Energy Tribune Speaks With Dave Pursell

Dave Pursell is a managing director and head of macro research at Tudor Pickering Holt and Company, a Houston-based energy investment and merchant-banking firm. Pursell spent eight years at S.A. Holditch and Associates (now part of Schlumberger) and did a stint for Arco Alaska, where he helped manage field engineering and operations. Pursell holds B.S. and M.S. degrees in petroleum engineering from Texas A&M University. He exchanged e-mails with Robert Bryce in early December.

ET: We recently talked on the phone about peak oil. Where do you see the peak oil crowd as having their facts wrong?


DP: I am not sure when oil production is going to peak, but since Colonel Drake discovered oil, everyone who has called the top of oil production has been wrong. The initial peak oil theory developed by M. King Hubbert, used to accurately predict the peak in U.S. Lower 48 onshore oil production, is reserve-based