Kurt Cobb: Making society forecast-proof

The trouble with forecasts is that they are almost always wrong. That’s in part because the accuracy of forecasts deteriorates rapidly with time. I might predict quite well what I will be doing tomorrow. But predicting accurately what I will be doing exactly one year from today or exactly 10 years from today is exceedingly difficult if not impossible, even if I already have something planned.

How much harder it is then to predict the state of complex systems such as the world’s energy delivery systems 10, 20 or 30 years hence. There are many factors that make such predictions hard including:

● the inaccessibility of audited data such as oil and natural gas reserves for many of the largest producing countries in the world
● the uncertainties about future discoveries
● the uncertainties over the rate of depletion for fossil fuels
● the uncertainties concerning future technological advances in extraction and energy efficiency
● the growth and viability of alternative fuels
● and the future course of energy prices and the world economy just to name a few.

And yet, we have premised our entire future on business-as-usual forecasts made by leading energy consulting firms and government agencies. Strangely, some of these forecasts come without even the slightest hint about how unreliable they may be. A forecast from the highly influential energy consulting firm Cambridge Energy Research Associates tells us we have precisely 3.74 trillion barrels of remaining recoverable oil in the world. It concludes that a peak in world oil production is still at least 20 years off and is to be followed by an “undulating plateau that may well last for decades.” Neither a range nor an error bar can be found in this forecast.

Energy Bulletin