BP Says We’ve Already Reached Peak Oil

BP is saying the quiet part loud: In the 2020 Energy Outlook report the energy giant published this week, it said that the world may have reached peak oil. The covid-19 pandemic has done a serious number on the oil industry, with demand falling to historic lows amid lockdowns and prices falling into negative territory. […]

Peak Oil: BP, Eni, Shell lead Big Oil’s search for new business model

For most of the past century, Big Oil executives found it pretty easy to explain to investors how their businesses worked. Just locate more of the commodities that everyone needed, extract and process them as cheaply as possible, and watch the profits flow. That’s all over now. The change has been so profound that the chief […]

Humans exploiting and destroying nature on unprecedented scale

Animal populations have plunged an average of 68% since 1970, as humanity pushes the planet’s life support systems to the edge Mass soybean harvesting in Campo Verde, Brazil. Intensive agricultures has contributed to the collapse of some animal populations. Photograph: Alffoto/WWF Wildlife populations are in freefall around the world, driven by human overconsumption, population growth […]

Unwinding the Opec+ deal will be difficult

It has taken 60 years for Opec linchpin Saudi Arabia to find a non-Opec partner that it could see itself settling down with. The original Opec+ agreement led by Riyadh and Moscow in 2016 was very much a marriage of convenience, and the commitment from the producer group’s leaders was decidedly one-sided. Saudi Arabia was […]

Daniel Yergin’s sobering and smart take on the global state of energy

At a time when solid facts and reasoned arguments are in retreat, Daniel Yergin rides to the rescue. The Pulitzer Prize-winning author and energy savant is armed to the teeth with enough telling statistics to sink an oil tanker in “The New Map: Energy, Climate, and the Clash of Nations” (Penguin Press, 512 pp., ★★★★ out of […]

The Psychology of Denying Overpopulation

Let’s imagine we were giving an award for the worst social problem in the world today. Do you have any nominations? Did I hear someone say international conflict? Racial prejudice maybe? Environmental destruction anyone? Millions of homeless refugees? Exploitation of women? Turns out there’s one problem that connects all of those, and it’s one you […]

Kunstler: The Ghost in the Machine

The abiding mystery of the 2020 election is how come the Democratic Party, wishing so zealously to win back power, took pains to nominate a candidate weaker than the ghost of Millard Fillmore. Resorting to Occam’s Razor, one might have to conclude that Joe Biden was simply the best they had — a surefire case […]

The End of Oil is Near, or Maybe Not

The cover of the September/October 2020 issue of Sierra magazine states “The End of Oil is Near”.  The corresponding story “The End of Oil?” was paralleled with a recent segment on Democracy Now.  I think that is wishful thinking.  To the extent that oil demand goes down in the future, it will go down because […]

Why ‘peak oil’ may coincide with ‘peak plastic’

BP’s new energy review suggests the world is heading for ‘peak oil’ while the same trends may mean we have also reached ‘peak plastic’. ‘Peak oil’ may coincide with ‘peak plastic’ as circular economy undermines demand for virgin petrochemicals Lower oil production will impact availability of chemical feedstock Expect shift to renewables to impact chemicals […]

How Big Oil Misled The Public Into Believing Plastic Would Be Recycled

Note: An audio version of this story aired on NPR’s Planet Money. Listen to the episode here. Laura Leebrick, a manager at Rogue Disposal & Recycling in southern Oregon, is standing on the end of its landfill watching an avalanche of plastic trash pour out of a semitrailer: containers, bags, packaging, strawberry containers, yogurt cups. […]

The End of Oil? Pandemic Adds to Fossil Fuel Glut, But COVID-19 Relief Money Flows to Oil Industry

As the coronavirus pandemic contributes to a glut of fossil fuels, groups like Greenpeace are calling on Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden to ban fossil fuel interests from his campaign and administration, if he wins, even as he recently declared at a campaign stop that he “will not ban fracking.” We discuss the politics of […]

What Will the World Look Like in 2030?

Big demographic, economic and technological changes are coming — from an aging population in the U.S. and the rise of sub-Saharan Africa as a compelling middle-class market to automation causing “technological unemployment,” according to Wharton management professor Mauro Guillen. In his new book, “2030: How Today’s Biggest Trends Will Collide and Reshape the Future of […]

Peak Phosphorous

In crop nutrition, much has been made with problems associated with nitrogen. But it’s phosphorous that we should be concerned about, says soil scientist Dr. Jay Goos. Goos… “Phosphorus is a natural resource and rock phosphate is not found in very many places around the world”. One of those places is Florida, but Dr. Goos […]

Despite doomsayers, man’s Golden Age might be ahead

A world without resources is high on a long list of doomsday scenarios offered by folks out to scare the rest of us to death. The day approaches, they warn us, when our raw materials will be exhausted, our mines stripped, our forests destroyed, our farmland depleted, our petroleum used up and our atmosphere poisoned. […]

Merkel Open to Action Against Nord Stream

Chancellor Angela Merkel opened the door to taking action against the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline as Germany and its allies mull a response to the poisoning of Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny. Merkel’s rethinking of her sustained support for the controversial Baltic Sea pipeline underscores the escalating tensions with President Vladimir Putin’s government after […]

Are We on the Brink of a New Dark Ages?

The foreign policy of a progressive US administration could entail a fanatical pursuit of race-based “intersectionality” policies, similar to the proletarian internationalism of yesteryear. If US foreign policy were in fact composed of such policies, many countries would consider China the lesser of two evils. A world dominated by a progressive US on the one […]

Are We On The Cusp Of A Global Energy Crisis?

Goehring and Rozencwajg believe that we are on the cusp of a global energy crisis because of the depletion of U.S. tight oil plays. “We are on the cusp of a global energy crisis…Global energy markets in general and oil markets in particular are slipping into a structural deficit as we speak. We believe that energy […]

Total CEO predicts peak oil by 2040

Speaking at the ONS Digital Conference in a video presentation, Patrick Pouyanne, the CEO of Total SA, said he now expects oil production to peak between 2030 and 2040, although he added that oil will continue to be needed. Pouyanne expects greater generation from wind, solar and other renewables, as well as better use of […]

Apocalypse kabuki

Let’s look beyond the hubris and hypocrisy for a moment. Nancy Pelosi has made her attempt to put the SalonGate behind her. She says it was a setup, “…and that’s all I’m going to say about that.” So while there is very little in this world more pathetic than the spectacle of an eighty-year-old woman fulminating […]

Oil Market Sentiment Turns Sour

The oil market sentiment has turned sour. That’s according to Rystad Energy’s senior oil markets analyst Paola Rodriguez-Masiu, who made the statement in a comment sent to Rigzone on Monday. “We don’t see oil prices bouncing back anywhere near to the $50 per barrel level anytime soon unless OPEC+ decides to deepen the current cuts. […]

Beijing May Be More Addicted to Coal Than Oil

There’s one surprise entrant in the group of oil companies announcing plans this year for how they’ll reduce emissions: PetroChina Co. China’s oil companies, unlike their peers in the U.S. and particularly Europe, don’t traditionally treat climate targets as a major issue. Beijing, after all, isn’t even promising to hit its emissions peak until 2030. The […]

A new energy order in the offing

THE notion that ‘oil demand is approaching the cliff’ is now being formalised. Global energy leaders are beginning to assert oil is past its peak. Not that oil would not be required in the years and decades to come. It would still be in demand but the world would not be critically, crucially, and strategically […]

2020 presidential election will have major impact on oil and gas

The outcome of the presidential election will have a big impact on the energy front in Colorado and other oil- and gas-producing states. If U.S. voters decide to stay the course, the current push for energy dominance through increased drilling will continue. If they elect a new president, the challenger has pledged to end new drilling […]

As much as half of the world’s water supply is being stolen

Global water supplies are under stress from rising populations. Agriculture is mainly to blame for illegal water abstraction. Climate change is adding to the number of water crises across the globe. As much as half the world’s water supply is being stolen, with agriculture responsible for much of that, according to a new study. Writing […]

Big Oil just isn’t as big as it once was

A dozen years ago, ExxonMobil was the bluest of blue-chip companies. Raking in record-breaking profit, it spent every quarter of 2008 as the world’s most valuable publicly traded company. Not anymore. The oil giant’s market value today is a third of what it was in 2008, when it was worth over $500 billion. That slide […]

EIA Reports Massive Draw On Supplies

The impact of Hurricane Laura’s production shutdown is now being felt. Earlier this morning, the U.S. Energy Information Agency (EIA) reported a massive -9.362 million barrel decline in oil stocks on hand. Much of the downturn may be attributed to last week’s Category 4 storm that ceased production in the Gulf Coast region.   However, […]

Saudi Cutting Oil Deliveries to US

Saudi Arabia is continuing to divert its oil away from America’s shores. The kingdom last month loaded about 5.6 million barrels a day on to tankers, a small increase from July, vessel-tracking information compiled by Bloomberg show. Within that, an ever-smaller share went to the U.S., and cargo data show that deliveries in the week […]

Is Big Oil Doomed To Repeat The Coal Industry’s Mistakes?

Until this year, alarmists proclaiming the end of oil were often dismissed as crackpots or overly optimistic environmentalists. But the spread of the novel coronavirus and its unprecedented disruption of the global economy and many of the stalwart industries at its core has amplified the discussion about life after oil and brought it into the […]

Peak oil production seen by 2040 as IEA calls 2020 ‘turning point’ for energy

Global oil production is set to peak by 2030 or 2040 with more energy supplied from solar, wind and carbon capture while storage solutions are developed, Total SA CEO Patrick Pouyanne said Aug. 31. In a video presentation for the ONS Digital Conference, Pouyanne said oil won’t disappear because it’s still the most efficient source […]

Srait of Hormuz: the world’s most important oil artery

The U.S. military on Wednesday said Iranian forces briefly boarded a Liberian-flagged oil near the Strait of Hormuz, heightening tensions in the world’s busiest oil waterway. Sources said the Iranian action was retaliation against the Greek owner of some of the vessels that were carrying fuel to Venezuela. The cargoes are covered by a U.S. […]

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