[ROCKMAN]

Oh God...another Dude fan. Well..stay away..I saw him first.

Just a spiritual thing Dude...don't worry.

[DomusAlbion]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ROCKMAN', 'O')h God...another Dude fan. Well..stay away..I saw him first.

Just a spiritual thing Dude...don't worry.

[TheDude]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ROCKMAN', 'O')h God...another Dude fan. Well..stay away..I saw him first.

Just a spiritual thing Dude...don't worry.

[Starvid]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('seldom_seen', 'I') remember, somewhere in the dusty archives of this forum, where talk of a global decline rate of 6-9% would be written off as alarmist, or too pessimistic. I recall the consensus being somewhere around 2-3%.

The concerning thing about this report is that it is quite possible that the IEA will come out underestimating by a wide margin, and in reality we could have a high teens or 20% decline in global production.

Same thing happened with Canterell..."Yep it's going in to decline...should be around 5-8%." A few months later, "Yeah...hmm. Not looking good." A few more months, "Hells bells! grab your hats...we've got a 20% decline rate at Canterell!"

[Starvid]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ayame', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('seldom_seen', 'I') remember, somewhere in the dusty archives of this forum, where talk of a global decline rate of 6-9% would be written off as alarmist, or too pessimistic. I recall the consensus being somewhere around 2-3%.

[Starvid]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('RSFB', 'T')his is getting interesting!

http://www.iea.org/

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')EA Statement on Unauthorised Press Coverage of World Energy Outlook 2008
29 October 2008
The Financial Times carried a cover page article this morning and a second article on page 4 allegedly reporting on the findings of the forthcoming WEO 2008. This article was drafted without any consultation with the IEA. It appears to be based on an early version of a draft from several months ago that was subsequently revised and updated. The numbers in the article can be misleading and should not be quoted or considered to be official IEA results. We are dismayed that such a comprehensive and important IEA report was made public without our input and verification.

The IEA will present the final and accurate results of the World Energy Outlook 2008 officially as planned at a press conference in London on 12 November. At that time, we will be happy to discuss the results and their implications for the global energy and climate in full detail.

[Starvid]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kokoda', 'S')o here is the problem ... aging oil fields need a massive influx of investment simply to slow the decline.

Unfortunately the global economic meltdown means that the money for this massive investment no longer exists. Then of course you have global warming apparantly excelerating.

Seriously ... just how screwed are we?

[JohnDenver]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('TheDude', '
')
Give it up for my posse!

[JohnDenver]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Starvid', 'T')his 9.1 % number is not the number which have been refered to a lot in other sources. Nor is it the post peak decline rate, which has often been seen as 2-3 %, or even 1 %. I further want to add that the 6.4 % number is not post peak decline. It is the decline we would get if we had no drilling of new fields! If I recall correctly, Exxon has put this number at 4-6 %, and now the IEA puts it at 6.4 %.

The IEA has not put a number on post peak decline rates, just as they haven't put out a peak year projection, for obvious reasons.

But don't mix apples and oranges!

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('JohnDenver', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Starvid', 'T')his 9.1 % number is not the number which have been refered to a lot in other sources. Nor is it the post peak decline rate, which has often been seen as 2-3 %, or even 1 %. I further want to add that the 6.4 % number is not post peak decline. It is the decline we would get if we had no drilling of new fields! If I recall correctly, Exxon has put this number at 4-6 %, and now the IEA puts it at 6.4 %.

The IEA has not put a number on post peak decline rates, just as they haven't put out a peak year projection, for obvious reasons.

But don't mix apples and oranges!

[shortonoil]

The Available Energy model includes both declining production and declining ERoEI. The sum effect will produce a drastic decline in economic activity during the last few years of the oil age. The net affect will trigger a substantial decline in oil production as the world's economies unwind.

That decline is what we are presently experiencing!

[Rubin_Flagg]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ROCKMAN', 'W')e’ll take it point by point John:

First, there’s no need to “to show a significant large area (continent etc.) encompassing thousands and thousands of fields”. As most here already know current global production rate is dominated by the mega fields. It matters not what thousands of small oil fields do or not. Given the obvious impact of just the Cantarell decline for Gulf Coast refineries it’s clear we are looking at two different realities.

Second, as far as “Cantarell is pretty much a one-of-a-kind” we are again living in two different worlds. I’ve worked on many gas injection projects (N2…CO2…NG…air). They are just as common as the decline characteristic I described of such recovery operations.

Thirdly, Ali doesn’t disagree with me at all. Your regurgitated statement only describes his opinion that water injection lengthens the life of such water drive reservoirs. Well…dah. Of course it does. That’s why we do it. But you might want to dig up some of his papers on the nature of the near-end decline rates of highly effective water injection programs such as being done at Ghawar. He supports my premise in those works.

And finally, and most importantly, look at your own graph. You clearly show two decline rates, starting in 1971 and 1985, which show a more cliffish drop. In fact, YOUR DECLINE CURVE PROJECTS a production rate 50% less than Hubert’s by the year 2020. Maybe you want to argue about what a “cliff” is and isn’t. Fine…you’re welcome to have that conversation with yourself. You can also work on the question regarding angels on pins heads. I suspect a few years ago you would be arguing that Cantarell wasn't heading for a “cliff”. Funny how cliffs work. By most definitions they’re not very predictable from trends until the trend hits the cliff. Thus they are called cliffs and not slopes.

This isn’t about who’s smarter. This isn’t about who has more impressive titles. This is about science and first hand experience. I’ve only got 33 years of petroleum geology and reserve engineering to guide my opinions as well as associations to some of the smartest folks in the oil patch.

But, hey, you got me on my spelling. Normally I use spell check (geologists are notorious bad spellers). But I was in a hurry. Also, I’m not normally so terse with folks on here but since you feel it’s appropriate to be condescending to other here I figure it’s appropriate.

[TheDude]

I never referenced the 9.1% as set in stone, read what I posted. The IEA statement gives it as an extreme, 6.4% is an advance over what has been postulated previously.

CERA's 4.5% applies to the whole world, which obviously will be a mishmash of Skrebowski's classifications. These are political and economic in nature as much as describing the geologic situation, and don't see the need to obfuscate things by using them.

Skrebowski states plainly enough:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'C')urrently, world oil depletion is running at 4-6 percent, according to ExxonMobil. Taking 5 percent of 2004 production of 82.5 million barrels per day (mn b/d) gives a depletion rate of 4.1mn b/d per year. This sounds huge but is in fact correct.

[Sys1]

JohnDenver : Jean Lahere and Campbell are wrong about decline rates. I assisted to a conference in Paris where Jean Lahere and other experts participated. Lahere spoke only about oil production. His conclusion was that a depression would eventually occured in the coming years and we would have later to shift to... nuclear energy. Sorry but even this guy seems to have no clue about Olduvai theory, Jaevon paradox, economy based on perpetual growth, in a word, the ramifications of peak oil.

This guy is intelligent in his domain, but his domain is pretty narrowed by his expertise, oil fields. It reminds me when I was 15 years old and our computer teacher explained us that we won't need more than 8MO RAM ever on a computer, with this argument : "How could we need such a memory, it would be too long to program". I'm certain that this guy know more than me about algorithms and boole alegebra, but let's face it : his prediction looks ridiculous today.

The reality is that all those oil projections are made without considering economy and politic which will be the main reason for oil rate decline.
Take a simple example : As dollar will collapse, OPEC countries will understand that they gave precious non renewable ressource and received in exchange a mountain of paper.
As an oil producer, knowing that my ecoomy is screwed anyway, I would simply stop any exportation of oil.

This is why it won't be the nice symetrical decline drawed by Hubbert. To paraphrase someone, I would conclude by :
"It's the economy, stupid!"

[wisconsin_cur]

{thread merged}

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'O')utput from the world’s oilfields is declining faster than previously thought, the first authoritative public study of the biggest fields shows.

Without extra investment to raise production, the natural annual rate of output decline is 9.1 per cent, the International Energy Agency says in its annual report, the World Energy Outlook, a draft of which has been obtained by the Financial Times.

The findings suggest the world will struggle to produce enough oil to make up for steep declines in existing fields, such as those in the North Sea, Russia and Alaska, and meet long-term de mand. The effort will become even more acute as prices fall and investment decisions are delayed.

The IEA, the oil watchdog, forecasts that China, India and other developing countries’ demand will require investments of $360bn each year until 2030.

The agency says even with investment, the annual rate of output decline is 6.4 per cent.

The decline will not necessarily be felt in the next few years because demand is slowing down, but with the expected slowdown in investment the eventual effect will be magnified, oil executives say.

“The future rate of decline in output from producing oilfields as they mature is the single most important determinant of the amount of new capacity that will need to be built globally to meet demand,” the IEA says.

The watchdog warned that the world needed to make a “significant increase in future investments just to maintain the current level of production”.

The battle to replace mature oilfields’ output could even offset the decline in demand growth, which has given the industry – already struggling to find enough supply to meet needs, especially from China – a reprieve in the past few months.

The IEA predicted in its draft report, due to be published next month, that demand would be damped, “reflecting the impact of much higher oil prices and slightly slower economic growth”.

[ROCKMAN]

I agree with you Plant. But the one booger in the bush that keeps me worried is the unpredictable. Here's a long explanation but it shows my mind set. Two reservoirs...same operator. Estimate of total recoverable reserve for each: 100 million bbls of oil. One field is water drive: the water moves upward pushing the oil towards the producing wells. The second is a pressure depletion drive. No water movement but the NG dissolved in the oil expands as the wells are produced. Similar to shaking a bottle of hot soda: expanding gas pushes the fluid out.

This is how an outside auditor (one of my past jobs) would risk the 100 million bo numbers (remember: geology isn't hard math...a number of assumptions all subject to variations generate these reserve numbers). Both fields have produced for 5 years. The water drive reservoir has maintained a fairly flat production curve…the nature of water drive reservoirs (like Ghawar). But the pressure depletion field has show a nice constant decline rate. (just as Cantarell did when it first began to produce). As the pressure drops (because there’s a limited amount of NG in the reservoir to expand and drive the oil out) one can plot the decline curve (typically a very straight line) on a log normal chart and commonly use a straight edge to project the ultimate recovery. It’s essentially the area under the curve. Avery easy and accurate projections.

Thus the auditor can assign a fairly low risk estimate to the recovery of the pressure depletion curve: 85 million bo. (company geologists and reservoir engineers always use optimistic assumptions). But with respect to the water drive reservoir the auditor might also assign 85 million bbls recoverable but with a much lower probability of being correct. In that field the wells will produce fairly flat until the water level reaches the perforations in the producing wells. In other words, if you laid a straight edge onto the production curve of the water drive reservoir it might project 1 billion bbls of recoverable oil….a physical impossibility. But when the water level reaches the perfs the decline suddenly accelerates. I’ve seen wells making 200 bopd drop 80% in 12 months once “the water hits”.

But what about Cantarell? By injecting N2 into the reservoir PEMEX keep the gas expansion machine going producing a decline curve more similar to a water drive like Ghawar. Except instead of water moving upwards the N2 forms a gas cap and actually pushes the oil downhill toward the producing wells which are perforated at the lowest possible point. But just like in the case of a water drive reservoir, when the expanding N2 gas cap reaches down to the perforations production will drop very quickly. Which is just what we’re seeing at Cantarell today. The wells are "gassing out" as opposed to "watering out" in a water drive reservoir.

And this brings us back to that booger. The KSA has done a great job of injecting water into Ghawar to maintain higher production levels. But when the water levels (yes…different water levels in different parts of the field) hit the perforations we’ll start seeing a dramatic drop in rates. The water won’t hit all the perfs at the same time but it will hit them all eventually. I’m sure the KSA has a pretty good idea when this will happen (or has already begun to happen). They have had some of the most knowledgeable (and expensive) Swiss reservoir modelers working on it for many years.

If Ghawar and the other mega fields didn’t make up such a huge chunk of oil exports it wouldn’t be so critical. I’m working with a water drive field that began producing in 1948 and will still be producing commercial oil for another 30 or 40 years. But it producing 99% water and netting only 160 bopd. Ghawar will be producing oil 100 years from now thanks to the KSA secondary recovery efforts. But it will go into that high water cut profile not too far down the road. Let’s assume Ghawar is declining at 3% today. When the water starts hitting enough of the wells that decline rate could jump to 15% -20% within a couple of years. Again, given what a large percentage Ghawar contributes to net exports that really is a frightening, but inevitable, turn of events.

If you haven’t slipped into a coma by now you understand depletion mechanics better than 99.9% of all the economists out there. Congratulations!!!

[TreeFarmer]

"It expects oil consumption in 2030 to reach 106.4m barrels a day, down from last year’s forecast of 116.3m b/d."

This is one of those odd statements you see periodically. Yes the world might want to use 106.4m barrels per day, but what is the anticipated supply? They should really state it in terms of the anticipated supply, you can't use more barrels than you have, no matter how crafty you are.

It is like saying I believe in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, the Soul Cake Duck and I believe I'll use 106.4 m barrels per day even if the world supply is only 80 m barrels per day.

TF

[lb262]

I'm doing my degree's thesis on Peak Oil and its impact on International Relations (University of Exeter), and last summer I interviewed the French geophysicist Jean-Marie Bourdaire (former Director of Long-Term Cooperation and Policy Analysis -LTO- Office at the IEA, responsible for publishing World Energy Outlook reports).

At the end of the interview, I asked him if he was rather pessimistic… he answered me extremely seriously: “I think we are at the end of mankind; the only ones who will survive will be extremely educated and extremely mobile people”

If we look at the facts and current developments, I would take his words seriously… link