Energy security

“You mention in one of your articles that Peak Oil could occur as early as 2015. It may have already happened. There is increasing evidence that supply is declining off the various Peaks, depending on what liquids one is looking at. A continued rapid decline in Saudi (it has declined 11 per cent from its highs already) production, whether for geological, economic or political reasons, will not be masked for much longer.

Also it doesn’t matter why the Saudis are producing less. Whether they cannot, or will not still means there is less oil in the market.
If they do have control, my guess is that having seen prices rise to $70 without causing economic hardship (except for poorer people and countries) that they may be trying to get to $100 (or some other higher number), but not precipitously, they will continue trending down production so that prices trend up.

At first glance you would think that is terrible. I beg to differ, I think it is good. Western governments (including no doubt yours in T&T) have been lax and mendacious as far as the security of energy supply is concerned. They should have forced the price up by levying taxes (my favourite is to replace income taxes with energy taxes), but if they won’t do it I suppose the Saudis have decided to do it themselves. Now they get the benefit of the ‘tax’. Anyway, higher prices will hopefully dampen demand and encourage conservation.”

“While responsible people can disagree on what the annual production data are telling us about our proximity to Peak Oil, in my opinion it is a virtual certainty that Peak Oil from the point of view of importers is here. This virtual certainty is due to the lethal combination of flat to declining oil production and the (sometimes rapidly) rising domestic consumption in exporting countries, resulting in sometimes catastrophic decline in exports. In effect in my opinion the very lifeblood of the world economy is draining away in front of our very eyes.”

Trinidad Express