[bruin]

So what happens to these top 100 guys with PO? http://www.andpop.com/article/4031

I don't believe the rich get richer all the time. If Microsoft takes a dump, and Walmart can't ship in its goods from China, they are sure to lose money. Who will be the new number 1? Probably Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Alsaud from Saudi Arabia.

[pip]

I bet the Beany Babies guy doesn't make it.

[Novus]

There was a short collumn by Forbes himself about the oil crisis.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]Dry Well

President Bush accused Americans of being "addicted to oil" in his State of the Union address. He might as well have said we are addicted to prosperity, to progress. Without oil, of course, we would be an infinitely poorer nation--on a par, say, with Bangladesh...

[pup55]

Oooh..

Actually I think a year or so ago he was spouting off about how plentiful oil is, and all is well, etc. etc.

We should probably do a steve forbes search, and see if this is truly the case.

[pup55]

2000: "I've been supportive of opeining up ANWR"

2000: "open up ANWR and also open up the Strategic Petroleum Reserve"

2003: "Tell the arabs they have to pump more"

2005 "Oil prices are driven by speculation and will drop to $35"

August 2005: "Oil prices will drop to $35 within a year"

No evidence that the guy is a peaker, but also, maybe he does not come out and say that oil is actually plentiful. We should probably keep track of this guy's statements because he is one of those people that are supposedly running the world.

[Micki]

Just had a read of some of the reader comments in the last Forbes link and I was really stunned.
A majority seeems absolutely convinced that high oil price just is the result of speculation.

Most people didn't seem to understand comments made by Forbes that a crash resulting in $35/bbl would make the techwreck look like playschool actually referred to a massive depression. They seemed to think that the crash only would apply to oil companies and speculators and all other businesses and people would be cheering.

I know most people are totally ignorant but read this was just to much.
All I can say is that I was totally flabbergasted.

[Novus]

Forbes' latest comments are a complete 180 from what he was saying just six months ago. "Addicted to prosperity, to progress..."? He sounds like Montyquest or any other well versed doomer.

Forbes is no fool. When confronted with the facts of Peak Oil there is only one reasonable conclusion a rational man can come to. The world as we know it is over.

[Leanan]

Well. Clear a spot in the Cornucopian Graveyard for Mr. Forbes.

[Leanan]

Then again, maybe not. I found the column:

http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2006/0227/027.html

Sounds like he's painting a dire image of the world without oil just to push drilling in ANWR and the like.

[thorn]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '.').. So it is puzzling to many industry analysts that instead of using these profits to develop new sources of supply, they prefer to lavish them on their shareholders in the form of higher dividends and buy back stock. The industry protests that it has poured $106 billion into new production already this year. But though that may sound like a lot, it isn't even enough to replace the depletion of current oil fields as well as cover the wear and tear on equipment and machinery.

"The oil companies have done a tremendous amount of investment," says James Hamilton, an economist and energy expert at the University of California at San Diego. "But they have to just to remain in the same place."

Several factors are making it difficult for the companies to expand production, including shortages of engineers and equipment created from years of low-priced oil. In addition, investment opportunities are scarce. Up to 75% of the world's reserves are off-limits to private oil companies, calculates Philip Verleger, an industry expert at the Institute for International Economics in Washington. And the projects that are available aren't always that lucrative since national governments demand most of the profits for themselves.

But another, more surprising, factor is holding back the oil companies: They simply aren't that bullish on the oil market 10 or so years down the road, when a project started today will start to produce oil.

"My guess is virtually 90% of the oil industry is assuming that $70 oil is not going to last more than a few years," according to Adam Sieminski, the chief energy economist at Deutsche Bank (nyse: DB - news - people ). He guesses that most oil companies are projecting crude will fetch $40 a barrel plus inflation over the long-term.

On that score, the oil companies appear to be virtually alone. Wall Street continues churning out predictions of $100 oil. Hedge fund managers are pouring millions into oil futures. And peak oil theorists, who argue that humans have produced nearly half the oil that there is to produce, and that therefore prices will shoot up enough to bring economic growth to a halt, are enjoying their heyday.

"The people most alarmed about future supply are not the people running oil companies," says John Felmy, the chief economist at the American Petroleum Institute, an industry trade group in Washington.

... And if oil expert Daniel Yergin is right, the world is about to see an unprecedented surge in supply. A field-by-field analysis conducted by his company, Cambridge Energy Research Associates, predicts that 16 million new barrels a day will come online by 2010. That would amount to a 20% increase in world oil production.

At the time of the study's release last summer, critics charged that it low-balled the rate of depletion for fields currently in production and that it didn't leave room for the inevitable slippage of project deadlines. To some extent, they were right. Production in the North Sea has declined more rapidly than Cambridge Energy predicted, and Gulf hurricanes have knocked some projects off course. But there is little doubt that a good portion of this fresh supply will come online eventually as the projects were planned when oil was much cheaper.

Over the longer term, oil companies are counting on getting cleverer at extracting more oil from any given field as well as from unconventional sources, such as oil shale or tar sands. If history is any guide, they will succeed.

In the past, only 10% of oil discovered worldwide ever made it to market, says Jerry Taylor, the director of natural resource studies at the Cato Institute in Washington. But thanks to the march of technology, that portion has climbed to 35%; a move to 40% would create a big increase in new supply. Peak oil theorists have ignored the impact of these technological advances when they have predicted for years that world oil production was nearing its peak. And that is the reason they keep getting it wrong.

[emersonbiggins]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b] Peak oil theorists have ignored the impact of these technological advances when they have predicted for years that world oil production was nearing its peak. And that is the reason they keep getting it wrong.

[PolestaR]

Don't you hate it when some third party just comes out nowhere and basically goes "Peak oil theorists are crazy people" .

For a second there I felt crazy.

Then logic fought a jihad total war and won.

[thethief]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'O')il, Oil Everywhere
Leonardo Maugeri, 07.24.06
We're not running out of oil--but high oil prices are needed to find it.
There is an alarmist theory that the world is running out of oil. Quite the contrary. There is plenty of oil in the ground, and high prices are just what's needed to tap the earth's vast reserves.

For two decades low prices have discouraged the search for new resources in areas with the largest deposits of crude. Over time this has thinned out global production capacity and virtually eliminated the safety margin needed to provide a cushion against sudden crises. Today spare capacity is a mere 2% of world consumption, holding the price of oil hostage to every kind of political or climatic crisis, and fueling rumors and speculation.

Starting in the mid-1980s and continuing until the early years of the new century, the price of oil mostly oscillated between $18 and $20 a barrel, held down by oversupply. In 1986 and 1998--99 prices dipped below $10. In this environment oil producers, terrified by the specter of overproduction, held back on the search for new oilfields. Some countries limited production to already active fields.

The scope of this phenomenon is extraordinary but barely understood outside the industry. During the last 25 years more than 70% of exploration has taken place in the United States and Canada, mature areas that probably hold only 3% of the world's reserves of crude. The Middle East, on the other hand, has been the scene of only 3% of global exploration, even though it harbors 70% of the earth's reserves. In the Persian Gulf, holding 65% of the region's reserves, fewer than 100 exploration wells were drilled between 1995 and 2004. During the same period, 15,700 such wells were drilled in the U.S.

Looking back over a longer time frame, you find the same lopsided ratios. In Saudi Arabia only 300 oil and gas wells (including developmental wells) have ever been drilled, as opposed to several hundred thousand in the U.S. The contrast is even more striking with respect to Iran and Iraq, and Russia is still paying the price for the technological backwardness and poor management of its fields during the Soviet era. Even today it is scarcely expanding its productive base, although its recent groping toward Western capital and expertise may change that picture (click here to see story).

Venezuela could double its production of crude in ten years with the help of foreign capital and technology, but political considerations drive it in the opposite direction, and its production is falling.

In fact, the vast majority of prime producing countries get their oil from old fields, most of which have been in production since their discovery in the first half of the last century. And in many instances they are operated with 50- and 60-year-old technology and equipment.

There is little that the small or large Western oil companies can do to alter this situation. They control only 8% of global reserves of crude, while more than 90% of the world's reserves are in countries that do not allow foreign access and are unwilling or unable to develop new reserves on their own.

While the industrialized world is concerned with future energy supply security and price, the producing countries have been driven by concern over future demand. Will consumption of crude hold up in the future, they ask, or is the current scenario only a bubble, bound to explode as it has done so many times before?

Only relatively high prices for oil can provide a painful but effective antidote for the current situation. The process has already begun, but the cure will take time. Thanks to high prices, investment in oil exploration and development has exploded during the last two years worldwide. A plausible forecast is that by the end of the decade the daily demand for oil will have expanded by 7 to 8 million barrels. If global production continues at present rates, it could grow by 12 to 15 million barrels per day in that period. In other words, there is more than enough oil in the ground.

[emersonbiggins]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', ' ')In the Persian Gulf, holding 65% of the region's reserves, fewer than 100 exploration wells were drilled between 1995 and 2004. During the same period, 15,700 such wells were drilled in the U.S.

[peripato]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')e're not running out of oil--but high oil prices are needed to find it.

[dub_scratch]

Reading the title of this piece, I thought the "oil, oil everywhere" was going to be in Alberta tar or Colorado shale. But not this time folks. No, our horn of plenty is now located in the yet to be discovered nooks & crannies of the Persian Golf.

Cornucopian logic operates by the lack of negative proof as proof positive of "oil, oil everywhere". That is: in between all the established dry holes and discovered fields there exist huge reserves of sweet crude until exploration activity discovers dirt and rock under all that dirt & rock .

[emersonbiggins]

Forbes makes it sound like that it's crazy NOT to become a wildcatter.

Alright, I've got my hardhat, where do I sign up?

[dub_scratch]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')n fact, the vast majority of prime producing countries get their oil from old fields, most of which have been in production since their discovery in the first half of the last century.

[Dreamtwister]

Forbes is looking out for Forbes.

The more lemmings he can convince to swallow his cornucopian kool-aid, the richer he and his buddies will get when the dust settles.

Don't listen to what he says. Watch what he does.

[XOVERX]

I've got this graph, see, that shows less discoveries than consumtion all the way back to 1982.

The discovery part blips way down, then up a little, then way down again, never approaching consumption.

The consumption part just goes up, up, up. So that now for every barrel discovered, the world consumes 4.

What? Forbes worry?