice profitable EROI at 10/1. Human farming... simple agriculture is 5/1. When you add horse or oxen then it falls to 1-2/1. This low EROI worked for centuries because farmers didn't consider the pasture to feed the animals.... as there was always more forests to fell and lands to conquer.
However, the modern U.S. Agricultural-Processing-Distribution system is a HUGE NET ENERGY LOSER at 1/10. Of course this is technology at its finest. So, technology didn't increase the EROI of food production... IT DESTROYED IT.
MSM thinks SHALE OIL will be our energy savior. Sure, it's added some extra oil production, but its EROI of 5/1... doesn't allow our modern food system of 1/10 to function. We need an energy supply with an EROI north of 10/1.
There lies the RUB.
Trying to solve the problems of technology with more technology just goes to prove we failed considerably when we compare the modern man to hunter gatherers.
GOD HATH A SENSE OF HUMOR...
i find it amusing to read articles about peak oil when there is a massive drop in demand due to the global economy slowing. europe and the US are screwed, and china's growth is slowing down. The baltic dry index has collapsed, and its only going to get worse. If and when all these derivatives cause most banks to go belly up, we will see an even bigger drop in demand. I think real, actual growth is required to make these peak oil theories pan out.
What caused the slowing growth in the first place? Could it be rising energy prices as demand growth outstripped supply growth?
You can't prove that so don't be smug. More likely is the demand pulled forward by zero interest rate policy finally ran out. The entire economy is dot gov printing. You've probably heard that once or twice on ZH.
This ^
We're at the point now were growth is more deadly to the status quo than the downward spiral we're currently trapped in. With the system awash in cheap money all we need is an uptick in velocity for things to go straight to hell.
Same thing with Energy. The capacity for consumption is still there, it's just asleep. If inflation ever rears it's head expect it to come along with skyrocketing energy costs.
Where you get your numbers?
I am thinking draft cow, tri-purpose like Swiss (Braunvieh) was sustained.
Nothing was transported away. Nothing arrived to sustain. Isolated valleys.
Only if the human population grows too much make it beyond continuing.
as long as few in valleys
but when move and increase cities negative ratio grows while thinking progress
especially without wise conservative culture
makes up curve to depletion of resources
Thinking about your points, I have connections to research this some
and long experience Agriculture
which became nothing more than mining
then poisoning also
And as a cherry on top, .gov mandates " renewables", and we use food to make fuel. And in the process use so much fucking energy and WATER to make that fuel from food, that it MUST be mandated by .gov to even come close to finding a market.
Facism and stupidity at its finest.
Still waiting on that solar powered airliner. Elon? Sir Richard?
I find that people who have to resort to cursing in their arguments are usually wrong. Thank you for confirming.
Were you the one calling for mass starvation in the 70's and 80's, too? Mmk. Technology has always won.
nope.
American oil production peaked in 1971 and has never been surpassed. Nor will it be. It's all downwards with just an occasional minor bump.
Nuclear power is the obvious solution. It is the safest cleanest form of energy. Of course, this video is stupid for a number of reasons and I don't think we've reached peak oil. Peak oil was en vogue with the government, academics, naysaysers, and a bunch of other people back in 2007. Everyone ignored and later underestimated the "stupid rednecks" in Oklahoma and Texas who were using new technology to create a revolution in oil and gas. Exxon Mobil and all the other oil giants also laughed at these guys and were looking abroad for oil and ignoring new tech. Now those "stupid recnecks" are billionaires and the oil just keeps coming. This technology is barely even getting started abroad. There are massive oil and gas fields in Argentina, Russia, UK, Europe and all over the world that aren't even producing yet. The main hurdles are political.
Another moron.. That's just great! 3 Mile Island, Chernobyl, FUKUSHIMA!!!
All three of those incidents had 1 in a million probabilities of happening.
Therefore according to Obama's lawyers nuclear power should be safe for another 3 million years...
Probability doesn't work that way. It's 1 million × 1 million × 1 million, which boils down to FUCKING IMPOSSIBLE!! ... But what the fuck ever. Human optimism doesn't really care about science. These comments make that ABUNDANTLY clear!
So you're saying it's safe then right?
yeh all three where unpossible
Total deaths from all three combined are less than any given year from coal. 0 deaths from Fukushima, 0 from 3 mile island, and 41 at Chernobyl.
Nuclear power is dead in this country. It doesn't suit anyone's political interests. Well, anyone who "matters", anyway.
Where do YOU think the uranium comes from? Wal Mart? It needs to be mined. And processed. With equipment that uses fairy dust.
And the waste product then is safely transported to a huge modern underground storage facility in Nevada, Yucca Mountain,constructed at the cost of 10's or hundreds of billions of dollars. Oh, wait...
double post
Oil is peaking mate. If it was not peaking, then humanity would never "frack" for it. Or gone to the freakin Arctic to get it. Or deep offshore, etc etc etc... Even Saudi Arabia will run out one day.
Sure technology can alleviate some of the pain and push the barriers further and further, but there is a limit for everything.
Fracking just pulls what would have been future production into the present. It will make the production chart more lopsided steepening the downward slope.
You forgot the oil mining in Canada, dalitis.
Got hijack this thread.
What the fuck happened with we are all going to die from ebola?
Huh?
What the fuck. THe media went silent over the story we were getting butt fucked with day and night.
Isis
Theatre.
On advice, I'm teaching myself not to react emotionally to the news.
All the real Ebola news will come out after the election is over. Wait.
There has been so little ebola news lately it's almost as if it went away...
It's just the government silencing all news outlets.
If they can do this with Ebola what else is covered up?
The real problem is no one cares that they are knowingly being lied to.
Nov. 4: Total Cases: 13268
Still expanding at roughly the same exponential rate. . .
>> so little ebola news
When they jacked energy prices sky high after the election everybody put ebola on the back burner.
It's holiday season. Fry's Electronics had a sign at the front of the store the other day: "Only 48 days of Christmas Shopping Left!"
Ebola doesn't move product off the shelf, and lots of product needs to go off the shelf to maintain any semblance of illusion.
What happens to last year's unsold baubles?
Apparently people don't care about the Ebola or the Bengazi. They want to know what the Repubicans are going to do now that they run Congress like they been crying for.
Here's what happened: our new Ebola czar is on the job. Statistics are getting manipulated and news sources are being throttled. The guy is a politician and a fixer-- he's doing exactly what he was hired to do.
In about three months or so, one of two things will happen: (1) reports will start filtering out of west Africa that shit has gone seriously sideways and the disease is completely out of control, or (2) we'll get stupid-lucky and somehow the disease will burn itself out, despite any "best" efforts to the contrary.
Anybody with a brain is betting on (1) but who knows, maybe we'll get lucky. Either way don't expect any news about Ebola cases on US soil. My guess is, our czar's plan is to identify any US Ebola cases quickly and whisk them out of sight before anyone gets the wiser.
Basically, there's a new fear mongering campaign underway:
http://www.ibtimes.com/ebola-mutation-lack-virus-samples-us-hampers-effo...
http://www.prisonplanet.com/if-there-arent-any-ebola-cases-in-the-us-why...
Get ready for Santa to deliver a little Ebola in your Christmas stocking.
Media blackout. That's what the new Ebola Czar was hired for. Not for his medical skills.
I have a website on my homepage,a Ebola Count. The number of cases and dead are going DOWN. That's right, fuckers are coming back to life. Must be a zombie apocolypse over there. Talk about a manipulation. There is NO news coming out. At this rate, the reduction is going exponential. In exactly 3.45 weeks, everybody who is dead will be alive, and nobody sick.
LOL, NoPension!
A worn out macabre sense of humour is about the only thing left to try cope with the ways that the more one learns, the worse it gets!
Meanwhile, I continue to believe that Peak Social Insanities will surpass Peak Everything Else!
While I think there are an abundance of creative alternatives that could be integrated to possibly resolve problems better, the only thing that I am certain of is our civilization will ACTUALLY continue to be controlled by systems of legalized lies, backed by legalized violence, which systems of enforced frauds are going to drive Peak Insanities, to the point where those wipe out any chance that any other better alternatives might have had ...
I am not sure what the truth is, but I am sure that the society I live in is almost totally controlled by Huge Lies backed by Lots of Violence, and that reality is getting worse, faster. Therefore, it makes perverse sense that the ways the established systems appear to have decided to deal with the Ebola Epidemic is similar to how they responded to the flu epidemic at the end of World War I
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-11-04/government-lied-about-pandemic-which-killed-50-million-people-…-attempt-“prevent-pan
Government Lied About Pandemic Which Killed 50 Million People … Attempt to “Prevent Panic” Backfired
"The combination of rigid control and disregard for truth had dangerous consequences."
When one adds together all of the consequences of the ways that civilization is controlled by entrenched systems of lies backed by violence, which systems of enforced frauds have spun out of control, by becoming astronomically amplified due to advances in science (which makes very plausible the idea that the current versions of Ebola were bioweaponized, and so on and so forth for every other technology) the unbelievable overall conclusion is that the human species appears to be preparing to commit suicide. The more one learns about the full set of those sorts of facts, the more believable it becomes that the ways that human civilizations were professionally controlled by lies backed by violence have become collective criminal insanities, which have dangerous enough consequences to the unbelievable degree that the human species is quite possibly going to be causing its own extinction.
The basic ways that one most "reasonably" expects a political economy based on enforced frauds will respond to Peak Cheap Oil is by going through psychotic breakdowns via the phases of Peak Insanities. It my view is is not possible to exaggerate the degree to which our civilization is controlled by enforced frauds, which are automatically becoming more criminally insane every day!
Although, almost every day, one can read about some wonderful new laboratory demonstration of some possible Alternative Energies & Society Adapting to Them, however, that kind of news based on scientific and technological progress is dwarfed by the news which avalanches down on one every day about how most of the real events in the world are being controlled by runaway criminal insanities, like one false flag attack, inside job, event after another, starting war after war based on deceits, in order to back up the debt slavery systems, which together make all the money spent on developing systems of creative alternatives look relatively trivial in comparison.
The real world is actually controlled by the biggest and best organized crime gangs, and therefore, we are more headed towards times of Peak Insanities, as we approach Peak Everything, more than anything else! In that context, I kind of envy the people who can still believe in the possible technological miracles (which I too believe are possible), while being able to deliberately ignore the kinds of political miracles that would be necessary to prevent a civilization actually almost totally controlled by enforced frauds somehow not continuing to push those collective criminal insanities through towards some overall Peak Social Insanity point.
In my opinion, most of the "Crash Course" presumes upon Hanlon's Razor too much. Chris Martenson, et alia, underestimate the degree to which our civilization has developed into systems of runaway criminal insanities, which overwhelm all other technical fixes, because there are no corresponding political fixes. We have reasonably good chances of developing possible technological miracles, however, there are no reasonable chances of developing the kinds of political miracles that we need much more.
The threat of bioweaponized plagues is a good example of the potential for runaway criminal insanities to overwhelm everything else. The historical patterns, as well as the present examples, are for those threats to be responded to by the authorities by them doubling down on their trends to lie about those things. Everywhere one looks, one sees a similar pattern!
Wait, you mean ebola was all a distraction? /s
I hope I wasn't the only one who was tired of Ebola hedge with every other article being about who handled disposable gloves and the third cousins who shared a taxi ride.
With neoconservative taking over another branch of government, notice that we are starting to see stories about North Korea and Iran again, which we haven't seen in years due to the Syria and Ukraine "humanitarian intervention" angle of starting WWIII.
Now, with the red shade of the purple party "in power", will they demand a vote on the first declaration of war since WWII or will they show their true colors and demand executive action against Iran and North Korea as their preferred method of kicking off the festivities that will be the next ebola-like distraction from global economic collapse?
Average Joe seems to lap up the Iran propaganda more readily than those other countries they can't find on a map...
It looks more like peak available rather then cheap / expensive or whatever else takes your fancy oil in Europe.
It may be cheap in $ but nobody can afford to burn it.
Regardless of this the banks still give out credit for cars as they are caught in a double entry bind.
Eventually the cars will remain in their driveways - not for 23 hours in the day , but 24.
Cue Russia engaging in military expansion.
The oil will be burned.
Russian oil demand now at a all time high and 400KBD over the 5 year avaerage.
NATO out mans Russia 5 to 1. I think it's nato that's in a position for military expansion. The Russian army is weak and outdated. Do some fucking research.
peak people will save us from peak oil.
until peak smart aleckness delivers us to peak denial
Interesting comment, because when you scratch the surface of the 'peak oil' nostrum, one inevitably finds 'peak-population' or the necessity for some method of widespread population control, riding shotgun...
that part of the equation is always ignored isn't it, just as it is here. malthus raises his ugly head.
You're putting the cart before the horse.
The peak oil people are warning that the planet's carrying capacity has been vastly extended using cheap oil, and when the oil production chart starts to decline it will have a strong effect on the ability to maintain that extended carrying capacity.
Or... put another way.
Famine.
no need for oil if there are no people. the population explosion in the 20th century exploded the need for oil, not the other way around, oil did not cause a population explosion. the "green revolutioon", petro based fertilizer, does not sustain it. ironically, it is becoming clear a post industrial economy cause a drop in population growth as babies become liabilities from the assets they were in an agrarian pre welfare society.
famine is caused by the inability to get the medium of exchange to get food because the petro based economy cannot throw off enough money for everyone to have enough to eat without petro.
Peak Prosperity is a bankers outfit.The reason why stuff moves from A to B in Europe is because money is scarce.
Cars then chase this scarce money with liquid fuel - Then they make oil scarce when it is not.
Its simple to understand.......give a basic income to everybody and they will not need to chase scarce money..........they can go down to the pub and talk shit all day.
Very little inputs required.
For your info the world was told this in 1978 by the Shah of Iran.
It led to his ousting and the subsequent price hike of a revolutionary world realizing the consequences of his remark, said as an Oil King reclaiming his exponentially rising financial rights to his friends; political masters : the US corporates + the state CIA, that ran its economy and protected his class in an Iran that went theologically conflictual with the West in the wake of his political demise.
At that time Pres. Carter started to push for industrial changes (Syn fuels program), assuming that subsequent hi-priced oil was a GIVEN. And, the OIL lobby of that age (Seven Sisters) agreed gleefully, rubbing their hands at the idea of huge windfall profits thru high priced sales for low priced production in conventional oil structures.
When Reagan got elected his first objective was to get oil price down, using accelerated oil discoveries (Cantarell and North Sea etc.), economies of energy and arm twisting of key Saud swing producer in OPEC (in their joint effort to bring down Shia Iran-- US's main enemy now--, with Saddam's Iraq as spear carrier); which resulted in Oil prices reverting down and the SAME OIL Lobby singing "we are drowning in Oil", as they realised that soft oil prices would knock out key competitor USSR, opening up subsequently its huge markets to their lucrative portfolio and global reach.
Reagan thus obtained a double objective : bringing down "Commie axis of evli" and extending corporate Pax Americana's hold on the world's oil resources even behind the now torn curtain of Cold war's demise.
Until US oligarchy hubris ramped up globalization and runaway oil consumption to fulfill the deadly prophecy of the Shah, in the global 2003 oil price spike.
Energy is always interchangeble . Conservation of energy .
The rate of exchange is the criterion .
See
http://andreswhy.blogspot.com/2008/10/financial-crisis-2008-exchange-rat...
Convertible, not interchangeable. You cannot pour coal into your car's fuel tank, but you can convert coal into gasoline inefficiently.
Wrong. Oil is irreplaceable for energy density and numerous by-products like plastics, lubricants, pharmaceuticals and fertilizers.
You CANNOT make anything from electricity, no matter how it is produced, it just powers some of the machinery used to make stuff ... and electricity will never power commercial aircraft, only more or less toy ones, all commercial and military aircraft use kerosene (jet fuel) derived from crude oil, whilst piston-engined aircraft use highly refined, high octane gasoline/petrol.
You can make oil using electricity and various carbon containing feedstocks. The Germans did during WWII. The problem is efficiency.
What sort of oil? As the Castrol ads say, "Oil ain't oils".
Crude oil comes in many forms, with heaviest (and dirtiest, most difficult) containing many useful, crackable fractions, from bitumen, through lubricating oils, to diesel, kerosene, gasolene/petrol and gas - with a lot else yielding plastics, etc..
Light sweet crude, such as Libya is abundant in, could almost (I'm exagerating a lot) be put straight in your car tank, but a BIG downside (including with fracked oil in the US, I've read) is that you canno cheaply produce even diesel with it - let alone anything else much - and disel is THE fuel of choice for industrial apps. including heavy road and rail transport.
So what sort of oil are you refering to - very light I'd guess - which you already admit is inefficient.
With locomotives, diesel is the fuel but the power is electric. Shit, coal oil used to be burned for lighting..are you saying technology stops here? The possibilities for electrical power generation are boundless.
For all intents and purposes, you can't make a silk purse out of a sows ear. But we can get close to Sow'er Pusses if we try real hard.
+1000 , Setarcos
It is almost impossible to make the average, even highly intelligent individual understand just how much work is embodied in a gallon of gas or diesel. We have been burning it at 50 cents to $4.00 a gallon for so long, we don't appreciate it.
Put a gallon of gas in your car, drive it until it stops, and push it back.
Cut your 3 acre lawn by hand.
Saw logs or use an axe instead of a chain saw.
Park the excavator or dozer, and dig it by hand.
Peak Oil?
My comment:
A PILE OF EXCREMENT
Apparently you didn't get past the 2nd grade. The concept is peak "cheap" oil, not peak oil.
For those like him, who aren't fully literate, it means there's lots of oil, but not at $40 a barrel.
High school equivalency courses>>>>>> this way
:-)
Cost = hours of work or technology fee
Cost is no issue.
Existence of technology is the issue
If technology exists, government can make oil extraction cost quite low via subsidies
Where are the subsidies to come from? Oil tax? Well(sic) no. Income tax? Thin air?
Besides I think you are probably technologically illiterate. I doubt you'd be writing this if you were an engineer, for instance.
Same as when non-scientists make the faith claim, "Science will solve the problem."
mechanical engineer
Subsidies are just a government fiat order, just as money is.
My assumption is that technology exists or will exist soon.
Funding it is not an issue at all.
funding? what is funding? debt and derivatives?
when is peak of that?
there are many peaks in real
existence of technology is the only issue, nothing else.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engineering
This is just silly. Recent technology in the drilling field is really just technique refinement. Increased efficiency in fracking etc. They've made some great improvements in drilling altogether. But ounce we blow through those types of fields and start deep water drilling all bets are off. Drilling at 30 plus thousand feet is a crap shoot. The likelihood of hitting pockets of immense pressures exceeding human engineering is quite high.
I'm fine with this logic.
If technology is not there, no chance
So fake fiat will extract real minerals with no consequence?
Our problems are solved.
Thanks ekm1, those letters after your name really do mean something.
I never said there wouldn't be any consequence.
totally agree from an economic point of view. the easy way to look at it is the change in technology and the rate of change in technology just looking back 20 years ago. the oil exploration and extraction business funds huge research and development efforts to improve their efficiencies. that is an obvious adjustment as are high miliage and alt energy cars but the higher cost of oil for energy opens up the market for more alt energy and transportation methods. today's driver age kids are real auto averse compared to my generation. i know several high school kids in the last few years who have delayed or not even obtained a driver's liscense yet in their mid twenties. they seem to be real ready for good local mass transit. so there are social changes that affect the model. the most dramatic will be population adjustments as oil gets more expensive the people who cannot afford it will perish, peak people.
maglev is the new tech. maglev cars powered by a fuel cells by 2050.
No, they can't.
We non oil producers survive on the surplus energy. As the surplus drops closer to 0, more and more of us have to become involved in finding or producing energy to survive. That cost can't be magick'd away.
The rules of the game are much different at the elite level. They know very well when a nation is printing prosperity, because the funds have to be put through one of the channels, such as SWIFT.
So, this is why countries don't(unless they're permitted to like China)just print madly and subsidize whatever they want to, they know there are rules in place.
Beyond that, yet another ignorant comment.
"Why don't we just print money to subsidize energy production?"
Better idea Buzz, if you're gonna just print, why bother with energy production? Just print.
Again. High school course equivalency>>>>>>>
:-)
Defense Industry is fully nationalized, but privately managed.
No reason extraction industry not to be the same.
Defense industry gave us:
iphones
internet
etc etc etc
Here's a short list:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_invention
And in case you didn't know, the concept of too big to fail did NOT start with the large insolvent bank.
That concept was invented for: LOCKHEED MARTIN
So in other words, every square mile of drill-able, frack-able, pump-able geography on Earth has been mapped and found to be wanting of 'cheap' oil extraction? I mean, in essence, isn't that what the whole premise of (peak cheap oil) suggests or infers...? If not, then how has this 'hard' conclusion been reached...?
Listen 1.
Since no one else will say it, "FUCK YOU" and your High school discourse!
Hey dumbass, if you've had been reading ZH for longer, you'd know how about 2 years ago all these kind of articles were about "Peak Oil."
I ridiculed them then, as it would require pretty complete and accurate mapping of the top 3 miles of Earth's crust to be able to make such a statement,
so if anything we could be at or past "Peak Cheap Oil."
And funnily CHS and then also Chris Martenson changed their mantra just along these lines.
Note:
Even though I find it possible that we are past Peak Cheap Oil, I still find it highly unlikely as nobody knows what new technologies make difficult extraction easier in the future, not to mention a comparison of Oil Price today vs. historical is extremely difficult with rigged Inflation Indexes everywhere.
+10,000 ekm1
thank you
What a splendidly moronic comment.
The article/video is not about Peak Oil, it is about Peak Cheap Oil.
Things have moved on from when you could dig a post hole (more or less) in Texas and accidentally hit a gusher at virtually no cost.
Now reserves must be searched for - expensive - and are likely to be in deep oceans, remote regions, or unstable countries - all very expensive and likewise fracking and tar sands, when it can take four barrels equivalent of energy (e.g. from natural gas) to produce one barrel of oil.
What don't you get about this?
Sir, do you know the concept of COST?
Cost = hours of work
Cost = land fee
Cost = Technology fee
As long as technology exists, cost is not an issue.
Government can find ways to make it very cheap via peaceful of violent means
Can government make it work to use 2 barrels of oil to produce 1 barrel of oil?
If it takes 2 barrels of oil to make 1 barrel of oil, how will production continue increasing?
I keep saying 'if technology exists'. And yes it does
Silicon generates electricity from sunlight effortlessly forever.
Wrong. Photovoltaic cells steadily lose efficiency and, in any case, nothing can be made from the electricity produced. It may well power machinery with which things are produced from various materials, but, for instance, solar power can never power an aluminium smelter, which requires massive amounts of cheap electricity, with hydro being about the cheapest, or else if there a large natural gas field, as in Western Australia ... look up "aluminium production" if you'd like to be informed.
Aluminium, glass, steel and concrete all require huge amounts of energy to produce. You basically have to burn stone to produce the lime (CaO) required for concrete.
That energy is produced by slowing down a river or by a nuclear reactor or by burning coal.
Not safe energy, but it still there.
Humans must make trade-off decisions between energy abundance and its negative effects and dangers, like Fukushima style.
When a technology exists, it all becomes a matter of human decision as far as advantanges and risks.
Cost = the energy required to get the energy?
That is why I say: If technology exists and it does
Are you an engineer, or technologist of some other kind? If not then you canno know what you are talking about.
I used to be a toolmaker/fitter/turner and a friend of mine had a detail drafting company involved in building off-shore oil rigs, it's an immensely complicated affair.
It is absolutely true that technology in recent years has made it easier to reach new reserves. But your assertion that cost is not an issue as long as there is "technology" is naive. That's one hell of an assumption. Yes, there are ways governments make it cheap but to think it's all predicated on technology and will always be this way is where you go off the rails.
Government ends up nationalizing in one way or another anything that is crucial to the survival of the nation, same as Defense Industry which is practically nationalized, but seems as if it is private.
For an ME you seem woefully ignorant of Thermodynamics.
With fiat currency, price is not nearly as important as the Laws of Physics: EROEI.
What's the point here? The market price of crude has fluctuated a lot over the last ten years, but let's say adjusted for inflation it's up about 50% since 2004. So the Sauds can keep pumping even some of their more depleted wells, Canadians can cook their sands, and Americans can frack everything in sight. So the peak is now and wasn't 1997 after all, or whenever. Or maybe the peak is manana at even higher prices. So maybe "peak *cheap* oil" already happened, in 1997 or maybe 1977 or 1957 or whenever, when you filled up the tank, got free maps and drinking glasses and your windshield washed with a smile.
Lets not confuse the lack of purchasing power crisis in Europe with peak global oil.
The euro has made europeans poorer.
Esp from 1990 ~ on we have seen a dramatic rise in oil consumption at the expense of basic purchasing power.
In Europe we work for the machines as we have become exposed to mercantile dumping.
This is especially so in Ireland and Spain.
If Irish monetary policy was working properly we would have seen a huge rise in rail travel as happened in the Uk & NI.
Northern irish rail is almost identical in structure to its southern counterpoint yet it has seen a doubling in passengers post 2001/2 while irish mainline rail has stagnated since that time.
Something inherent in the euro prevents people from having basic purchasing power.
That energy is diverted towards machines which serve no real purpose.
Northern Irish rail is the perfect little scientific control when oberserving the Southern irish conduit.
http://www.irrs.ie/Journal%20184/184%20NewsNIR.htm
As can be seen the only decline in rail passengers was on the Dublin to Belfast route (a decline of 12%)
Every other route In NI has seen huge growth albeit from a tiny base.
Peak oil is a simple notion that a finite resource is after all finite. The German Army sorted this out several years ago in the following study. Do with the information what you will. http://www.permaculturenews.org/files/Peak%20Oil_Study%20EN.pdf
If one has 'followed' Martenson over the past 7 or 8 years, one would have noticed the 'trend line' of this peak-oil Fear trade. It was riding high in the saddle from '08 to about '10 or so, then went curiously 'quiet'. It seems however, that there has been somewhat of a 'resurgence' of late. Regardless, when one is $$$pushing the Fear Trade, it's never a bad time to be scared...
Listen Zero's.
Paying members get to learn about "PEAK MARGARITAS". Suck the straw bitchez!
Oil is not the last, best source of energy on earth. We are not "in trouble" when oil starts to run out. We will just switch to other energy sources.
Listen.
I believe. Just use inflation to balance out the transition. Fuck "PEAK" peak-speak. Central Banking and fiat is the answer to "ANY" problem.
Go on then...
Gets the popcorn out...
Such as?
The only energy source we tap is the sun.
Oil is concentrated sunlight.
Wind, solar and hydro are are functions of energy input by the sun.
Nuclear , you have an argument. But it has too many negatives in my opinion. Including mining of uranium and safe storage of waste. We are all probably dead from Fukishima anyhow, so what the fuck.
Geothermal and hot springs are great, but very limited geography.
Not really mentioned, there are over 10,000 industrial uses for oil besides burning it for energy.
NEWSFLASH: Nuckular power plants magically begin churning out billions of tons of life-sustaining plastics and petrochemicals as byproducts. Windmills begin shitting rainbow skittles.
LOL Well said, more succinctly than I've tried to explain it.
Listen you two fucking retarts.
There are always ways to recycle plastics.
Long landfill reclamation re-recyclers. Once engineered resins are produced they can be reused to infinity. Years worth of plastics are burried in the ground. Think Zero's, "THINK"!
"retarts" are we. What's that? Recycled cakes or loose women? But seriously:
There are many different kinds of plastics and it is very labour intensive to sort them, e.g. you can't lump nylon, polystyrene, PVC, etc. all together and produce anything, other than maybe some horrible, multicloured, weak panels.
If you knew a little more you wouldn't make the claims you do.
1) If, as is stated by yrbmegr, "Oil is not the last, best source of energy on earth" can you tell us what is?
2) And if we take as given that an article about peak cheap oil specifically refers to liquid transport fuels, and that when the oil runs out "We will just switch to other energy sources" would you care to name (even just) one other energy source?
3) Finally, to quote from ekm1 "My assumption is that technology exists or will exist soon."
A bold assumption. I detect a case of << The Technology Fairy will come to rescue us >>. Good luck with that line of wishful thinking.
Conclusion - The Laws of Thermodynamics are a Bitch!
Now you have shocked me! This means that you don't believe in the Tooth Fairy either.
Promise not to tell anyone, but neither do I, nor the Technology Fairy, nor the Science Fairy, not even Santa Claus, nor the 'grownup' version said to live in the sky and is said to perform miracles on demand (if you are good, that is).
Nice, using "The Big Lie" (a/k/a baffle them with bullshit) already in the second sentence:
Exponential debt requires exponential increasing energy? Seriously??
Please enlighten us how much energy exactly does the Fed need to conjure up a few more digital currency units.
This is Marxist thinking.
Oil is regulated and manipulated. There is only a pretense of a market place. Hence, we cannot know what a reasonable price for oil should be. Without market signals we cannot know what is available. Technology matters.
Furthermore, Oil is quoted in US Dollars, a depreciating asset. As the Dollar stops being the world's reserve currency, as Russia and China are demanding, the price for oil will increase and demand will be affected.
Is the world running out of exploitable oil? No. The amount of known oil available at today's price as never been higher -- above 50 years. Cheap is not a market concept. Scarcity is.
Is Energy scarce? Sure, it always has been. Is there abundant energy at today's price? Sure. Much of the world has Oil and Gas shale which could be exploited. Governments are getting in the way; they are increasing the cost of extraction. The US Department of the Interior has placed off limits huge tracts of fields on the East and West coastal shelves and in Alaska.
Only Japan is attempting to exploit its Methane Hydrate deposits. That energy source alone has thousands of years of natural gas in it.