Shell’s Van Der Veer Gets Refreshingly Honest

So Who says Peak Oil is not about to become a reality? It must be true; Shell’s biggest cheese, Jeroen van der Veer, effectively says so.

In an e-letter to staff that must surely be splattered right across the Big Oil community by now, and be doing the rounds of NOCs (national oil corporations), Shell’s CEO basically says that conventional oil output will peak in seven years – oh, and gas shortages are on the way, too.

That’s not really fresh news. But what is significant is that van der Veer has essentially joined the now growing cadre of upstream bosses who are gradually admitting that the clock is ticking and it’s five minutes to midnight.
His letter reads rather like a distillation of what has been said at so many climate change/ environment conferences over the past quarter of a century. But I’m not criticising him for that.

He quite rightly urges caution over whether December’s Bali declaration on climate change was just rhetoric or the beginning of a global effort to counter it, and that a lot hangs on how attitudes evolve in Beijing, Brussels, New Delhi and Washington.

I’m intrigued that Shell sought a second opinion from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology regarding its two scenarios and that van der Veer is astute enough to recognise that the way we approach energy is utterly critical to our future.

“The sobering reality is that the Blueprints scenario will only come to pass if policymakers agree a global approach to emissions trading and actively promote energy efficiency and new technology in four sectors: heat and power generation, industry, mobility and buildings. It will be hard work and there is little time.”

MEANWHILE, those idiots at Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA) have their heads firmly embedded in the sand, judging by their latest “free” crowing.

RedOrbit