[PolestaR]

Is there a month to month "production output" of oil available to look at? It would be helpful in predicting the peak I think.

[dada]

IEA graphs for many countries for the past 10 years are available here:

http://omrpublic.iea.org/supplysearch.asp

Many of these 10 year graphs are quite dramatic. It looks like ODEC countries, as a group, are well into decline. OPEC, rather than increasing output, is decreasing. Saudi Arabia has not had a meaningful increase in production for over a year.

[Leanan]

You might find this story at the Oil Drum helpful.

[Zardoz]

Any questions about when we hit the "undulating plateau" of the peak?

2008? 2012? 2115? We wish!

We're there, folks. Hirsch's worst-case scenario is unfolding right before our eyes, right now. It's only a matter of time before TSHTF.

Things are going to get very ugly, aren't they?

[turmoil]

Enjoy the relative peace while it lasts...

[PolestaR]

Don't get me wrong, I want us to be peaked also, but......

The graph doesn't quite look like it has a plateau yet, or a real decline. Sure this COULD be the peak, but it could also not be, it isn't 100% proven yet I think.

[Revi]

It may be that Ken Deffeyes was right and the peak was around the 16th of December, 2005. Whether it's the peak or not we are definitely on the plateau, so we aren't shooting up in production like we did the past five years or so. Even if we aren't at the absolute peak we are getting to the top of world oil production. It'll be a ride down soon. Enjoy the view from the summit!

[PWALPOCO]

As dramatic as the graph above is , the post at The Oil Drum does point out that the slice of oil producing history being shown is quite small.

It would appear at first glance that the surging run of oil production maxed out at between 84-85mbd.

Putting it against the big historical context however ;

Link to image


The yellow area represents the area in the first graph in this thread. As you can see , in the big picture there have been little peaks and troughs and the occassional wobble in production along the way up till now.

Its obvious that based on previous patterns that you cant rely on a relatively short space of time to tell if youve peaked , hence the wisdom of the "rearview mirror".

Paul

[Novus]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Zardoz', '[')img]http://img211.imageshack.us/img211/6729/oilproductionjan062ay.jpg[/img]


Any questions about when we hit the "undulating plateau" of the peak?

2008? 2012? 2115? We wish!

We're there, folks. Hirsch's worst-case scenario is unfolding right before our eyes, right now. It's only a matter of time before TSHTF.

Things are going to get very ugly, aren't they?

[frankthetank]

I wonder if it'll ever be possible to know the exact day we peaked?

[rogerhb]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('frankthetank', 'I') wonder if it'll ever be possible to know the exact day we peaked?

[Revi]

Is this it, the real Magilla? I have a feeling it might be the peak we all talk about. We'll see. I feel like Chicken Little, finally the sky is actually falling. See I told you this would happen. The problem is that the sky is falling on all of us.

[MfromAmsterdam]

Sorry Guy's. We didn't mean to. It was just that the worlds that we let others create around us, were soo interesting that we forgot other more basic things.

Again we didn't mean to, we just weren't ment I guess...

Michel

[donshan]

I too believe we are in the "undulating plateau" of peak oil now, but I would urge some caution about interpreting any one month's total production data.

The total production number includes increased production from new oil fields going into production minus depletion of old fields, weather events (Katrina/Rita) and geopolitical events ( e.g. Nigeria etc.).

In January, 2006 CIBI World Markets published a survey of 2006 that went into details about these factors.

See the Peak Oil discussion from last Jan for the link to the study:
http://www.peakoil.com/fortopic16539-0-asc-15.html

My point is that CIBI gives a table which shows over 30 new oil projects nearing significant new production in the next three years. They list new oil production of 3.6 million bbl/day in 2006, 3.7 in 2007, and 3.1 in 2008.

However they estimate 60% of this new production is needed to offset depletion leaving a net new production of about 3.5 million bbl/day increase in total production over the next 3 years. However this still leaves some room to expand total oil production IF weather and geopolitics don't interfere. However we all are seeing such news events every week. A reduction due to some world news event is NOT the geological peak in oil production we are looking for. Such a drop due to Katrina/Rita is clearly seen in the chart posted above.

My point is just to separate the underlying fundamental physical limits from production problems due to weather and geopolitics and technical problems and delays in new projects.

The CIBI study thinks there is a little room for another expansion in production to meet expanding demand for the next three years unless we have disruptions from Iran, Nigeria, Venezula, Iraq, Saudi Arabia etc , or more hurricane damage.


$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'S')ubtracting depletion of around 2.2 million barrels
annually from our estimates of new field production
capacity leaves about 3½ million barrels of daily
production available to support consumption growth
over the next three years. As noted previously, all of
the net increase in global production will come from
non-conventional sources such as deep-water and oil
sands production . Assuming that
consumption continues to increase at near a 2.5%
trend rate, spurred by rapidly rising energy demand
in countries like China and India, oil consumption will
soon exceed projected global supply growth, requiring
further price rationing to bring demand growth back
in to line with the very modest supply growth we see
lying ahead.

[Revi]

Stuart Standiford from The Oil Drum seems pretty sure that the peak is now. Here's the blurb on his prediction from Mobjectivist:

http://mobjectivist.blogspot.com/2006/0 ... blimp.html

I would have given you the info from the Oil Drum, but I can't get it to come up any more on my computer for some reason. Hmmm....

[BO]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('donshan', 'H')owever they estimate 60% of this new production is needed to offset depletion leaving a net new production of about 3.5 million bbl/day increase in total production over the next 3 years. However this still leaves some room to expand total oil production IF weather and geopolitics don't interfere. However we all are seeing such news events every week. A reduction due to some world news event is NOT the geological peak in oil production we are looking for. Such a drop due to Katrina/Rita is clearly seen in the chart posted above.

My point is just to separate the underlying fundamental physical limits from production problems due to weather and geopolitics and technical problems and delays in new projects.