On Friday, two weeks after I discussed the issue at length in the Huffington Post ("WikiLeaks Brings Misguided Joy to Preachers of Peak Oil") the New York Times found the wherewithal to present us with Michael Lynch's op-ed, "Drilling For an Oil Crisis." The Times piece covers virtually the same territory, namely that the WikiLeaks revelation of an American diplomat's dispatch about the constraints of Saudi oil reserves gave false credence to the peak oil theorists and rendered unto the peak oil pranksters erroneous and misguided bragging rights which they happily exploited to push their agenda that oil production has "entered a terminal decline."
The Times' op-ed, as did my earlier Huffington Post piece, raises serious doubts about the 'peak oil' theory. Lynch hits the issue squarely on the head when he comments about Saudi Arabia: "Officials there have discovered approximately 70 major oil fields that they've left untapped over concerns that increased Saudi production would cause global oil prices to collapse." Well and good and so much for the timeliness of the New York Times' revelations.
However, then the Times piece goes seriously off track. Ascribing blame on the 'peak oil' crowd's lamentations that oil's production has "entered a terminal decline", bolstered by the WikiLeaks revelations, as the motivating factor in the Obama administration's "throwing federal subsidies -- some $8 billion in the 2012 budget at all sorts of unproven, unrealistic and inefficient energy technologies like wind farms and electric cars." That "we should not let a false panic over disappearing oil reserves lead into rushed government investments."
Wrong, and wrong once again! Concern about disappearing oil, real or imagined plays a role, but the motivating impulse toward alternative energy technologies is far more fundamental. Perhaps, better said it is 'existential' touching on the very existence of life on the planet.
The environmental threat to our existence and that of generations to come grows every day. Seeking non-fossil fuel solutions to our energy needs are not "rushed government investments" as the op-ed piece pontificates. And they are hardly "rushed." They are already several generations overdue.
Mike Lynch
But the industry has responded with a universal capping device, similar but more elaborate and versatile than the valve that stopped the BP gusher. And deep water drilling will resume - with improved safety. This safety device will be at the ready a day or two boat ride from where the action is. And others are in planning. Officials just have to be assured we will not have another one go wild.
Even the oil drum does not expect production to plateau until 2037. A very slow fall off can be expected after we hit that plateau which will be the top of the slow broad hump of oil production.
Any other scenario is manipulation to get the highest possible price for crude.
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/7100
Nassim Taleb's book the Black Swan is subtitled: The impact of the highly improbable.
See Black Swans at www.aesopinstitute.org for a bit about two highly improbable energy events.
Cheap green energy is being born. It will supersede oil and all fossil fuels much more rapidly than conventional ignorance would suggest.
A flock of Black Swans is likely to take flight fast enough to surprise legions of skeptics.
This does not argue that we should wait for them.
By buying off large swaths of foreign governments with the sell and trade of fossil fuel (a major resource of their ownership) we are able to keep extremist Jihadists and Bedoin Wahabists in check.
The theory being its easier to influence your partners decisions than it is to push your enemy around with threat of force. Which is historically proven. They try to do the same with us so it's a dance.
But now the times have changed. The mass amounts of "online" populace and student activists are becoming educated on fact based issues instead of being mislead by government directed media. The reaction is over whelming desire for change, for more opportunities for the people, the desire to just express rebel ideas, and the courage and daring to actually use the word Freedom in their efforts. We've seen this before, one time long ago in this country.
Lets not squander this window of chance. Lets put Big Oil on notice now. Tell them they are either part of the solution or they are the problem.
Action not words. Man and Money investments will signal change. Manufacturing of infrastructure changes.
Peak Oil exists but it doesn't have to rule our future. Not if American people stick together. We need to demand U.S. Media to report on whats important to U.S. citizens not just Lindsy Lohan.
Do your part, communicate with family and friends.
However, Peak Oil exists. It's real not imagined.
We can transition our existing structure of energy use to get more from less and it would be an infrastructure investment. The hydrogen fuel cell for automobiles can be built for other mass fuel engines.
We can use biofuels but again the infrastructure of support required to accompany such changes in combustion engines should have been in the last 20 budgets. Its fast become mute point if we do not do something dramatic now.
Obama cannot beat Big Oil solo. His democratic allies are pure spineless jello and the GOP are ready to back the devil himself if it will diminish Obama's administration 1 billionth of polling record.
He knows he can't take Big Oil to the mat without the American people. Most citizens are skeptical of alternative fuels because they don't SEE vehicles using it. Chicken or the egg scenario. Leadership. This requires big balls and leadership.
The time is now ripe to change U.S. National Security strategy using fossil fuel. Its part of the reason why most administrations will not allow a transition to biofuels. But with Middle Eastern countries hungry for democracy and protests its possible to reach our goal of reducing extremists, increasing trade, improving diplomacy all by supporting a regime change at the top of the chain.
Or we can go with safe, clean nuclear energy, which would take roughly the area of a large Midwestern county to build enough nuclear plants to meet the nation's energy needs.
There is also the issue of net energy. Surely the heavier crude takes more energy to extract. Eventually we may find ourselves with a negative net energy making it useless to supply more of the heavy stuff.
Are they liars or not?
As an institution I say both Big Oil and OPEC are not to be believed.
Wikileaks may be a re-hash of what is already known by peak oil enthusiasts, but is a break from the usual talking points from the KSA.
I do look forward to ACTUAL production from KSA that occurs under the *duress of regional revolution* as it may settle the debate about their production capabilities once and for all.
What will you say if they cannot meet demand? that they are holding back?
I can't wait.
Those silly savants also admit that no matter how many of the prospects in Alaska or offshore pan out, there's no returning to that peak for the U.S. Production from such wells would make 5¢/gallon difference in a decade for gas.
Currently, prices are near $100 / barrel, and nearly 70% of domestic consumption is imports. Does anyone notice a trend?
Big oil (and OPEC) actually worries about prices that rise too high because people will get serious about conserving. If our infrastructure returned to the days when working transit was common, we may have to upgrade our current train system--something the Romanians would be ashamed of--but changing infrastructure would do more, more cheaply than costly nuclear.
For example, either retrofitting suburbia, or building new pedestrian-friendly mixed-use neighborhoods cuts driving roughly in half, even without transit.
FYI, CERA suggests that peak oil enthusiasts underestimate the potential for additional supplies around the Caspian Sea -- you know, near those pillars of political stability, Iraq, Iran, Azerbaijan, Georgia, etc. -- and in the deep waters off the mouth of the Amazon. What could possibly go wrong with deep water drilling?
Whatever, we say. Anything to maintain our standard of living.
www.offthegridmpls.blogspot.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHmXhgBhtWk
MrEnergyCzar
Safety: the risks and potential liabilities of another Chernobyl or worse. No one wants to insure these things which leaves the public carrying the water once again while private industry takes the profit.
Waste: What to do with it, I presented a paper to the Governor of Utah about the hazards of a proposed nuclear waste dump (They prefer the word "repository") near Canyonlands National Park as long ago as 1982 or 83. There are no better solutions for the problem of nuclear waste today than thirty years ago.
Safety: We don't build Chernobyls here in the US and Chernobyl is the worst that it can get. US nuclear plant operators do carry insurance, which they all pay into. The liability has been capped by law at $15B. If you're worried that isn't enough, consider that Three Mile Island was a complete loss of coolant accident with a partial meltdown. No one was hurt and no loss of personal property occurred. The molten core barely melted through 7/8 inch of an 8 inch containment vessel.
Waste: Why is it that an industry [nuclear power] that captures its waste, contains it in a finite volume and maintains strict controls over it is considered to have a "waste issue" while one [fossil fuels] that constantly dumps waste out of smoke stacks gets a free pass? The reason there are no better solutions is because the federal government decided it didn't want to pursue any better solutions. In fact, the Clinton administration cancelled the integral fast reactor project in 1994. This concept would have been able to use spent fuel without the requirement for an aqueous stage in reprocessing such as the PUREX process.
Take away the "insurance subsidy" contained in federal law and every plant would be shut down immediately, and not a single new one would even be considered. That's just plain fact.
Not to minimize the dangers of pollution, and having been an advocate of a national energy policy emphasizing alternatives and renewables for over thirty years, air and water do contain natural mechanisms of self renewal. On the other hand, crack open a fuel rod cask in 100,000 years (assuming there are any that haven't already cracked open by then, and the radiation would still fry your cajones to dust in short order. Can you see the difference in that, or not?
I've never come under their sway but, by your handle, I would guess that you might know someone who has.
This is simply incorrect. I suggest you go read about WIPP:
'The United States Department of Energy began planning for the facility in 1974.[2] After more than 20 years of scientific study, public input, and regulatory struggles, WIPP began operations on March 26, 1999. Disposal operations are expected to continue until 2070 with active monitoring for a further hundred years. By 2010, the facility had already processed 9,000 shipments of waste. Research is ongoing on the disturbed rock zone geomechanics at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant[3].'
Canada is moving towards interim (eg ~150 yr or so) storage sites for spent fuel. The list of countries moving towards nuclear power is long and getting longer every month. Just recently, Holland elected to build a new nuclear plant.
Nonetheless, your comment does provide an interesting example of the real problem here: the calcified thinking of some opponents of nuclear power, which indeed has not changed since the 80s, despite decades of safe operation, despite the lack of an alternative at the necessary scale, and despite the toll exacted by the status quo, which is hideous.