IEA report reminds us peak oil idea has gone up in flames

[PowerSwitchJames]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/d ... t-peak-oil

What follows from this is that the idea of peak oil has gone up in flames. We do not have too little fossil fuel, we have far too much. It also follows directly that the world's stock markets are sitting on toxic levels of subprime coal and gas, a giant carbon bubble ready to explode

[UndercoverElephant]

Badly written pile of poo, IMO.

Firstly, he conflates conventional oil, unconventional oil and coal/gas. Or rather he relies on switching mid-paragraph from one to the others, as if this doesn't matter.

Secondly, he is working on the assumption that you can't possibly have too much oil and not enough oil at the same time. Sounds pretty logical, right? Wrong, because "not enough" means "not enough to keep industrialised civilisation going without an economic meltdown" and "too much" means "too much for the climate to cope with." And you can most certainly have both of those at the same time, especially given that the climate is already changing.

He wanted to be able to write "peak oil is a myth" because he thought it would make a good headline.

3 out of 10. Not worth reading.

[biffvernon]

Pity. Carrington usually writes quite well.

[kenneal - lagger]

You can also have not enough cheap, conventional oil and far too much expensive unconventional oil. This is extremely bad for the economy but better for the climate as it means that less of the expensive oil will get used.

It also conflicts with what the CE of Ofgem says here about energy supply

[extractorfan]

You can also have too much cheap good, easy to get oil. Times are good when you do but you don't invest for a future requiring more expensive, alternative fuels, it's where the free market fails, sadly.

[SleeperService]

You can also have too much cheap good, easy to get oil. Times are good when you do but you don't invest for a future requiring more expensive, alternative fuels, it's where the free market fails, sadly.

+1

Free markets will ALWAYS fail as they rely on perfect knowledge of the market. As information assymmetry will always be there you have the hub of the problem.

[extractorfan]

You can also have too much cheap good, easy to get oil. Times are good when you do but you don't invest for a future requiring more expensive, alternative fuels, it's where the free market fails, sadly.

+1

Free markets will ALWAYS fail as they rely on perfect knowledge of the market. As information assymmetry will always be there you have the hub of the problem.

Well I don't know. They work pretty well in imaginary worlds where resources are infinite....erm......oh wait

[mobbsey]

Well I don't know. They work pretty well in imaginary worlds where resources are infinite....erm......oh wait

The problem with the "invisible hand" is that you never know when it's giving you the digit!

[Yves75]

This IEA report is really moving towards pure propaganda (the MSM articles making the thing even more rosy than what is really in the report).

You end up wondering to what extend it is a "communication leaflet" to pump the shale gaz oil bubble in the US, as described in for instance :

http://www.resilience.org/stories/2012- ... -gas-alive

Plus let's not forget the story around the 1998 report, when they tried to make a Hubbert model data oriented report, result : the whole team fired besides Fatih Birol :
http://petrole.blog.lemonde.fr/how-the- ... s-mission/

[Halfbreed]

This IEA report is really moving towards pure propaganda (the MSM articles making the thing even more rosy than what is really in the report).

You end up wondering to what extend it is a "communication leaflet" to pump the shale gaz oil bubble in the US, as described in for instance :

http://www.resilience.org/stories/2012- ... -gas-alive

Plus let's not forget the story around the 1998 report, when they tried to make a Hubbert model data oriented report, result : the whole team fired besides Fatih Birol :
http://petrole.blog.lemonde.fr/how-the- ... s-mission/

Quite an excellent article, and tells an excellent story. But it appears to confuse a perspective of someone (peak oil must happen) with honest people disagreeing because not everyone buys the perspective. Obviously anyone proclaiming the end of oil production during the late 90's would be laughed out of a given room (or fired) and based on how the next decade turned out, that is a completely justifiable end based on what actually happened.

This statement shouldn't be confused with trusting the IEA, or Fatih Birol in particular, because I think they lack the expertise to make an honest extrapolation of oil production rates. Very few agencies that I am familiar with, domestic (US) or international, have the people needed to actually discuss this topic intelligently. They use economists instead of oil experts, and lets face it, economists make some interesting assumptions which are not necessarily based in the reality of the oilfield, exploration and discovery, development and distribution.

[JavaScriptDonkey]

Peak oil isn't about running out of oil.
Peak oil is about running out of cheap oil.

In that context economists are exactly the people you need to be talking to.

[Yves75]

Quite an excellent article, and tells an excellent story. But it appears to confuse a perspective of someone (peak oil must happen) with honest people disagreeing because not everyone buys the perspective. Obviously anyone proclaiming the end of oil production during the late 90's would be laughed out of a given room (or fired) and based on how the next decade turned out, that is a completely justifiable end based on what actually happened.

This statement shouldn't be confused with trusting the IEA, or Fatih Birol in particular, because I think they lack the expertise to make an honest extrapolation of oil production rates. Very few agencies that I am familiar with, domestic (US) or international, have the people needed to actually discuss this topic intelligently. They use economists instead of oil experts, and lets face it, economists make some interesting assumptions which are not necessarily based in the reality of the oilfield, exploration and discovery, development and distribution.

Not sure I get your point, the 1998 report was a bell curve prediction hubbert model kind using a data set, that's all (I guess, not seen it). Are you saying you still call the "peak oil banality" a "theory" ?

As to the current report, I think they have the experts or could use some without any problem, it is really about "behind the scene tractions".

And in fact some may prefer to leave, like Olivier Rech lately (now free lance and within ASPO).

And again, the "financial leaflet" aspect for the shale oil and gas might very well be real, for instance :
http://oilprice.com/Interviews/Shale-Ga ... erman.html

As to peak oil being an understandable reality or not in the nineties, maybe if Americans had been told the truth about the first oil shock, that is that the first oil shock was a direct consequence of US peak in 1970 and not this "arab embargo" little song (the declaration of the embargo had a price effect, but it was a quasi non event in number of barrels terms, plus shortages and price rise started at US peak, not to mention KSA having cheated the "embargo" troughout towards the US), things would have been a bit different.

[Yves75]

About the last IEA report, if it has this "shale oil miracle" message for the US, and this message relayed (even in a bumped up way) by the media, the core of the report isn't optimist at all.

A summary (in french) on Matthieu Auzanneau blog :
http://petrole.blog.lemonde.fr/2012/11/ ... ment-12550

And for the US part :
http://petrole.blog.lemonde.fr/2012/11/ ... e-en-2017/

Also for the US part summary on Matt Mushalik site :
http://crudeoilpeak.info/us-shale-oil-h ... e-oil-hype

Also a Fatih Birol interview on European energy review (need free account to read) :
http://www.europeanenergyreview.eu/site ... tikel_3970

[Halfbreed]

Peak oil isn't about running out of oil.
Peak oil is about running out of cheap oil.

In that context economists are exactly the people you need to be talking to.

Cheap oil?

"Peak oil is the point in time when the maximum rate of petroleum extraction is reached, after which the rate of production is expected to enter terminal decline."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_oil

So, once it looked like the internetz weren't quite up to snuff, I tried the originator of the idea.

http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2 ... ssil-fuels

and he didn't say cheap either. Did you have someone specific in mind who created "peak cheap" rather than "peak production"?

[Halfbreed]

Not sure I get your point, the 1998 report was a bell curve prediction hubbert model kind using a data set, that's all (I guess, not seen it). Are you saying you still call the "peak oil banality" a "theory" ?

Peak oil (not the cheap oil, but the production one) isn't a theory, itis just a really bad non linear regression fit to time series data. With a bump somewhere along the path I suppose, otherwise the entire bell shaped curve assumption wouldn't be in the mix.

As to the current report, I think they have the experts or could use some without any problem, it is really about "behind the scene tractions".

What is a behind the scene traction? Having dealt with government agencies, my first tendency is to discount their ability to have people of appropriate experience at the right levels. They can afford economists and whatnot, but not usually the upstream petroleum or exploratory petroleum professionals.

And again, the "financial leaflet" aspect for the shale oil and gas might very well be real, for instance :
http://oilprice.com/Interviews/Shale-Ga ... erman.html

Berman is great, and will tell you where to drill one of those shale wells. Of course, he will tell you where to drill a successful one, rather than the kind he rails against. Get the hint?

As to peak oil being an understandable reality or not in the nineties, maybe if Americans had been told the truth about the first oil shock, that is that the first oil shock was a direct consequence of US peak in 1970 and not this "arab embargo" little song (the declaration of the embargo had a price effect, but it was a quasi non event in number of barrels terms, plus shortages and price rise started at US peak, not to mention KSA having cheated the "embargo" troughout towards the US), things would have been a bit different.

Americans are told all sorts of things, as is everyone else. There were certainly people who knew exactly what was going on, whether or not they told the general populace about it is another question (as is, would the general populace understand anyway).

If I recall there were certainly a fair number of shrieking meemee's going on back then, I find it unlikely that peak oil wasn't included in all the catterwalling at the time as well.