The Oil Drum: Do Oil Reserves Tell Us Anything?

Maybe.

Of course, the reason to ignore proven reserves numbers is that two thirds of the global total rests with characters like these: [graph of History of claimed proved reserves for various Middle Eastern countries. No major discoveries in these countries were announced in the 1980s. Source: BP Statistical Review of World Energy.]

The only thing proven by these time series is that the sources of the data are dishonest and we won’t be certain of anything useful about the situation until long after the fact.

But is there anything useful to be extracted from the rest of the world’s data? After all, reserves data in other countries are covered by legal or professional standards which might count for something (Bubba wrote a nice summary a while back). I decided to take a look at the BP history of claimed proven reserves for various countries of interest. Enjoy.

Much more after the jump to The Oil Drum. And don’t forget to read “The Politics of Oil: The Discourse Must Change” up in the left hand corner of peakoil.com. Send it to your representatives and your friends!