[ohanian]

All,

Here is my bold prediction on the date of peak oil.

April - May 2005

Here is how I arrived at that date.

* Estimate of slack is 1%
* Estimate of depletion rate is 4400 barrel per day per day
* Daily extraction rate is 82 million barrel per day

82*10^6 barrels per day * 0.01 = 820,000 barrels per day (SLACK)

This will be completely depleted at

820,000 / 4400 = 186 days
= 6.2 months

Today is 18th October 2004 THUS in 6 months time it would be
April - May 2005 where SLACK is zero.

[Rembrandt]

I don't really get what you are saying.

what do you mean by slack?

You are calculating the peak as far as i get it by an estimate of when an amount of barrels have been extracted then the peak will hit.

Depletion of 4400 barrels per day until peak that is?

besides that the 82 million barrel figure isn't static although in such a "short" timespan it can be used in that way.

I hope you can clarify these things for me.

[Guest]

ohanian

Carry in living in fantasyland.. meanwhile I'll keep burning oil. Then in 20 yrs time I'll come and drive my SUV over to your hideaway in the hills and remind you of these calculation...

JD

[ohanian]

Question: What is slack?

Answer:

slack (adjective)

1. Not pulled tight

2. Not busy

3. Not working hard

In this case, slack is another word for spare capacity.

[clv101]

Ohanian, your 'model' does not take into account the currently declining production from some major regions, nor does it take into account the increasing production from some other regions. Without these two rates your analysis is worthless. I also don't know where you get your 1% slack figure from – there is no reason for any producer to be sitting on any spare capacity right now.

[tmazanec1]

Well, he might be better than Gary North's "July 2, 2006" (although to be fair it was really "halfwat through 2006") or that guy who said Thanksgiving Day 2005.

[slick50]

Ohanian, I agree with your assesment, and so does T.Boone Pickens and Deffeyes. That fellow who still thinks he will be driving an SUV in 20 years has another thing coming.

[Soft_Landing]

Although some find enjoyment in locating an exact date, may I suggest that it's not really that important? We probably wont recognise a peak until several years after it occurs, if history is any judge. Further, there will likely be plenty of 'proximate causes' along the peak plateau that have more to do with the actual date of peak than any comparitive rate extrapolation or anything like that.

May I suggest that a more proactive exercise might be to learn about the issues and challenges set to arise, and that it might be prudent to leave the forecasting to the experts?

http://www.peakoil.net/iwood2003/paper/CampbellPaper.doc

http://www.csis.org/energy/040908_presentation.pdf

http://globalpublicmedia.com

[ohanian]

Actually there are two dates.


1) Date which extraction capability has peak. IE: unable to extract greater "barrels per day" even if the extractors wanted to.

2) Date which demand of oil has exceeded the supply of oil. IE. perhaps demand in that period grew faster than the increase of extraction rate.

On a practical level (2) is more worrying because the price of oil will rise.

[skateari]

April 16th, 2005 is the date of peak.

I used all the information ever know to produce this figure. yall better get preparing because you have 189 days and counting...

[Rembrandt]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ohanian', 'A')ctually there are two dates.


1) Date which extraction capability has peak. IE: unable to extract greater "barrels per day" even if the extractors wanted to.

2) Date which demand of oil has exceeded the supply of oil. IE. perhaps demand in that period grew faster than the increase of extraction rate.

On a practical level (2) is more worrying because the price of oil will rise.

[ohanian]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Rembrandt', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ohanian', 'A')ctually there are two dates.


1) Date which extraction capability has peak. IE: unable to extract greater "barrels per day" even if the extractors wanted to.

2) Date which demand of oil has exceeded the supply of oil. IE. perhaps demand in that period grew faster than the increase of extraction rate.

On a practical level (2) is more worrying because the price of oil will rise.

[Zeltum]

Oil may peak in about 50 years, but it won't matter. It won't be the primary resource then. Just like coal isn't now. And I know you crazies on here will all say "there is no alternative to oil etc" but my grandfather keeps telling me how eveyone said that about coal in his day.

Yes society will change, industry, agriculture etc will change. But all that (and more) has changed since his day. Lets face it life is change - and for some people that's scary - hence sites like this. There have always been doom-mongers, and always will. In fact some recently translated persian tablet talks about the end of civilization and mankind, but here we still are.

Go figure.

[FusionMaster5000]

In response to the previous post: We are indeed a plucky lot. Sure, we've painted ourselves into a corner at this time, but when push comes to shove, human innovation comes alive. I hope that we're more than a bunch of reindeer on an island...

But only time will tell!

[savethehumans]

I dunno--I think the Saudis can mask their reserves a few more months, and some new (if much smaller) sites are kicking into production next year. So they may be able to pull the wool over the sheeps'--uh, I mean, the PEOPLE'S--eyes for a teeny tad longer. Deffeyes predicts November 2005. Campbell, I believe, says the plateau will end--and start permanently falling--in 2008. Others still stick to 2010--but fewer than there were at this time last year.

Anyway, if there seems to be a slight "recovery" (i.e. sleight-of-hand?) next year, don't be surprised. I promise--I won't be surprised if the cow patties hit the fan by Valentine's Day! But time is short, regardless....

[ohanian]

Picking a peak is a fool's game.Not picking a peak is a bigger fool. So how does one goes about picking a peak when the numbers are delibrately fudge to benefit the producer countries?

There are three main possibilities:

1) Conventional oil has already peak in 1999-2000

2) Conventional oil is peaking in 2005-2006

3) Conventional oil will peak in 2010-2015

How does one pick the correct one? For one, predicting the date of the peak of a group of oil fields which have not yet peak is hard.

The solution is to look at the fields that have already peaked. Record their rate of depletion. This mean the existing non-peak oil fields must (A) pump out their existing oil extraction rate (B) in addition, increase the extraction rate to compensate for the (other) ageing fields that had already peaked.

If the non-peaked fields cannot (or is unable to) compensate for the depletion of the peaked fields then the global peak is happening (event P).

How does one know when event P is occuring? Assuming that the world demand for oil is a constant. If event P occurs then the price of OIL will go up drastically. If event P is not occuring then the price of OIL will fall by 10%-15% (from max oil price) due to random speculations in a period of 30-40 days. However you must take the seasonal adjustments into account.

All in all, this is tricky and will be obvious in hindsight.

My suggested rule of thumb is this.

If the price of oil goes up, we are moving closer to the peak.
If the price of oil goes down, we are moving away from the peak.
Use a 14 day moving average to smooth out the noise factor.

[Guest]

http://www.davesweb.cnchost.com/nwsltr52.html

[Guest]

Regarding the above link posted by another guest:

Ok, so assuming that the Russians are correct and oil is produced abiotically, I can't help but notice that there is one issue that is studiously avoided in said missive, namely what is the rate of generation?

If this process is indeed the underlying source of our known deposits of "conventional" oil, I would think it safe to assume that it has been continuously occurring for an extremely long time, at least as long as the Earth has been habitable. If that's the case, and our "conventional " sources represent the extent of what's migrated to the surface since the process commenced, then I would think that PO is still quite relevant. Even if wells do replenish, it seems highly doubtful to me that they could do so quickly enough to come anywhere near meeting the increasing demand.

Or am I missing something?

[fastbike]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Guest', 'h')ttp://www.davesweb.cnchost.com/nwsltr52.html

[ohanian]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ohanian', 'A')ll,

Here is my bold prediction on the date of peak oil.

April - May 2005

Here is how I arrived at that date.

* Estimate of slack is 1%
* Estimate of depletion rate is 4400 barrel per day per day
* Daily extraction rate is 82 million barrel per day

82*10^6 barrels per day * 0.01 = 820,000 barrels per day (SLACK)

This will be completely depleted at

820,000 / 4400 = 186 days
= 6.2 months

Today is 18th October 2004 THUS in 6 months time it would be
April - May 2005 where SLACK is zero.