Largest Oil Scale Reserves BY FAR in the world!

[RGR]

You know the definition of the word empire goes far beyond your convenient 'google-tard' maneuver.

When dealing with a 'tard, it is best to not assume they understand much of anything. You demonstrate why nearly every time you post.

Don't take it personally, you needing to be reminded of the definitions of words, not everyone can have passed the 3rd grade.

Oh, and for the record, tool shed, I know far more about peak oil than you do.

Obviously not. Not a page ago you couldn't even figure out in which speech Jimmy predicted we would be running out of oil by the end of the 80's. And certainly you lack any knowledge of past peaks or predictions of peak. You can't calculate an EROEI in any way except one which would make me rich, and you thought that Faith had retired from the IEA except...he hadn't.

Anything else you have displayed ignorance of I can remind you of? Oh yeah, and you never read Hirsch 2005 DOE report, and didn't even know his 1987 report even existed. Yeah...you've been trained really good in the ignorance of the peak oil church.

But you'll be fine behind your gated community, huh Texas?

I don't live in Texas. Polly wanna cracker?

 

[RGR]

The best example being when he actually calls ME the "parrot." That's truly rich.

Come up with a single idea of your own and I'll stop calling you what you are. Apply a single microsecond of critical thought to ANYTHING and I'll stop assuming you might be a bot. A mediocre one at that.

 

[KissMy]

In 2007 the Peak Oilers predicted Russia would now be in steep decline. Yet now in 2011 Russia is still increasing & now is the worlds #1 Oil Producer pumping 10.51 mb/d.

 

[RGR]

In 2007 the Peak Oilers predicted Russia would now be in steep decline. Yet now in 2011 Russia is still the worlds #1 Oil Producer pumping 10.51 mb/d.

What a surprise...peak oilers continuously predicting peak oil and getting it wrong. Attention span of a goldfish.

In 1989 or so the High Priest of Peak himself (Colin Campbell) predicted peak oil in 1990. Oops. After a decade of bad calls, he started ASPO so that someone else could get the pie in the face prize on every new missed call.

 

[konradv]

One again, why you have no credibility.

Oil = a deadly debilitating drug.

I'd ask if you were brain damaged, but the evidence is plain to see.

Hey RGR, I was wrong about the arguments they'd use. Now they're using the Oil is evil/dangerous and should be banned argument... and replaced by a fictional energy source no one's been able to get working.

You're not really that quick on the uptake, are you? Where's the "oil should be banned' argument? I take back the the "not quick on the uptake" comment, because it appears you're really just purposely deceitful. You know quite well the analogy was simply meant to compare one "gotta have" with another and how you'll never wean yourself off, if it gets cheaper. The answer isn't banning, but trying to find alternatives.

About as deceitful as equating deadly, illegal drug use to using oil?

Are you really thinking you can get away with that and not get called on it? The very comparison implies that in its saying!

And, let's turn up the volume for the cheapseat nosebleeds you're obviously sitting in:

THERE IS NO SUBSTITUTE FOR PETROLEUM AT THIS TIME!!!! ONLY FAILED PRETENDERS!!!!!!

Comprende offende?

Just like a junkie, you're saying that we have no choice but to continue down the same path. You want to focus on the "deadly drug" part of the analogy, but that's where your deceit comes in, since that's not my point. Rather, it's the notion that we can keep doing the same thing, looking for new supplies of our "drug" and think we won't be at the same point a few years down the road. Of course we can't stop using oil, we just can't behave as if this can go on forever.

 

[LordBrownTrout]

Right here in America. Actually in CO. Actually we have the 2nd, 3rd and 4th largest also.

We have the technology to tap this source, but the environazis have not allowed us to drill tea spoon from this source!

Green River Formation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Place.................Barrels in the Millions ....... Weight in Million of Tons
(1) Green River Formation USA......... 1,466,000....................213,000
(2) Phosphoria Formation USA............250,000......................35,775
(3) Eastern Devonian USA...................189,000......................27,000
(4) Heath Formation USA....................180,000......................25,578
And coming in (5) and (6)
(5) Russia..........................................167,715.....................24,000
(6) Congo...........................................100,000....................14,310

http://pubs.usgs.gov/sir/2005/5294/pdf/sir5294_508.pdf


Russia has less oil scales then our 4th largest and they are utilizing this source and making a killing off it. To date, the Environazis won't allow us to use any of this black gold!

We don't have the technology to pull oil shale out of the ground. We simply don't. We've known about Green River for many years. But we can't get at it.

However that was true for nat gas trapped in shale just 7 years ago before fracking.

We're pulling out crude, 9 percent porosities, right now. Unheard of a few years ago.

 

[manifold]

I think it makes good strategic and tactical sense to use up the rest of the world's oil and natural gas before we set about depleting our own.

I'd be interested to hear solid reasoning to the contrary.

 

[Old Rocks]

I saw the 60 minutes thing on it. The controversy is real and should be taken seriously, but Natural Gas has made small towns diamond mines. Not just for the tax revenue coming out of it. But the hotels are always filled. The restaurants have steady streams of people. The stores are packed with people that make a lot of money. Rental property is getting snatched up. It's been great for many small towns!

Not to mention many homeowner that are leasing their property for production are making a killing!

Too bad those small towns also become unlivable in the long run. It's appalling to trade the entire future away for some short-term benefits.

A lot of small towns start out this way with a boom that attracts people, investments and other business. Some go the way of the ghost towns, but some build on it and grow.

If that small town was an agriculteral community, chances are it will be a ghost town when the gas runs out. Aquifers are important to agriculture, in case you haven't noticed.

 

[Old Rocks]

The only way around Crude Oils low EROEI is to take the unreliable 18:1 EROEI of wind turbines & use that energy to extract & refine low EROEI crude oil when the wind blows.

LOL!!! You are so backwards, it's hysterical.

Crude oil does NOT have "low" EROEI. It's the highest, that's why it's the most coveted.

Also, who on Earth claims wind is at 18:1?

You know the point I was making. I should have said alternative energy with higher EROEI could be used to get the hard to extract Crude Oil from Oil Shale & Tar Sands with a EROEI so low that it can't sustain it's own production.

As for the Wind EROEI of 18:1 I googled it & that is what game up. Here is a chart.

Interesting chart. Don't know how accurate it is, but it has PV at present, with the low efficieancies of the present panels, as equal to coal. Perhaps that is why China has First Solar under contract to install a 2 gw plant right now.

Why use the energy from alternatives to get uneconomical 'oil' from tar sands and shale? Why not use it directly? In fact, why not start some major R and D to convert our grid to a distributed grid, and up the efficiency of the solar panels? At the same time, doing the same for electrical storage systems.

Time for a paradigm shift in our use and generation of energy.

 

[Big Fitz]

In 2007 the Peak Oilers predicted Russia would now be in steep decline. Yet now in 2011 Russia is still the worlds #1 Oil Producer pumping 10.51 mb/d.

What a surprise...peak oilers continuously predicting peak oil and getting it wrong. Attention span of a goldfish.

In 1989 or so the High Priest of Peak himself (Colin Campbell) predicted peak oil in 1990. Oops. After a decade of bad calls, he started ASPO so that someone else could get the pie in the face prize on every new missed call.

Hey! Goldfish deserve more respect than that! Why they should be... ummm... should be....

.... what were we talking about again?

 

[Old Rocks]

I think it makes good strategic and tactical sense to use up the rest of the world's oil and natural gas before we set about depleting our own.

I'd be interested to hear solid reasoning to the contrary.

File:Mauna Loa Carbon Dioxide-en.svg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[manifold]

I think it makes good strategic and tactical sense to use up the rest of the world's oil and natural gas before we set about depleting our own.

I'd be interested to hear solid reasoning to the contrary.

File:Mauna Loa Carbon Dioxide-en.svg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Big Fitz]

You're not really that quick on the uptake, are you? Where's the "oil should be banned' argument? I take back the the "not quick on the uptake" comment, because it appears you're really just purposely deceitful. You know quite well the analogy was simply meant to compare one "gotta have" with another and how you'll never wean yourself off, if it gets cheaper. The answer isn't banning, but trying to find alternatives.

About as deceitful as equating deadly, illegal drug use to using oil?

Are you really thinking you can get away with that and not get called on it? The very comparison implies that in its saying!

And, let's turn up the volume for the cheapseat nosebleeds you're obviously sitting in:

THERE IS NO SUBSTITUTE FOR PETROLEUM AT THIS TIME!!!! ONLY FAILED PRETENDERS!!!!!!

Comprende offende?

Just like a junkie, you're saying that we have no choice but to continue down the same path. You want to focus on the "deadly drug" part of the analogy, but that's where your deceit comes in, since that's not my point. Rather, it's the notion that we can keep doing the same thing, looking for new supplies of our "drug" and think we won't be at the same point a few years down the road. Of course we can't stop using oil, we just can't behave as if this can go on forever.

Well, it's been 40 years since the first predictions of peak oil, and still more and more oil deposits are being found.

So where is the accuracy in your analogy? Oil use = Heroin Addiction.

 

[Old Rocks]

In 2007 the Peak Oilers predicted Russia would now be in steep decline. Yet now in 2011 Russia is still the worlds #1 Oil Producer pumping 10.51 mb/d.

What a surprise...peak oilers continuously predicting peak oil and getting it wrong. Attention span of a goldfish.

In 1989 or so the High Priest of Peak himself (Colin Campbell) predicted peak oil in 1990. Oops. After a decade of bad calls, he started ASPO so that someone else could get the pie in the face prize on every new missed call.

Hey! Goldfish deserve more respect than that! Why they should be... ummm... should be....

.... what were we talking about again?

Fritz yapping out of his nether end again.

Current World Oil Situation

 

[Old Rocks]

About as deceitful as equating deadly, illegal drug use to using oil?

Are you really thinking you can get away with that and not get called on it? The very comparison implies that in its saying!

And, let's turn up the volume for the cheapseat nosebleeds you're obviously sitting in:

THERE IS NO SUBSTITUTE FOR PETROLEUM AT THIS TIME!!!! ONLY FAILED PRETENDERS!!!!!!

Comprende offende?

Just like a junkie, you're saying that we have no choice but to continue down the same path. You want to focus on the "deadly drug" part of the analogy, but that's where your deceit comes in, since that's not my point. Rather, it's the notion that we can keep doing the same thing, looking for new supplies of our "drug" and think we won't be at the same point a few years down the road. Of course we can't stop using oil, we just can't behave as if this can go on forever.

Well, it's been 40 years since the first predictions of peak oil, and still more and more oil deposits are being found.

So where is the accuracy in your analogy? Oil use = Heroin Addiction.

So, where is the next Gwarar? There isn't one.

Current World Oil Situation

 

[KissMy]

Well, it's been 40 years since the first predictions of peak oil, and still more and more oil deposits are being found.

So where is the accuracy in your analogy? Oil use = Heroin Addiction.

It has been way over 100 years since the Government Scientist predicted we peaked in oil production in the 1800's.

“I take this opportunity to express my opinion in the strongest terms, that the amazing exhibition of oil which has characterized the last twenty, and will probably characterize the next ten or twenty years, is nevertheless, not only geologically but historically, a temporary and vanishing phenomenon – one which young men will live to see come to its natural end” (1886, J.P. Lesley, state geologist of Pennsylvania).

- “There is little or no chance for more oil in California” (1886, U.S. Geological Survey).

- “There is little or no chance for more oil in Kansas and Texas” (1891, U.S. Geological Survey).

- “Total future production limit of 5.7 billion barrels of oil, perhaps a ten-year supply” (1914, U.S. Bureau of Mines).

- "Within the next two to five years the oil fields of this country will reach their maximum production, and from that time on we will face an ever-increasing decline." (1919 director of the U.S. Bureau of Mines)

- "Oil shales in Colorado and Utah would be exploited to produce oil, because the demand for oil could not be met by existing production." (1919 National Geographic magazine)

- "The time is, indeed, well in sight, when the United States will be nearing the end of some of its available stocks of raw materials on which her industrial supremacy has been largely built. America is running through her stores of domestic oil and is obliged to look abroad for future reserves. (September 1919, E. Mackay Edgar, in Sperling's Journal)

- "The position of the United States in regard to oil can best be characterized as precarious." (January 1920 Dr. George Otis Smith, Director of the United States Geological Survey)

- "Americans will have to depend on foreign sources or use less oil, or perhaps both." (May 1920 Dr. George Otis Smith, Director of the United States Geological Survey)

- "On the whole, therefore, we must expect that, unless our consumption is checked, we shall by 1925 be dependent on foreign oil fields to the extent of 150,000,000 barrels and possibly as much as 200,000,000 of crude each year, except insofar as the situation may at that time, perhaps, be helped to a slight extent by shale oil. Add to this probability that within 5 years--perhaps 3 years only--our domestic production will begin to fall off with increasing rapidity, due to the exhaustion of our reserves" (1920 David White, United States Geological Survey)

- During the period 1919-22, imports of crude oil from Mexico had been large--equal to 22 percent of total United States consumption in 1921. But salt water began to appear in some Mexican wells, and by 1921 geologists were debating whether Mexican production was not "through." in commenting upon the Mexican situation. "A great slump in Mexican production seems sooner or later inevitable. Thus there was not only alarm about the United States oil potential but also about our primary foreign source of supply. Lendling encouragement to these doubts were statements appearing in foreign publications describing the United States oil position." (1921, David White of the United States Geological Survey)

- "Given a resumption of trade and the consequent demand for oil products in, at the most, a year or two, the world will be confronted with an oil shortage such as has never been experienced before. (1921, E. Mackay Edgar)

- “Reserves to last only thirteen years” (1939, Department of the Interior).

- “Reserves to last thirteen years” (1951, Department of the Interior, Oil and Gas Division).

- “We could use up all of the proven reserves of oil in the entire world by the end of the next decade” (President Jimmy Carter speaking in 1978 to the entire world).

- “At the present rate of use, it is estimated that coal reserves will last 200 more years. Petroleum may run out in 20 to 30 years, and natural gas may last only another 70 years” (Ralph M. Feather, Merrill textbook Science Connections Annotated Teacher’s Version, 1990, p. 493).

- “At the current rate of consumption, some scientists estimate that the world’s known supplies of oil … will be used up within your lifetime” (1993, The United States and its People).

- “The supply of fossil fuels is being used up at an alarming rate. Governments must help save our fossil fuel supply by passing laws limiting their use” (Merrill/Glenco textbook, Biology, An Everyday Experience, 1992).

Quotes like these could fill a thousand pages easily. _PeakOil?

One interesting example of a big oil find in the midst of "an exhausted field" occurred in Kern County, California. Kern River Oil Field was discovered in 1899, and initially it was thought that only 10 percent of its heavy, viscous crude could be recovered. In 1942, after more than four decades of modest production, the field was estimated to still hold 54 million barrels of recoverable oil. As pointed out in 1995 by Morris Adelman, professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and one of the few remaining energy gurus, “in the next forty-four years, it produced not 54 million barrels but 736 million barrels, and it had another 970 million barrels remaining.” But even this estimate was wrong. In November 2007 U.S. oil giant Chevron announced that cumulative production had reached two billion barrels. Today, Kern River still puts out more than 80,000 barrels per day, and Chevron reckons that the remaining reserves are about 480 million barrels.

"Proven Reserves" are those that can be produced "economically." But the definitions of economical production are constantly changing, as the technology (and the politics eg, Iraq) changes.

And then there are the "unconventionals," such as heavy oils, oil sands, oil shales, coal to liquids, gas to liquids, and biomass to liquids. A doomer will not even stoop to discuss this 50 ton gorilla in the room, but any good economist would be forced to consider them.
The cost of oil comes down to the cost of finding, and then lifting or extracting. First, you have to decide where to dig. Exploration costs currently run under $3 per barrel in much of the Mideast, and below $7 for oil hidden deep under the ocean. But these costs have been falling, not rising, because imaging technology that lets geologists peer through miles of water and rock improves faster than supplies recede. Many lower-grade deposits require no new looking at all.

To pick just one example among many, finding costs are essentially zero for the 3.5 trillion barrels of oil that soak the clay in the Orinoco basin in Venezuela, and the Athabasca tar sands in Alberta, Canada. Yes, that’s trillion – over a century’s worth of global supply, at the current 30-billion-barrel-a-year rate of consumption. _WallStreetJournal Jan 2005_quoted by_PeakOil?

 

[Old Rocks]

Well, it's been 40 years since the first predictions of peak oil, and still more and more oil deposits are being found.

So where is the accuracy in your analogy? Oil use = Heroin Addiction.

It has been way over 100 years since the Government Scientist predicted we peaked in oil production in the 1800's.

“I take this opportunity to express my opinion in the strongest terms, that the amazing exhibition of oil which has characterized the last twenty, and will probably characterize the next ten or twenty years, is nevertheless, not only geologically but historically, a temporary and vanishing phenomenon – one which young men will live to see come to its natural end” (1886, J.P. Lesley, state geologist of Pennsylvania).

- “There is little or no chance for more oil in California” (1886, U.S. Geological Survey).

- “There is little or no chance for more oil in Kansas and Texas” (1891, U.S. Geological Survey).

- “Total future production limit of 5.7 billion barrels of oil, perhaps a ten-year supply” (1914, U.S. Bureau of Mines).

- "Within the next two to five years the oil fields of this country will reach their maximum production, and from that time on we will face an ever-increasing decline." (1919 director of the U.S. Bureau of Mines)

- "Oil shales in Colorado and Utah would be exploited to produce oil, because the demand for oil could not be met by existing production." (1919 National Geographic magazine)

- "The time is, indeed, well in sight, when the United States will be nearing the end of some of its available stocks of raw materials on which her industrial supremacy has been largely built. America is running through her stores of domestic oil and is obliged to look abroad for future reserves. (September 1919, E. Mackay Edgar, in Sperling's Journal)

- "The position of the United States in regard to oil can best be characterized as precarious." (January 1920 Dr. George Otis Smith, Director of the United States Geological Survey)

- "Americans will have to depend on foreign sources or use less oil, or perhaps both." (May 1920 Dr. George Otis Smith, Director of the United States Geological Survey)

- "On the whole, therefore, we must expect that, unless our consumption is checked, we shall by 1925 be dependent on foreign oil fields to the extent of 150,000,000 barrels and possibly as much as 200,000,000 of crude each year, except insofar as the situation may at that time, perhaps, be helped to a slight extent by shale oil. Add to this probability that within 5 years--perhaps 3 years only--our domestic production will begin to fall off with increasing rapidity, due to the exhaustion of our reserves" (1920 David White, United States Geological Survey)

- During the period 1919-22, imports of crude oil from Mexico had been large--equal to 22 percent of total United States consumption in 1921. But salt water began to appear in some Mexican wells, and by 1921 geologists were debating whether Mexican production was not "through." in commenting upon the Mexican situation. "A great slump in Mexican production seems sooner or later inevitable. Thus there was not only alarm about the United States oil potential but also about our primary foreign source of supply. Lendling encouragement to these doubts were statements appearing in foreign publications describing the United States oil position." (1921, David White of the United States Geological Survey)

- "Given a resumption of trade and the consequent demand for oil products in, at the most, a year or two, the world will be confronted with an oil shortage such as has never been experienced before. (1921, E. Mackay Edgar)

- “Reserves to last only thirteen years” (1939, Department of the Interior).

- “Reserves to last thirteen years” (1951, Department of the Interior, Oil and Gas Division).

- “We could use up all of the proven reserves of oil in the entire world by the end of the next decade” (President Jimmy Carter speaking in 1978 to the entire world).

- “At the present rate of use, it is estimated that coal reserves will last 200 more years. Petroleum may run out in 20 to 30 years, and natural gas may last only another 70 years” (Ralph M. Feather, Merrill textbook Science Connections Annotated Teacher’s Version, 1990, p. 493).

- “At the current rate of consumption, some scientists estimate that the world’s known supplies of oil … will be used up within your lifetime” (1993, The United States and its People).

- “The supply of fossil fuels is being used up at an alarming rate. Governments must help save our fossil fuel supply by passing laws limiting their use” (Merrill/Glenco textbook, Biology, An Everyday Experience, 1992).

Quotes like these could fill a thousand pages easily. _PeakOil?

One interesting example of a big oil find in the midst of "an exhausted field" occurred in Kern County, California. Kern River Oil Field was discovered in 1899, and initially it was thought that only 10 percent of its heavy, viscous crude could be recovered. In 1942, after more than four decades of modest production, the field was estimated to still hold 54 million barrels of recoverable oil. As pointed out in 1995 by Morris Adelman, professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and one of the few remaining energy gurus, “in the next forty-four years, it produced not 54 million barrels but 736 million barrels, and it had another 970 million barrels remaining.” But even this estimate was wrong. In November 2007 U.S. oil giant Chevron announced that cumulative production had reached two billion barrels. Today, Kern River still puts out more than 80,000 barrels per day, and Chevron reckons that the remaining reserves are about 480 million barrels.

"Proven Reserves" are those that can be produced "economically." But the definitions of economical production are constantly changing, as the technology (and the politics eg, Iraq) changes.

And then there are the "unconventionals," such as heavy oils, oil sands, oil shales, coal to liquids, gas to liquids, and biomass to liquids. A doomer will not even stoop to discuss this 50 ton gorilla in the room, but any good economist would be forced to consider them.
The cost of oil comes down to the cost of finding, and then lifting or extracting. First, you have to decide where to dig. Exploration costs currently run under $3 per barrel in much of the Mideast, and below $7 for oil hidden deep under the ocean. But these costs have been falling, not rising, because imaging technology that lets geologists peer through miles of water and rock improves faster than supplies recede. Many lower-grade deposits require no new looking at all.

To pick just one example among many, finding costs are essentially zero for the 3.5 trillion barrels of oil that soak the clay in the Orinoco basin in Venezuela, and the Athabasca tar sands in Alberta, Canada. Yes, that’s trillion – over a century’s worth of global supply, at the current 30-billion-barrel-a-year rate of consumption. _WallStreetJournal Jan 2005_quoted by_PeakOil?

Hubbert's prediction was dead on for the US. It is accurate for the rest of the world, also. However, even bringing in the very expensive forms of oil resources does not change the curve, for at some point, it simply becomes too expensive to use as fuel.

Peak oil - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

M. King Hubbert created and first used the models behind peak oil in 1956 to accurately predict that United States oil production would peak between 1965 and 1970.[1] His logistic model, now called Hubbert peak theory, and its variants have described with reasonable accuracy the peak and decline of production from oil wells, fields, regions, and countries,[2] and has also proved useful in other limited-resource production-domains. According to the Hubbert model, the production rate of a limited resource will follow a roughly symmetrical logistic distribution curve (sometimes incorrectly compared to a bell-shaped curve) based on the limits of exploitability and market pressures.

 

[Big Fitz]

Well, it's been 40 years since the first predictions of peak oil, and still more and more oil deposits are being found.

So where is the accuracy in your analogy? Oil use = Heroin Addiction.

It has been way over 100 years since the Government Scientist predicted we peaked in oil production in the 1800's.

“I take this opportunity to express my opinion in the strongest terms, that the amazing exhibition of oil which has characterized the last twenty, and will probably characterize the next ten or twenty years, is nevertheless, not only geologically but historically, a temporary and vanishing phenomenon – one which young men will live to see come to its natural end” (1886, J.P. Lesley, state geologist of Pennsylvania).

- “There is little or no chance for more oil in California” (1886, U.S. Geological Survey).

- “There is little or no chance for more oil in Kansas and Texas” (1891, U.S. Geological Survey).

- “Total future production limit of 5.7 billion barrels of oil, perhaps a ten-year supply” (1914, U.S. Bureau of Mines).

- "Within the next two to five years the oil fields of this country will reach their maximum production, and from that time on we will face an ever-increasing decline." (1919 director of the U.S. Bureau of Mines)

- "Oil shales in Colorado and Utah would be exploited to produce oil, because the demand for oil could not be met by existing production." (1919 National Geographic magazine)

- "The time is, indeed, well in sight, when the United States will be nearing the end of some of its available stocks of raw materials on which her industrial supremacy has been largely built. America is running through her stores of domestic oil and is obliged to look abroad for future reserves. (September 1919, E. Mackay Edgar, in Sperling's Journal)

- "The position of the United States in regard to oil can best be characterized as precarious." (January 1920 Dr. George Otis Smith, Director of the United States Geological Survey)

- "Americans will have to depend on foreign sources or use less oil, or perhaps both." (May 1920 Dr. George Otis Smith, Director of the United States Geological Survey)

- "On the whole, therefore, we must expect that, unless our consumption is checked, we shall by 1925 be dependent on foreign oil fields to the extent of 150,000,000 barrels and possibly as much as 200,000,000 of crude each year, except insofar as the situation may at that time, perhaps, be helped to a slight extent by shale oil. Add to this probability that within 5 years--perhaps 3 years only--our domestic production will begin to fall off with increasing rapidity, due to the exhaustion of our reserves" (1920 David White, United States Geological Survey)

- During the period 1919-22, imports of crude oil from Mexico had been large--equal to 22 percent of total United States consumption in 1921. But salt water began to appear in some Mexican wells, and by 1921 geologists were debating whether Mexican production was not "through." in commenting upon the Mexican situation. "A great slump in Mexican production seems sooner or later inevitable. Thus there was not only alarm about the United States oil potential but also about our primary foreign source of supply. Lendling encouragement to these doubts were statements appearing in foreign publications describing the United States oil position." (1921, David White of the United States Geological Survey)

- "Given a resumption of trade and the consequent demand for oil products in, at the most, a year or two, the world will be confronted with an oil shortage such as has never been experienced before. (1921, E. Mackay Edgar)

- “Reserves to last only thirteen years” (1939, Department of the Interior).

- “Reserves to last thirteen years” (1951, Department of the Interior, Oil and Gas Division).

- “We could use up all of the proven reserves of oil in the entire world by the end of the next decade” (President Jimmy Carter speaking in 1978 to the entire world).

- “At the present rate of use, it is estimated that coal reserves will last 200 more years. Petroleum may run out in 20 to 30 years, and natural gas may last only another 70 years” (Ralph M. Feather, Merrill textbook Science Connections Annotated Teacher’s Version, 1990, p. 493).

- “At the current rate of consumption, some scientists estimate that the world’s known supplies of oil … will be used up within your lifetime” (1993, The United States and its People).

- “The supply of fossil fuels is being used up at an alarming rate. Governments must help save our fossil fuel supply by passing laws limiting their use” (Merrill/Glenco textbook, Biology, An Everyday Experience, 1992).

Quotes like these could fill a thousand pages easily. _PeakOil?

One interesting example of a big oil find in the midst of "an exhausted field" occurred in Kern County, California. Kern River Oil Field was discovered in 1899, and initially it was thought that only 10 percent of its heavy, viscous crude could be recovered. In 1942, after more than four decades of modest production, the field was estimated to still hold 54 million barrels of recoverable oil. As pointed out in 1995 by Morris Adelman, professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and one of the few remaining energy gurus, “in the next forty-four years, it produced not 54 million barrels but 736 million barrels, and it had another 970 million barrels remaining.” But even this estimate was wrong. In November 2007 U.S. oil giant Chevron announced that cumulative production had reached two billion barrels. Today, Kern River still puts out more than 80,000 barrels per day, and Chevron reckons that the remaining reserves are about 480 million barrels.

"Proven Reserves" are those that can be produced "economically." But the definitions of economical production are constantly changing, as the technology (and the politics eg, Iraq) changes.

And then there are the "unconventionals," such as heavy oils, oil sands, oil shales, coal to liquids, gas to liquids, and biomass to liquids. A doomer will not even stoop to discuss this 50 ton gorilla in the room, but any good economist would be forced to consider them.
The cost of oil comes down to the cost of finding, and then lifting or extracting. First, you have to decide where to dig. Exploration costs currently run under $3 per barrel in much of the Mideast, and below $7 for oil hidden deep under the ocean. But these costs have been falling, not rising, because imaging technology that lets geologists peer through miles of water and rock improves faster than supplies recede. Many lower-grade deposits require no new looking at all.

To pick just one example among many, finding costs are essentially zero for the 3.5 trillion barrels of oil that soak the clay in the Orinoco basin in Venezuela, and the Athabasca tar sands in Alberta, Canada. Yes, that’s trillion – over a century’s worth of global supply, at the current 30-billion-barrel-a-year rate of consumption. _WallStreetJournal Jan 2005_quoted by_PeakOil?

Nice! reminds me of a british politician who thought that in the late 1880's they should close down the patent office because everything that could be invented had been.

 

[LordBrownTrout]

Well, it's been 40 years since the first predictions of peak oil, and still more and more oil deposits are being found.

So where is the accuracy in your analogy? Oil use = Heroin Addiction.

It has been way over 100 years since the Government Scientist predicted we peaked in oil production in the 1800's.

“I take this opportunity to express my opinion in the strongest terms, that the amazing exhibition of oil which has characterized the last twenty, and will probably characterize the next ten or twenty years, is nevertheless, not only geologically but historically, a temporary and vanishing phenomenon – one which young men will live to see come to its natural end” (1886, J.P. Lesley, state geologist of Pennsylvania).

- “There is little or no chance for more oil in California” (1886, U.S. Geological Survey).

- “There is little or no chance for more oil in Kansas and Texas” (1891, U.S. Geological Survey).

- “Total future production limit of 5.7 billion barrels of oil, perhaps a ten-year supply” (1914, U.S. Bureau of Mines).

- "Within the next two to five years the oil fields of this country will reach their maximum production, and from that time on we will face an ever-increasing decline." (1919 director of the U.S. Bureau of Mines)

- "Oil shales in Colorado and Utah would be exploited to produce oil, because the demand for oil could not be met by existing production." (1919 National Geographic magazine)

- "The time is, indeed, well in sight, when the United States will be nearing the end of some of its available stocks of raw materials on which her industrial supremacy has been largely built. America is running through her stores of domestic oil and is obliged to look abroad for future reserves. (September 1919, E. Mackay Edgar, in Sperling's Journal)

- "The position of the United States in regard to oil can best be characterized as precarious." (January 1920 Dr. George Otis Smith, Director of the United States Geological Survey)

- "Americans will have to depend on foreign sources or use less oil, or perhaps both." (May 1920 Dr. George Otis Smith, Director of the United States Geological Survey)

- "On the whole, therefore, we must expect that, unless our consumption is checked, we shall by 1925 be dependent on foreign oil fields to the extent of 150,000,000 barrels and possibly as much as 200,000,000 of crude each year, except insofar as the situation may at that time, perhaps, be helped to a slight extent by shale oil. Add to this probability that within 5 years--perhaps 3 years only--our domestic production will begin to fall off with increasing rapidity, due to the exhaustion of our reserves" (1920 David White, United States Geological Survey)

- During the period 1919-22, imports of crude oil from Mexico had been large--equal to 22 percent of total United States consumption in 1921. But salt water began to appear in some Mexican wells, and by 1921 geologists were debating whether Mexican production was not "through." in commenting upon the Mexican situation. "A great slump in Mexican production seems sooner or later inevitable. Thus there was not only alarm about the United States oil potential but also about our primary foreign source of supply. Lendling encouragement to these doubts were statements appearing in foreign publications describing the United States oil position." (1921, David White of the United States Geological Survey)

- "Given a resumption of trade and the consequent demand for oil products in, at the most, a year or two, the world will be confronted with an oil shortage such as has never been experienced before. (1921, E. Mackay Edgar)

- “Reserves to last only thirteen years” (1939, Department of the Interior).

- “Reserves to last thirteen years” (1951, Department of the Interior, Oil and Gas Division).

- “We could use up all of the proven reserves of oil in the entire world by the end of the next decade” (President Jimmy Carter speaking in 1978 to the entire world).

- “At the present rate of use, it is estimated that coal reserves will last 200 more years. Petroleum may run out in 20 to 30 years, and natural gas may last only another 70 years” (Ralph M. Feather, Merrill textbook Science Connections Annotated Teacher’s Version, 1990, p. 493).

- “At the current rate of consumption, some scientists estimate that the world’s known supplies of oil … will be used up within your lifetime” (1993, The United States and its People).

- “The supply of fossil fuels is being used up at an alarming rate. Governments must help save our fossil fuel supply by passing laws limiting their use” (Merrill/Glenco textbook, Biology, An Everyday Experience, 1992).

Quotes like these could fill a thousand pages easily. _PeakOil?

One interesting example of a big oil find in the midst of "an exhausted field" occurred in Kern County, California. Kern River Oil Field was discovered in 1899, and initially it was thought that only 10 percent of its heavy, viscous crude could be recovered. In 1942, after more than four decades of modest production, the field was estimated to still hold 54 million barrels of recoverable oil. As pointed out in 1995 by Morris Adelman, professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and one of the few remaining energy gurus, “in the next forty-four years, it produced not 54 million barrels but 736 million barrels, and it had another 970 million barrels remaining.” But even this estimate was wrong. In November 2007 U.S. oil giant Chevron announced that cumulative production had reached two billion barrels. Today, Kern River still puts out more than 80,000 barrels per day, and Chevron reckons that the remaining reserves are about 480 million barrels.

"Proven Reserves" are those that can be produced "economically." But the definitions of economical production are constantly changing, as the technology (and the politics eg, Iraq) changes.

And then there are the "unconventionals," such as heavy oils, oil sands, oil shales, coal to liquids, gas to liquids, and biomass to liquids. A doomer will not even stoop to discuss this 50 ton gorilla in the room, but any good economist would be forced to consider them.
The cost of oil comes down to the cost of finding, and then lifting or extracting. First, you have to decide where to dig. Exploration costs currently run under $3 per barrel in much of the Mideast, and below $7 for oil hidden deep under the ocean. But these costs have been falling, not rising, because imaging technology that lets geologists peer through miles of water and rock improves faster than supplies recede. Many lower-grade deposits require no new looking at all.

To pick just one example among many, finding costs are essentially zero for the 3.5 trillion barrels of oil that soak the clay in the Orinoco basin in Venezuela, and the Athabasca tar sands in Alberta, Canada. Yes, that’s trillion – over a century’s worth of global supply, at the current 30-billion-barrel-a-year rate of consumption. _WallStreetJournal Jan 2005_quoted by_PeakOil?

Hubbert's prediction was dead on for the US. It is accurate for the rest of the world, also. However, even bringing in the very expensive forms of oil resources does not change the curve, for at some point, it simply becomes too expensive to use as fuel.

Peak oil - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

M. King Hubbert created and first used the models behind peak oil in 1956 to accurately predict that United States oil production would peak between 1965 and 1970.[1] His logistic model, now called Hubbert peak theory, and its variants have described with reasonable accuracy the peak and decline of production from oil wells, fields, regions, and countries,[2] and has also proved useful in other limited-resource production-domains. According to the Hubbert model, the production rate of a limited resource will follow a roughly symmetrical logistic distribution curve (sometimes incorrectly compared to a bell-shaped curve) based on the limits of exploitability and market pressures.

As a scientist, geologist, I'd never make such predictions, especially with technology moving at high speeds.

 

[KissMy]

Well, it's been 40 years since the first predictions of peak oil, and still more and more oil deposits are being found.

So where is the accuracy in your analogy? Oil use = Heroin Addiction.

It has been way over 100 years since the Government Scientist predicted we peaked in oil production in the 1800's.

“I take this opportunity to express my opinion in the strongest terms, that the amazing exhibition of oil which has characterized the last twenty, and will probably characterize the next ten or twenty years, is nevertheless, not only geologically but historically, a temporary and vanishing phenomenon – one which young men will live to see come to its natural end” (1886, J.P. Lesley, state geologist of Pennsylvania).

- “There is little or no chance for more oil in California” (1886, U.S. Geological Survey).

- “There is little or no chance for more oil in Kansas and Texas” (1891, U.S. Geological Survey).

- “Total future production limit of 5.7 billion barrels of oil, perhaps a ten-year supply” (1914, U.S. Bureau of Mines).

- "Within the next two to five years the oil fields of this country will reach their maximum production, and from that time on we will face an ever-increasing decline." (1919 director of the U.S. Bureau of Mines)

- "Oil shales in Colorado and Utah would be exploited to produce oil, because the demand for oil could not be met by existing production." (1919 National Geographic magazine)

- "The time is, indeed, well in sight, when the United States will be nearing the end of some of its available stocks of raw materials on which her industrial supremacy has been largely built. America is running through her stores of domestic oil and is obliged to look abroad for future reserves. (September 1919, E. Mackay Edgar, in Sperling's Journal)

- "The position of the United States in regard to oil can best be characterized as precarious." (January 1920 Dr. George Otis Smith, Director of the United States Geological Survey)

- "Americans will have to depend on foreign sources or use less oil, or perhaps both." (May 1920 Dr. George Otis Smith, Director of the United States Geological Survey)

- "On the whole, therefore, we must expect that, unless our consumption is checked, we shall by 1925 be dependent on foreign oil fields to the extent of 150,000,000 barrels and possibly as much as 200,000,000 of crude each year, except insofar as the situation may at that time, perhaps, be helped to a slight extent by shale oil. Add to this probability that within 5 years--perhaps 3 years only--our domestic production will begin to fall off with increasing rapidity, due to the exhaustion of our reserves" (1920 David White, United States Geological Survey)

- During the period 1919-22, imports of crude oil from Mexico had been large--equal to 22 percent of total United States consumption in 1921. But salt water began to appear in some Mexican wells, and by 1921 geologists were debating whether Mexican production was not "through." in commenting upon the Mexican situation. "A great slump in Mexican production seems sooner or later inevitable. Thus there was not only alarm about the United States oil potential but also about our primary foreign source of supply. Lendling encouragement to these doubts were statements appearing in foreign publications describing the United States oil position." (1921, David White of the United States Geological Survey)

- "Given a resumption of trade and the consequent demand for oil products in, at the most, a year or two, the world will be confronted with an oil shortage such as has never been experienced before. (1921, E. Mackay Edgar)

- “Reserves to last only thirteen years” (1939, Department of the Interior).

- “Reserves to last thirteen years” (1951, Department of the Interior, Oil and Gas Division).

- “We could use up all of the proven reserves of oil in the entire world by the end of the next decade” (President Jimmy Carter speaking in 1978 to the entire world).

- “At the present rate of use, it is estimated that coal reserves will last 200 more years. Petroleum may run out in 20 to 30 years, and natural gas may last only another 70 years” (Ralph M. Feather, Merrill textbook Science Connections Annotated Teacher’s Version, 1990, p. 493).

- “At the current rate of consumption, some scientists estimate that the world’s known supplies of oil … will be used up within your lifetime” (1993, The United States and its People).

- “The supply of fossil fuels is being used up at an alarming rate. Governments must help save our fossil fuel supply by passing laws limiting their use” (Merrill/Glenco textbook, Biology, An Everyday Experience, 1992).

Quotes like these could fill a thousand pages easily. _PeakOil?

One interesting example of a big oil find in the midst of "an exhausted field" occurred in Kern County, California. Kern River Oil Field was discovered in 1899, and initially it was thought that only 10 percent of its heavy, viscous crude could be recovered. In 1942, after more than four decades of modest production, the field was estimated to still hold 54 million barrels of recoverable oil. As pointed out in 1995 by Morris Adelman, professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and one of the few remaining energy gurus, “in the next forty-four years, it produced not 54 million barrels but 736 million barrels, and it had another 970 million barrels remaining.” But even this estimate was wrong. In November 2007 U.S. oil giant Chevron announced that cumulative production had reached two billion barrels. Today, Kern River still puts out more than 80,000 barrels per day, and Chevron reckons that the remaining reserves are about 480 million barrels.

"Proven Reserves" are those that can be produced "economically." But the definitions of economical production are constantly changing, as the technology (and the politics eg, Iraq) changes.

And then there are the "unconventionals," such as heavy oils, oil sands, oil shales, coal to liquids, gas to liquids, and biomass to liquids. A doomer will not even stoop to discuss this 50 ton gorilla in the room, but any good economist would be forced to consider them.
The cost of oil comes down to the cost of finding, and then lifting or extracting. First, you have to decide where to dig. Exploration costs currently run under $3 per barrel in much of the Mideast, and below $7 for oil hidden deep under the ocean. But these costs have been falling, not rising, because imaging technology that lets geologists peer through miles of water and rock improves faster than supplies recede. Many lower-grade deposits require no new looking at all.

To pick just one example among many, finding costs are essentially zero for the 3.5 trillion barrels of oil that soak the clay in the Orinoco basin in Venezuela, and the Athabasca tar sands in Alberta, Canada. Yes, that’s trillion – over a century’s worth of global supply, at the current 30-billion-barrel-a-year rate of consumption. _WallStreetJournal Jan 2005_quoted by_PeakOil?

Hubbert's prediction was dead on for the US. It is accurate for the rest of the world, also. However, even bringing in the very expensive forms of oil resources does not change the curve, for at some point, it simply becomes too expensive to use as fuel.

Peak oil - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

M. King Hubbert created and first used the models behind peak oil in 1956 to accurately predict that United States oil production would peak between 1965 and 1970.[1] His logistic model, now called Hubbert peak theory, and its variants have described with reasonable accuracy the peak and decline of production from oil wells, fields, regions, and countries,[2] and has also proved useful in other limited-resource production-domains. According to the Hubbert model, the production rate of a limited resource will follow a roughly symmetrical logistic distribution curve (sometimes incorrectly compared to a bell-shaped curve) based on the limits of exploitability and market pressures.

Oil production in the USA did not decline in 1970 due to geology as M. King Hubbert suggest, it was due to the government.

Since 2004 under George W. Bush we were able to increase our USA oil production & reduce our dependence on foreign oil by over 10%. That would have been impossible if geology were limiting production instead of government. See Chart Below. Now that Obama has imposed drilling bans again the chart is flattening & will soon turn upwards increasing our dependence on foreign oil once again.