[RattlesnakeJake]

The concept I had difficulty with (your audiance may also) is the demand side of the supply-demand dynamic. Think of demand as constrained and unconstrained. The 2% per year Cheney refers to is constrained demand. Constrained demand is always equal to production. It is constrained primarily by price. Unconstained demand would be the demand if supply was unlimited and the price never changed.

So the main fear of peak oil, high price and run away inflation, can occur long before the peak because unconstrained demand must be bent to the production curve by price increases.

We will never know what unconstrained demand is, but I found this webpage helpful in understanding the notion.

If unconstained demand is 5% (as in the example), any production increase(decrease) of less than 5% will produce a price increase. Production doesn't have to decline. The consequences are here now.

[Aaron]

OPEC's reserve claims are the 2nd most important topic associated with peak oil.

After all... if they are accurate, then peak is around 2030... if they lied then we have arrived.

So what's the most important argument in peak oil?

Deffey's said it...

What's the most significant date in the peak argument?

It's not when we run out of oil...

And it's not even when the production peak happens...

It's a point in time, prior to peak production, after which we have a diminished ability to make meaningful changes.

To avoid the most potent consequences of peak oil, the deadline is much earlier than the technical peak.

Puts the urg in urgency.

[mjpete]

A couple general presentation suggestions.

For timing, assume each slide will be up about 1 minute. This gives people time to process both the visual and audio and commit the information to long term memory.

Graphic slides should only have up to 6 pieces of new information per slide. More information will just be forgotten. i would tend to stay away from clip art slides. They tend to distract people from the information you are giving.

When half of the reserves has been extracted, it does not mean we are at peak oil. Many things can things can skew the peak to one side or the other. The half reservce production point, is more like a guide post indicating that you are likely close to the peak.

Otherwise, the presentation looked pretty good.

[lper100km]

I was very much taken with the presentation and in particular the chart #15. I have reproduced it on this note with an added curve to illustrate what I fear is more likely to happen.

My apologies. I am unable to add the jpeg file

It struck me that the future production is shown as a steady and orderly decline, which is bad enough. In a perfect world, with every one being co-operative and pleasant about it, this may be so. It’s possible that the demand and hence production could very well be significantly less as everyone joins the conservation movement. In the real world, it’s unlikely that conservation stands a chance, because everyone will be scrabbling for their share of the diminishing supply – and others share too if they can take it. I seem to remember some classic tale about the English commons and how, because everyone had unrestricted access for cattle and sheep raising, it was used unrelentingly until the land finally became barren and all starved in the end. Collective greed trumps common sense every time.

I think it is more likely that the producers will be pressured to attempt to satisfy the steadily increasing demand and run the fields at max production as long as possible, regardless of the consequences. In very much rounded numbers, the available reserves for the next 45 years is approx. 450Gbbls over and above a ‘baseline’ production of 5Gbbls/yr, according to the chart. Even if it is possible to maintain the present peak output of 25Gbbls/yr, the resulting maximum productive life expectancy is 18 years only, assuming we are at peak oil now, as seems to be indicated. Inevitably, there would be a sudden and massive drop in production as the wells run dry. By 2025, we are in a totally different world. Of course, it won’t go quite like that either. Running at max production will result in damage to ultimate recovery with more oil left in the ground than might have been produced, thus bringing the end year ahead of the 18. Technological problems, political strife and simply the increasing difficulty of doing any kind of work as time goes by and as oil becomes less economically available, will contribute to a huge slowing down of human endeavour. It could well be that because of human intransigence on a grand scale, major world wide economic and social breakdowns occur whilst there is a significant amount of recoverable oil still in place, also before year 18.

Whether it’s 18 years, or 15 or 25 is not so important. It’s the inevitability of it all. What is startling is that in human terms, this represents only one generation and well within the lifetime of most people today. Regardless of the actual shape of the decline curve, it is clear that by 2020, we are in deep trouble. (2020 – what irony!)

The world needs to plan for replacing the energy equivalent of 25Gbbls/yr of oil over the next 18 years for the status quo to remain. Better get started. But what should be done? The easiest of the alternatives is to create more electrical power generation. (Easiest and obvious, but not simple) But that’s not where the main problem lies. The majority of oil energy is used for mobility – travel, shipping, transportation, with lesser amounts used for heating, power generation, agriculture, plastics, medicine. Power generation can be addressed by a combination of central stations, most likely nuclear, and point of use distributed low power generation. No new technology requirements there – just political will primarily. But power plants take years to build once the ground has been broken – and that’s after all the high level and local planning, permitting etc., etc. which also takes years. More tellingly, the whole building process is totally dependent upon the oil economy, so it’s no use waiting for 15 years before starting to build something. Assuming all these issues are taken care of expeditiously, where then will come the resources needed in such huge amounts to make this happen – financial, human, materials – in such a concentrated time period? Already, we are seeing that energy projects in the tar sands in the $1b range are being postponed or cancelled due to lack of resources at the estimated costs that would make them economically viable, despite high oil prices. These project pale in comparison the size of the ones that will be needed eventually.

The big issue is fuel and its conversion into motive power. Where in the world, literally, are we going to find a fuel that packs a similar degree of energy density, safety, handling ability, convenience, distribution infrastructure and low cost? Think about oil for a minute or two. As a realistic figure, one gallon will transport four people for 25 miles in a 3,000lb vehicle in approximately 25 minutes. The energy expended in the fuel is of the order of 40kWh. We are now so used to this that the mind does not register the consequences of not having that gallon of oil. But, by what other means can 3,000lb plus four people be transported without that gallon – at any speed?

I will hazard that there is no new technology solution available now or forthcoming, that is applicable in the grand scale and that will address the problem of fuelling motive power to anything like the extent that we wish for or would need to sustain even basic activities.

Discounting the conspiracy theorists about big oil owning but suppressing other energy sources, it is impossible to imagine that any alternative sources for this application would not have been exploited by now. After all, there has been more than sufficient opposition to fossil fuel use raised by the environmental movement that should have motivated research into alternatives over the past 30 years and would certainly have been trumpeted to the world had such been found. Furthermore, even if the conspiracy theorists are correct, this would be the time for the oil companies to boost their sagging reserves by announcing access to those previously unknown fuels.

Sadly, and perhaps fortunately, the basic laws of physics tell us that energy cannot be created, merely transformed. Oil just happens to be unique in that it has served as a store of energy for millennia until discovered and now squandered in little over 100 years. The huge time lag between its discovery and conversion from organic materials so long ago allows us to consider it as a freebie.

We now, on the other hand, have to do our own energy conversions in order to obtain even nominal amounts of manufactured useable fuels, incurring massive chemical, energy and financial inefficiencies in the process. And, we need to replace say, the equivalent of 15Gbbls/yr of oil. (25 x 60% as an arbitrary fuel use estimate) That’s equal to 24x10^12kWh annually. Fat chance.

Alternatively, there are 18 years remaining in which to discover, develop, industrialise, create infrastructure and distribute some as yet unknown magical fuel in order to blend in seamlessly with the declining oil economy so that our way of life may continue without interruption. Fat to the point of obesity chance.

There are, of course, horses. (One will deliver 0.746kWh, providing it’s healthy, fed properly and exercised well. They are also organic, though do require iron shoes.) Furthermore, only 50 of them are needed to replace that gallon of fuel oil or 2,000 for a barrel of light, sweet crude.[spoil][/spoil][i]

[Madpaddy]

Great post iper,

I gave the presentation on Wednesday and it went well.
I made the point of the energy slaves and gave the analogy of pushing a car to work to illustrate the energy density of oil as you pointed out. I must upload my final version of the presentation as I gave it. Don't forget to look at the speakers notes.

MP