free hit counter
klimaschutz / Manpollo-Brainstorming-Transition
 | 
  • If you are citizen of an European Union member nation, you may not use this service unless you are at least 16 years old.

  • You already know Dokkio is an AI-powered assistant to organize & manage your digital files & messages. Very soon, Dokkio will support Outlook as well as One Drive. Check it out today!

View
 

Manpollo-Brainstorming-Transition

Page history last edited by Linda Siska 15 years, 2 months ago

Preparation

 

 

Display:

worm bin

homemade solar cooker

germane books, articles and PDF files of studies

 

 

Refreshments:

soup made in solar cooker

beer and wine

 

 

 

 

Peak Oil and Life as We Know It

 

Intro

 

 

Back in 2005, I went into a panic.  Our house had been hard hit by Ivan, Dennis came too close for comfort, and Katrina, which wasn’t even close, left 8 inches of water and two feet of debris in our yard.  I started to wonder, are we going to be going through this every summer?  Has the climate changed?  Is it global warming?  So I started to dig behind the headlines. I wasn’t trying to prove a point one way or the other. I wanted to know the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.  My mantra became, ‘don’t believe anyone, check it out for yourself.’  Well, I’m not here to talk about global warming – I know there are strong opinions on both sides of the argument and I don’t plan to go there, except perhaps peripherally.  I’m here to talk about peak oil, a concept I came across when I was doing my research.  It took me a while to understand what the term means and the implications of where we are, and now that I have a clearer picture, I feel obligated to share it with the people I care about most.

 

 

 

 

What is peak oil?

 

 

The concept of ‘peak oil’ originated with M. King Hubbert, a geo-scientist who worked for Shell Oil back in the 1950’s.  Hubbert had observed that oil discoveries in America had increased quite rapidly, leveled off, and were beginning to decline in what appeared to be a bell-shaped curve.  He postulated that the oil supply would follow a similar curve some few decades later. http://www.hubbertpeak.com/hubbert/1956/1956.pdf  As new oil fields were discovered and developed, the supply would naturally increase.  But as fewer and fewer new discoveries were made and as existing oil wells became depleted, the supply would peak and then taper off.  Of course, the bell curve is not as smooth and even in real life – but the overall trend still follows the basic shape.

 

 

Based on his observations, Hubbert, in 1956,  predicted that the U.S. oil supply would peak between the late sixties and early seventies. Hubbert was right on the button. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_Oil_Production_and_Imports_1920_to_2005.png

 

 

Now Hubbert made predictions about global oil as well.  He predicted that the world supply would peak around 1995, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hubbert_peak_oil_plot.svg, which obviously, it did not.  Several major discoveries – the north slope in Alaska, the North Sea in Europe, and new oil fields in Russia -- pumped more oil into the system than he had anticipated.  New technologies have allowed better extraction from existing oil wells, and with the increase in the price of oil, it has become profitable to drill in places that would not have been considered previously.

 

 

Hubbert does have his critics.  But it seems his critics are arguing the shape of the curve (does it have a peak at the top or a bumpy plateau?) and not the fact of the curve.  It’s kind of like two designers arguing over whether a shade of green is ‘pine’ or ‘forest’ when they both agree that it is dark green.

 

 

 

 

So Where are We Now?

 

 

That’s the big question.  There are a lot of unknowns.  First of all, we don’t know how much oil there is even in the known reserves -- in part because it is difficult to determine how much is underground and how much of what is there can be extracted.  As an oil well becomes depleted, it is increasingly difficult to suck the last bit out – kind of like trying to get that last puddle of the milkshake with your straw.  Secondly, most of the known oil reserves are in countries that are not known for their dedication to the truth.  Amazingly, all the OPEC countries have been reporting the same amount of reserves for years now. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Opec-reservers.png  Magical, isn’t it, how they could have been pumping all that oil since 1980 and have more than they started with?

 

 

By the way, note the big jump in reported oil reserves in the mid to late eighties.  Strange, isn’t it, as there were no new finds reported during that time frame.  Well, not so strange when you consider that back in 1983, OPEC placed quotas on its member nations.  The quotas were based on reported reserves – the more oil a nation declared, the more they were allowed to pump, and the more wealth they accumulated for their current regime.  So overnight, ta da, they suddenly had more oil than previously reported.[1]

 

 

What do the experts have to say about all of this?  Well, no one is saying we are going to run out of oil any time soon.  But they are saying that supplies will begin to diminish and costs will rise.  In November of 2008, the IEA (International Energy Agency), which is the authority on world energy supplies, issued their annual report, World Energy Outlook 2008.  The following quotes are taken from their press release:

 

 

“Oil will remain the world’s main source of energy for many years to come, even under the most optimistic of assumptions about the development of alternative technology. But the sources of oil, the cost of producing it and the prices that consumers will have to pay for it are extremely uncertain. “One thing is certain”, stated Mr. Tanaka, “while market imbalances will feed volatility, the era of cheap oil is over.”

 

 

 

 

To continue quoting:

 

 

“. . . decline rates are likely to rise significantly in the long term, from an average of 6.7% today to 8.6% in 2030.”

 

 

Of course there are also probable reserves which have yet to be developed.  The oil companies have tens of thousands of unused leases off the coasts of America at the current time.  Why are these leases going unused?  For a variety of reasons – one is that the equipment and experienced personnel needed for drilling are hard to come by.  The demand has outpaced the supply.  The second is that the leases are in places where drilling is expensive to do, where platforms are expensive to maintain, where crude is expensive to transport, and where weather can play hardball.  No oil company wants to go to all that expense only to come up dry or to price themselves out of an uncertain market.  “Drill, baby, drill,” sounds like a good solution until one begins to recognize the problems involved.  But don’t take my word for it.  Read the IEA 2007 report for yourself.

 

 

So is there more oil still to be discovered?  I certainly hope so.  The bell curve we saw earlier banks on new discoveries to replace the old.  And the methods the oil companies are now using are really, really sophisticated.  They use gravity surveys, magnetic surveys, and seismic reflection surveys to identify leads. Then they create 3 dimensional models through a process known as depth conversion and use all of that to identify possible reserves. Thanks to the new technology, they are finding new reserves all the time – in North Dakota, Brazil, and the Gulf of Mexico, but none of it is cheap, easy-to-get oil.  It is oil that it only makes sense to recover if the prices are high enough.  And as the price of oil goes up, so does the cost of extracting it.

 

 

And the amount of new oil we will need to offset the declines is staggering.  According to the IEA (“Science/IEA: World oil crunch looming? Not if we can find six Saudi Arabias!“):

 

“We have found that if we want to stand still–that is, continue producing 85 million barrels per day–for the next 22 years, we need new production of 45 million barrels per day to compensate for the decline. That means four Saudi Arabias.  Add on a demand increase of the sort seen the past couple of decades–equivalent to another two Saudi Arabias.”

 

So, no problem.  We find the equivalent of another six Saudi Arabias and we’re good to go for the next 22 years.  I’m not sure what happens at the end of 22 years.  They didn’t say.

 

Consider this. America’s number three source of oil after Canada and Saudi Arabia, is Mexico.  According to a report issued in December of 2008, Pemex, Mexico’s state-owned oil company, declared that its crude oil production was down 6.5% from the previous year, in part due to hurricane activity and in part due to declines in its major field.  Cantarell, the world’s third largest oil field, is declining twice as fast as predicted, down 33% from a year ago.  Declining pressure in the oil field has also made it more difficult and more expensive to pump.

 

Overall, the non-OPEC production rate looks like this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hubbert_world_2004.png

 

 

So we have used about half of the world’s oil.  We still have half to go.  But we have used the easy, cheap half and current demand is ever increasing.  What if the countries who are currently supplying our oil decide to hoard what they have left and dole it out to the highest bidder?  Or what if conflict in the middle east, a major hurricane hit on gulf coast refineries, or any number of other events interrupt the supply line?  I’m not talking no oil, I’m just talking not enough to go around.

 

 

Okay, but we still have lots of coal, right?  Let’s ignore the problem of trying to run your car or fly an airplane on coal and look at the latest figures.  The U.S. Geological Survey did an analysis of the Gillette Coalfield in Wyoming, America’s largest coal reserve.  They just published their findings in December of  2008 (Assessment of Coal Geology, Resources, and Reserves in the Gillette Coalfield, Powder River Basin, Wyoming)  According to them, we have a fraction of the coal we thought we did.  After subtracting out the inaccessible coal, mining and processing losses, and taking into account energy obtained from energy expended, they discovered that the Gillette coalfield is only 6 percent of the original resource total.  If coal is your answer, you’d better think again.

 

 

 

 

So, How Does This Affect Me?

 

 

Back in 2005, the Bush Department of Energy published a paper entitled Peaking of World Oil Production.  This paper concluded:

 

“The world has never faced a problem like this. Without massive mitigation more than a decade before the fact, the problem will be pervasive and will not be temporary. Previous energy transitions (wood to coal and coal to oil) were gradual and evolutionary; oil peaking will be abrupt and revolutionary.”

 

Let me repeat that, “The world has never faced a problem like this.”  We are in new territory, folks.  We cannot rely upon historical precedent.  “The world has never faced a problem like this.”

 

Look around you. Is there anything you can see or touch that wasn’t brought to you courtesy of cheap, abundant oil?  In the 'developed' world, everything, every thing in our lives is connected to oil. Everything.

 

 

By all signs, we are already at peak oil. Demand is down now, thanks to a depressed economy, but cheaper oil prices and economic stimulus may change all that. Even if demand stays depressed, the supply is already beginning to taper off. Eventually, supply and demand will cross paths and all hell will break loose.

 

So what happens when oil is no longer cheap and abundant? What happens when oil becomes expensive and increasingly scarce? What happens when you wait in line for hours at the gas station only to find that the pumps have run dry and the next shipment may arrive in a few days, or it may not? What happens when the trucks that supply the grocery store shelves are stranded en route waiting for gas to become available? What happens to your coal-fired power plant when the equipment that mines the coal and the vehicles that transport the coal are unable to operate due to a gas shortage?  What happens when you dial 911 and are told that the police/fire/ambulance cannot respond to your call right now, try again tomorrow?

 

 

Oh, but the scientists will save us, the same ones whose warnings we have been ignoring for years. They will come up with all these cool inventions. We will switch to alternative fuels. We will build solar arrays and wind farms and nuclear power plants. Good idea. Should have done that twenty years ago. Doing it during an oil shortage is not only going to be more expensive, but progress will be much slower. Maybe, if we act fast enough, we will keep our power grid up and going. Maybe we will convert to electric cars just in the nick of time. Maybe we will even find a way to keep our big trucks on the road, delivering food to all the Wal*marts. But have you ever heard of an electric airplane? Or a plug-in fighter jet? Are there enough sail boats in the world to keep the shelves at ToysRUs stocked with plastic robots made in China? And what about all the plastics themselves? Made from petro-chemicals. And the green revolution that feeds an over-populated world – based on petro-chemicals.

 

Is there no hope? Of course there is. Peak oil is out there like a huge hurricane headed our way, the biggest hurricane in recorded history.  Like any hurricane, there are unknowns.  It could change course.  It could weaken and even dissipate.  No one knows for sure.  But I believe we should be prepared for a rough ride. We all know first hand that if the hurricane comes ashore, the government won’t save us.  Insurance companies won’t save us.  If this hurricane comes ashore, life is going to change.  Drastically.  And forever.  There will be no going back to the good old days.

 

 

That doesn’t mean there isn’t hope.  We are fortunate enough to live in a place with abundant resources.  We have year-round sunshine, a long growing season, fish waiting to be caught, and water, water everywhere.  But our greatest resource is one another.  We are all strong, resilient people.  We proved that after Ivan.  We are talented, skilled people who have become even more skilled since Ivan.  And best of all, we are not only more like a family than a neighborhood, but we have the essential qualities that will carry us through – the ability to work hard and to play hard, the ability to care for one another, and enough sense of humor to keep us sane when the going gets rough.

 

 

We can create good new days.  We can build a post-carbon society where family and community and connection to the essentials are once again at the heart of our lives.  The really great news is that the things we can do to insure our survival are things that would benefit us even if peak oil turns out to be another Y2K -- they are things that will save us money in the here and now.  

 

 

 

 

Okay, so what are your big ideas, Hippie Chick?

 

 

Well, you can start with any of the following:

 

 

Compost your table scraps and garden refuse.  I’ve found the easiest way to get good compost is with a worm bin.  You can buy a fancy model or make your own.  I’ll be glad to share worms with anyone who wants to get started.

 

 

Plant more fruits and vegetables.

 

 

Collect rain water in barrels or cisterns.

 

 

Make yourself a solar oven and food dehydrator.

 

 

Consider getting chickens.

 

 

But it isn’t about me and my ideas, really.  It’s about all of us.  I want to hear what you think about the possibility of peak oil and your thoughts on how we might weather this storm should it impact our lives.

 

 

 

 

Open Discussion

 



[1] from The Breaking Point, an article by Peter Maas

 

 

Comments (0)

You don't have permission to comment on this page.