PEAK OIL

[nadinbrzezinski]

so was watching the news this morning... don't ask why... I think I was flipping through channels

And on MSNBC they had a PEAK OIL expert talking about Hubbard'd Peak and how someday soon you and I will not be able to get gas when we want to


And of course the babies (with LARGE vehicles) complaining about the price of gas.. and how they cannot really afford to go to the race this week, or drive up state to see the family.

That my friends will be the issue by 2012... yep in my crystal ball.. and just basic knowledge of what Hubbard's Peak is

In fact, it might be by November.

Her comments this week were highly innadecuate, but in the LONG run, when the age of oil comes to a screetching halt, it will not matter

It will be a footnote in history... and that is the truth.

So FOCUS... and time for all of you to truly move to the General Election

As is, when it comes to Peak Oil... I don't give a tinker's damn who is elected, their policies are way too cuddling of the energy conglomerates who should be nationalized... PERIOD

Some other issues on the table.. health care... if it stays the way it is... the system WILL COLLAPSE in ten years on the outside, closer in my view.

the war in Iraq...

FOCUS folks

Yes, she said things that are despicable... and yes, she is in a hole... but you know what? What I wrote above will matter, and much of this hoobabboob will be a footnote in somebody else's PhD thesis

[nadinbrzezinski]

1. Real issues don't matter

got it. Carry on

[AntiFascist]

2. Hillary only talks about fixing the symptoms....

actually high gas prices are a good thing in the long term because it is forcing people to make long-term changes, and it is forcing the auto industry to make some very necessary changes. I realize that the people who can't afford SUVs are the ones being hurt the most, not only by high gas prices but also by the rising cost of groceries and other necessities that are affected by transportation costs. These are the people who need to be helped the most by the funds which we choose instead to send to the Pentagon to fight oil wars in the Middle East, mostly to help the folks who want to continue driving SUVs.

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. Forget about her... or obama or McCain, the SYSTEM as it stands right now

does not deal with real issues.

And this is what this is about

These are REAL issues

[AntiFascist]

7. Nationalized oil companies are a solution for the Middle East...

it would allow Iraq to truly, and democratically, determine its own direction without interference from the West, for example, and might actually help ease tensions.

Capitalism may pose solutions for the West. Billionaire T. Boone Pickens is investing in vast wind farms, which could ultimately help provide power for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, for example.

I doubt if we could ever nationalize the existing oil companies, but we could provide tax incentives for oil companies to invest in alternative energy sources. They could be made to choose between paying windfall profits tax or investment in research for alternative sources of clean, electric power.

[nadinbrzezinski]

8. We no longer live in a capitalism system (at least not according to the

inventor of the system)

What we live is under a system of monopolies, which are antithetical to capitalism as Adam Smith understood it (as well as Richardo)

You want to keep them in private hands, they need to be broken up into itty bitty little units, just like the media

Or nationalized

Don't expect ANY national level politico to advocate for this. Either enforcing the Act that would break monopolies or nationalize that is.

At least NOT YET

[AntiFascist]

10. I also would not want to stir up the anti-communists...

that always leads to fascism.

The oil companies may eventually diminish along with the supply of oil. If they could be made to compete on the alternative research front then we may see the monopolies, or at least the cartel-like coordination of the monopolies, begin to break apart. Competition is always good for capitalism.

[nadinbrzezinski]

14. Point is, we have no competition right now, but monopolies

[AntiFascist]

24. That's where the government can come into play...

they can use incentives or they can use the judicial system to help break them up. The legislative branch can draft new laws. Under McCain, and certainly under Bush, this is not likely to happen. This could become a significant political point in the GE, provided the oil lobby does not take control of Obama. Imagine a Democratic Executive Branch and Congress bringing about these changes.

[nadinbrzezinski]

25. There are laws in the books

once they get enforced... well, we don't need new laws

[MH1]

3. You may be right.

I am not sure who to believe. I know there are still some untapped sources that are becoming economical with the current price. So while the warnings seem dire I am not sure what will happen.

But you'd better believe I'm working on getting my life right so I will be less directly impacted. Unfortunately if it is as cataclysmic as it seems likely to be, my neighbors' lack of preparedness will also impinge on me.

That said I care about this election because Obama is better than the others (if not everything I'd like in all respects), and I think he will do some things that matter, and that help us get through it. I could be wrong but I've got to pick one of 'em.

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. Hubbards peak, why it matters

it is becoming more and more expensive to get that oil

That oil is basic for things like the Green Revolution... no oil driven ag system, BILLIONS will starve

It will be a change as significant as the black death or the Industrial revolution

I am not sure whether democracy will survive that (not that it is too healthy these days)

And yes, unless we get the pedal to the metal on alternative... it will be that apocalyptic

Trust me, where you were when she said what... will be a distant memory from the good times

[screembloodymurder]

6. Demand will fall as the price goes up.

This was demonstrated in the 70's. We are simply adjusting the consumption growth curve back to sustainable levels. Americans need to accept a smaller piece of the pie, but we will adjust. We have no choice.

[nadinbrzezinski]

9. Peak Oil has little to do with the seventies

we simply have LESS oil that can be economically retrieved... and as the price goes up, some oil that you'd not go after you will now, but... that is the classic definition of Hubard's Peak. We are there.

Of course there is global warming... and yes they're related

[L0oniX]

11. Hubbard's Peak was from 1999 to 2003. We are past peak oil. We are now in the downward spiral.

I studied Hubbard's Peak long time ago and tried to warn people and friends who all denied it and said there's plenty of oil. Yea ..plenty of the hard to get and very expensive to get shale oil. it seems that very few people understood the difference between the easy to get oil and the hard to get oil. No one will spend 9 barrels of oil energy to get 10 barrels of oil energy. No president will get us out of this dilemma. You could move to Brazil where all cars there run on ethanol which is produced there by sugar cane. They are self sufficient and do not need oil except for grease. motor oil and other oil based products like plastic. It's over! Buy your guns now and stock up on ammo, canned food, rice and water.

[nadinbrzezinski]

12. Exactly and why by 2012 it will be a real issue

you and I know the politicos are way behind the power curve

Best case scenario we passed it in or around 2005

Worst case scenario, 'bout 2000

But it is an issue... not that your local or even presidential candidate will even talk about it

[L0oniX]

19. My source....

http://hubbert.mines.edu/

[nadinbrzezinski]

21. Thanks, changed puters and missed it

[Johnny__Motown]

15. It was my understanding that oil production continued to increase through 2007, but is expected to

begin declining in 2008.


I am no expert but from what little I have learned, it seems to be the consensus that the actual peak was last year.


the 135 dollar a barrel oil we are seeing now is just the beginning

[L0oniX]

18. This is what my source is....takes a bit of reading and study.

http://hubbert.mines.edu/

[bhikkhu]

29. Soon, but not last year, concerning "total supply" at least.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/international/oilproduction.html is the best source for raw data, and the spreadsheet under the "United States, Persian Gulf, Total OPEC, and World Total, Most Recent Months and Years" tab is where the most current information goes.

Essentially total production has been on a plateau of 84 1/2 mbpd for two and a half years, until October of last year. Then it increased to a new plateau of 85 1/2 mbpd, holding for four months of data so far. This is a smoothed-out rough description, of course.

There is a great deal of new production scheduled to come online this year and the next, and as long as new production replaces the depleting rates of existing fields there will be a net increase. Guesses are easy, but the best informed say 2009 or 2010 at 90 mbd may be the peak. Of course, that's just a guess.

[Combative Democrat]

13. I don't understand how Obama loses to McCain with oil this high

I hope we didn't elect a weak candidate.

[nadinbrzezinski]

16. Peak oil is here, a dem will deal with it in one way

while a republican will have his head in sand for a little longer, but... they will have to deal with it... PERIOD

End of oil will see the return of world wide famine

[depakid]

17. I don't think either major party survives the fallout over peak oil

Both of them are culpable for failing to prepare the nation for what's in store.

Obama even voted for Bush's insane energy bill, so I suppose if he manages to get elected, he'll end up having to clean up- and probably get blamed for the mess.

[nadinbrzezinski]

20. But notice how many folks don't like to talk about this?

these are the real issues... even if what one said is despicable, it is this week

[Johnny__Motown]

22. This isn't a "primaries" issue, this isn't the correct board for this discussion, (Peak Oil Forum)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=266

[nadinbrzezinski]

26. Driving to dinner with my parents (and later my brother in law and nephews)

I realized how much of a KITCHEN TABLE issue this is

No, not the ever so popular THEORY... but damn I-15 was damn emtpy for Memorial Day weekend (the price of oil and gas... peak oil)

Then we went into Marie Callenders, dad invited... and the place was a ghost Town....

Did I mention that folks cannot afford to go out for dinner due to filling up their tanks?

So tell me, how exactly this is not a primary issue?

I guess in that case the mess in the medical field (a system to collapse in ten years tops) is not a primary issue either. Neither is the fact that over the last seven years Average foiks have lost 1000 USD in their total income... oh and lets not talk about the dropping dollar

It is time to talk even of these arcane things, since I can guarantee you... they will CHANGE the way this country (and the world) works.

In fact, see Iraq... it is a CLASSIC resource war... and if you think the oil executives who went down the oil field maps with Chenney back in '01 didn't know of peak oil, I do have a nice bridge for sale... I think it seats over an oil field

I get it... most folks want to talk about he said, she said... but the job of an INFORMED citizenry is to elect the most prepared person for the office, not the best at the He said She said game. Yep, we deserve the guv'ment we get

[depakid]

23. Some are simply uninformed- and others are afraid

It's not an easy topic to discuss over cocktails, as it involves unpleasant realities and sacrifices, and Americans in particular, want desperately to believe that their wasteful and unsustainable "lifestyles" will go on as they always have, despite oil depletion.

Laws of thermodynamics be damned.

[nadinbrzezinski]

27. I think that is mostly it

but even here... where we should be looking for the most QUALIFIED CANDIDATE at times it feels like a HS election, and a beauty contest.

[flowomo]

28. It's not HUBBARD, it's HUBBERT.... and check this out:

This was my newspaper column from May 1st, about peak oil:

http://www.cumberlink.com/articles/2008/05/24/opinion/columns/rich_lewis/doc482b3e8acfd8a434338532.txt

Got some peak oil in my tank
By Rich Lewis, Sentinel Columnist, May 1, 2008
Last updated: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 3:34 PM EDT

$1,091.72.

That was how much it cost to fill our home oil tanks this week in preparation for the next heating season — 280 gallons at $3.90 each.

That’s pretty shocking when you consider the price was about $2.50 a gallon one year ago, $1.40 in 2004 and under $1 in 2002.

And of course gasoline is now around $3.60 a gallon, up from about $2.60 a year ago and about $1.40 in 2002.

Depressing numbers, but not nearly as depressing as the picture painted about oil in an April 9 article in The Arizona Republic by Guy McPherson, a professor of conservation biology at the University of Arizona.

He predicts “the end of the world as we know it.” Soon.

McPherson’s argument rests on a much-debated concept known as “peak oil.” The term, first used in 1956 by petroleum geologist M. King Hubbert, describes the point at which oil production reaches its “peak” and then begins to decline. Some say we have reached the peak; others say it’s decades away.

The bottom line is that once the peak is reached, less and less oil will be available to those who want it and the price will rise, until there is none at all.

This seems obvious enough. Oil can be used up and, unlike, say, trees, you can’t plant oil seeds to grow a new crop.

The real debate is over the effects of peak oil — and specifically whether it means, in McPherson’s words, “the end of civilization.”

His case for that disturbing claim is that we have sufficient oil supply “to keep the world running for 30 years or so, at the current level of demand” (but, of course, demand is rising as countries like China and India push hard to grow their economies).

But, he says, that’s “irrelevant” because the United States “absolutely demands” not “oil” but “cheap oil.” He notes that 90 percent of the oil consumed in the United States is burned by airplanes, ships, trains and automobiles and so “our entire system of food production and delivery depends on cheap oil.”

And those days, he says, are gone forever. Nothing we can do will reverse the rise in oil prices.

“Within a decade,” he writes, “we’ll be staring down the barrel of a crisis” because oil, now running at a little more than $100 a barrel, will cost $400 a barrel in 10 years as we slide down from the peak.

“We have come to depend on cheap oil for the delivery of food, water, shelter and medicine,” McPherson writes. “Most of us are incapable of supplying these four key elements of personal survival, so trouble lies ahead when we are forced to develop means of acquiring them that don’t involve a quick trip to Wal-Mart.”

Many others have written about the consequences of “peak oil,” and some agree with McPherson and some don’t. Many experts dismiss the whole argument about the “end of civilization” as “garbage” and a “myth.” A Google search on “peak oil” returns almost three million hits — so it’s obvious the topic is being widely discussed even if the term hasn’t yet percolated down to our daily conversations.

But as you sift through the arguments against the idea that we are on the edge of a disaster, you don’t find quite enough to make you feel entirely comfortable.

One argument is that new, untapped oil reserves are being discovered all over the planet — but this fails to take into account the politics of oil and whether the countries sitting on top of that oil can produce it and will want to sell it — to us, cheaply.

Another argument is that new energy technologies will bail us out. But, as McPherson notes, no alternatives exist now that can be “scaled up” to serve the entire United States, let alone the world.

How many solar panels or windmills or hydrogen cars have you seen around Carlisle? Could these or any other alternatives be ready to shoulder the load in 10 years? Or 20 years?

Will the cost of the energy they produce be cheaper than oil? And don’t forget — all these new technologies require the use of oil to develop, produce and transport, a chicken-and-egg problem that’s seldom considered.

This is what makes the current political debate over high gas prices so laughable. The president wants to go after oil in Alaska that might keep our tanks filled for a few more years. Hillary Clinton and John McCain are pushing for elimination of the federal gas tax — a move that might save you a dime a gallon this summer. Both ideas will help as much as an umbrella in a tornado.

Let’s suppose the truth lies somewhere between the “end of civilization” and the “don’t worry, be happy” schools of thought. Let’s suppose that oil prices only, say, double in the next 10 years. Let’s suppose that new technologies begin to fill in more of the gaps. Let’s suppose that oil-rich countries remain willing to sell us their oil, and oil-hungry countries generously agree to stop demanding so much of it.

All of these are possible. None are guaranteed.

And none addresses McPherson’s main point, which is that we depend on cheap oil to maintain our current lifestyle.

McPherson urges us to start making “other arrangements.”

The oil bill sitting on my kitchen table says he might be right.

Rich Lewis’ e-mail address is: [e-mail]

[Elspeth]

30. So you really think there is Peak Oil and that it's not just hype to cover oil company greed?

Not challenging you, just wondering what the real evidence is for it. I have an open mind about the subject and realize that resources are finite. I just think that Peak Oil has been a cover for the reduction of Iraqi oil production that was the reason for this war. (Both could be true, BTW.) I am interested to hear what evidence is out there.

Thanks.

[nadinbrzezinski]

32. It is real, started readying on this way back in 2002 as to the causes

of the Iraq war. It is a classic resource war, and the reason is peak oil

They've known about it for decades, why Carter wanted to start work back then and the oil companies went on hyperdrive

But it is here

[Elspeth]

34. Hey Nadin, where do I read up on it?

A reliable source.

If it's really here, it means some real changes.

:hi: nice to see you, BTW.

[nadinbrzezinski]

35. Some places

http://www.theoildrum.com/

http://www.energybulletin.net/primer.php

http://www.peakoil.net/

http://hubbert.mines.edu/

[Elspeth]

36. Thanks! I can see I have my Sunday reading.

Bookmarking.

[aaaaaa5a]

31. "Coast to Coast" with Art Bell...

have been discussing "Peak Oil" for years. They began doing stories about it years before we invaded Iraq. They even predicted the invasion because Iraq has the second largest oil reserves in the world and is the only major oil producing country that has not "peaked" yet.

I'll admit I've thought about it alot as I watched the U.S. use a "false accusation" to invade the country and build bases there.

Interesting note.

Again, "years ago" they said the U.S. would invade Iran because Iran would no longer trade their Oil using American currency. They moved to the Euro. This is why we are having economic difficulties. And it's why we will probably attack Iran unless they go back to the U.S. dollar for oil.

Google the subject. It's very interesting.

[nadinbrzezinski]

33. There are MANY reasons to attack Iran

but moving off the US Dollar is but one of the many causes

And again, resource war

I have been doing much readying on this for a while and looking at how best I can prepare for it

Hell's bells I have a short (story) that is set in a world after the end of the age of oil... quite the dystopia, or is it prophecy?

[Elspeth]

37. Isn't Art Bell the guy who had open lines for the Anti-Christ and victims of UFO experiments?

I seem to remember he had a really wacky show.

[nadinbrzezinski]

38. Oh he does, but it is fun listening from time to time

and on this one he's been more or less correct

Granted, Coast to Coast is no longer fun at the early oh my god in the morning... but when I was in Hawaii due to hubby's orders it was fun, after Malloy and the rest of the boys.

[Elspeth]

39. I'll be reading on Peak Oil.

But I remember the open lines for the Anti-Christ. Some goober called from a pick-up truck and said he was the anti-christ. It was hysterical. :)

[nadinbrzezinski]

40. I remember that one too

and a couple others... such as the implant from aliens and my guv'ment gave me tracking devices

Of course the latter is quite possible, RFID and all that... but still

[aaaaaa5a]

41. I will grant you the show can go off the deep end from time to time

But the show is actually real good when he's not discussing UFOs. (although there is even SOME truth to what they say about that too!)

And he nailed the "Peak Oil Debate." Plus he was talking about this 7 or 8 years ago.