Reuters India


By Alex Lawler

LONDON, July 21 (Reuters) - The looming peak in world oil production will set back international development and threatens to hinder efforts to make poverty history, a report by a group of UK lawmakers said.

While oil's rally to a record high is causing economic pain in developed countries, its impact on international development is being overlooked, the report by the All Party Parliamentary Group on Peak Oil and development groups RESET and Practical Action said.

"The deepening energy crisis has the potential to make poverty a permanent state for a growing number of people, undoing the development efforts of a generation," the report released on Monday said.

"Communities across the globe are more vulnerable than ever, living in an unsustainable present and facing an uncertain future."

A rally in oil prices, which hit a record $147.27 a barrel earlier this month, is leading to more interest in peak oil -- the controversial view that supply has reached, or will soon reach, a high point and then fall.

The parliamentary group, chaired by lawmaker John Hemming, was formed in 2007 to consider the production outlook and the consequences of declining supply for the British and world economy. It has 20 members.

Its report refers to warnings that peak oil is likely to occur "before 2015" and the current jump in oil prices is "a prelude to even more severe increases in the next decade," a statement issued with the report said.

Too bad peak oil doesn't post here anymore.

The only thing that will hinder world development is peak imagination and peak innovation.

What this world needs is peak government.  Unfortunately, that resource seems to have unfathomable depths for expansion.

Balderdash.

Maybe they shouldn't breed as much.

Quoted: The only thing that will hinder world development is peak imagination and peak innovation. What this world needs is peak government.  Unfortunately, that resource seems to have unfathomable depths for expansion.

Peak stupidity.  Idiotocracy is our future.

Everyone will have HHO generators on their cars and will lie about the mileage improvements.  Well, those that are not hypermilers who sue everyone that hits them in the rear.

Quoted: Quoted: The only thing that will hinder world development is peak imagination and peak innovation. What this world needs is peak government.  Unfortunately, that resource seems to have unfathomable depths for expansion. Peak stupidity.  Idiotocracy is our future. Everyone will have HHO generators on their cars and will lie about the mileage improvements.  Well, those that are not hypermilers who sue everyone that hits them in the rear.

I'll run them all over in my oldschool producer gas powered car.

We were the first to find oil. We used other stuff to power our cars before oil.

Quoted: The only thing that will hinder world development is peak imagination and peak innovation. What this world needs is peak government.  Unfortunately, that resource seems to have unfathomable depths for expansion.

And apathy... and largess... and inefficiency... and intrusion... and overbearance ...

Haha, peak oil.

More like peak stupid.

Quoted: We were the first to find oil. We used other stuff to power our cars before oil.

What are you talking about?

We weren't the first to find Oil. We didn't use "other stuff".

I am going to take you pst as sarcasm...

LA Times


Why the oil crunch may grow worse
Casey Christie / The Bakersfield Californian
KERN COUNTY - NOV. 2007 - Two oil pumping units are seen in the distance off Comanche Drive in the early morning hours as the sun comes up over Kern County's eastern mountains, Nov. 2007.
The fear is that all the easy-to-reach crude has been found. These may be 'the good old days,' one expert says.
By Elizabeth Douglass, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
July 22, 2008
» Discuss Article    (63 Comments)

With gasoline and oil costing once-unthinkable barrels of cash, the notion that things in our petroleum-addicted world soon will get worse -- maybe much, much worse -- is spreading fast.

Fear pushed oil to $131.04 a barrel in New York futures trading Monday, closing $2.16 higher after tumbling more than $16 last week. Supply concerns drove the increase as the market fretted about the potential for Tropical Storm Dolly to harm Gulf of Mexico oil operations.

But behind today's oil mania lies a deeper dread: that the world has found all the easy-to-reach oil, and the daily supply of the essential black goo will fall further and further behind escalating global demand.

"As much as you're uncomfortable with today's oil prices, these are going to be the good old days," oil expert Robert L. Hirsch told a recent Santa Barbara gathering of policymakers and environmentalists. "We're talking about pain here that is unimaginable."

The day-to-day cost of oil reflects a sharply weaker dollar, market speculation and geopolitical events such as unrest in Nigeria and other oil-exporting countries. At the same time, producers are barely slaking the world's energy thirst, and the market increasingly is fixated on the long-term supply picture.

Adding to the angst, several industry heavyweights caution that above-ground issues -- including instability among oil-producing nations and shortages of drilling rigs and engineers -- threaten to impose a "practical peak" on oil output that could be just as wrenching as the geologic peak envisioned by Hirsch and others.

"There are more and more people who believe that oil supply prospects are not very optimistic," said Fatih Birol, chief economist at the Paris-based International Energy Agency, a watchdog for industrialized nations.

Some argue that drilling in off-limits areas would buy the U.S. time in the race to develop oil substitutes, cut imports and ease economic pain. To that end, President Bush on July 14 lifted a White House ban on new offshore drilling for oil and natural gas and urged lawmakers to rescind the congressional ban.

Still, Birol counts himself among those who believe the world has reached at least "a peak of easily accessible oil." That alone is cause for worry, because many economies are built around the assumption that oil would continue to be cheap and plentiful.

Birol is leading a groundbreaking reassessment of the worldwide outlook for oil supplies, investment and production that many believe will deliver bad news when it is released in November.

"We are very concerned about future oil supplies," he said. "We may have difficult days to come in the oil markets."

In five years, demand for oil may exceed 94 million barrels a day and continue rising, spurred by growth in China and India, the International Energy Agency estimates. Experts put daily global production at between 82 million and 86 million barrels, and even the most optimistic oil authorities can't see production keeping up with demand without a big boost from unconventional sources such as Canada's vast oil sands or U.S. oil shale. Getting crude from such sources is more difficult, expensive and environmentally harmful.

"Unconventional oil includes all these things like tar sands . . . and some people count all that stuff as oil," said Texas oil investor Jim Baldauf, who in 2005 helped found the U.S. chapter of the Assn. for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas, which has affiliates in 22 countries. "If you do that, then you have a much rosier picture to look at."

Worries that oil production soon will fall short of demand or begin a steep dive aren't supported by the data his company has compiled, said consultant Daniel Yergin, chairman of Massachusetts-based Cambridge Energy Research Associates and author of "The Prize," a Pulitzer-winning oil history. But anxiety about long-term supply, he said, has "contributed to this very fevered psychology in the oil market."

Cambridge researchers acknowledge that the Earth's oil production eventually will max out. But Cambridge Energy Research Associates director Peter Jackson said that day is continually being pushed back because sizable oil reserves still are being found and technologies are boosting yields and paving the way for deep-sea drilling and other options not previously contemplated.

California's 108-year-old Kern River oil field, for instance, was read its last rites several times over the years. But the field recently produced its 2 billionth barrel and is still going, thanks to ever-evolving recovery techniques.

Jackson's conclusion: Don't panic.

He expects worldwide output -- including the unconventional variety -- to continue rising and satisfying demand until at least 2020. Once production peaks, he believes it will level off in an "undulating plateau" before an irreversible decline sets in.

"The equation is still a little bit tight, but demand is softening," Jackson said. "We just have to wait and see how those factors play out."

Hirsch, author of a widely cited 2005 Energy Department report on peaking oil output, sees a more urgent situation.

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More at the link.

peak oil my ass. 7 months and obama can wave his hands and oil shall appear for you, unless your an american and then Iguess you are just outta luck.

Let's wean ourselves back to clean, renewable whale oil. Screw the Middle East!

I say we power our country on the decaying corpses of dead terrorists!  Maybe we can make briquettes out em or something!

Quoted: But behind today's oil mania lies a deeper dread: that the world has found all the easy-to-reach oil, and the daily supply of the essential black goo will fall further and further behind escalating global demand.

Long ago you'd just have to scoop up the "bubbling crude" with a bucket.  When that's out derricks were built and drill bits were invented to break through formerly unbreakable rock barriers.  When that's not sufficient long pipe lines were built to some of the remote and inhospitable areas to pump out the oil.  When that's not enough platforms were built in middle of oceans.  When that' still lacking, new technologies were created to take out more oil from places previously unimagined or thought dry.  By their definition of easy-to-reach oil, peak oil should have happened over a hundred years ago.

Quoted: Quoted: We were the first to find oil. We used other stuff to power our cars before oil. What are you talking about? We weren't the first to find Oil. We didn't use "other stuff". I am going to take you pst as sarcasm...

Ford wanted to run the model Ts on ethanol.
Diesel's engine originally ran on peanut oil.

If Oil wasn't so cheap back these "alternative" fuels would have seen more use.

Quoted: I say we power our country on the decaying corpses of dead terrorists!  Maybe we can make briquettes out em or something!

That would rock.  I would buy some for to BBQ pork with.  I really would.

Quoted: Quoted: But behind today's oil mania lies a deeper dread: that the world has found all the easy-to-reach oil, and the daily supply of the essential black goo will fall further and further behind escalating global demand. Long ago you'd just have to scoop up the "bubbling crude" with a bucket.  When that's out derricks were built and drill bits were invented to break through formerly unbreakable rock barriers.  When that's not sufficient long pipe lines were built to some of the remote and inhospitable areas to pump out the oil.  When that's not enough platforms were built in middle of oceans.  When that' still lacking, new technologies were created to take out more oil from places previously unimagined or thought dry.  By their definition of easy-to-reach oil, peak oil should have happened over a hundred years ago.

Reserves are the amount of oil that is recoverable at a certain price.  When the price fluctuates, so do the reserves.  It's a very simple concept.

Quoted: "The deepening energy crisis has the potential to make poverty a permanent state for a growing number of people, undoing the development efforts of a generation," "Communities across the globe are more vulnerable than ever, living in an unsustainable present and facing an uncertain future."

Quoted: Let's wean ourselves back to clean, renewable whale oil. Screw the Middle East!

I just purchased 50 shares of MobilDick!

Quoted: Maybe they shouldn't breed as much.

Obama will turn water to oil then part the wine sea.

Quoted: Haha, peak oil. More like peak stupid.

that will never peak!!!!

Quoted: Quoted: Haha, peak oil. More like peak stupid. that will never peak!!!!

stupidity knows no bounds