Will We Ever Run Out of Oil?

16 Comments on "Will We Ever Run Out of Oil?"

rockman on Fri, 17th Jan 2014 1:09 pm 



Nothing terribly wrong with the video. OTOH nothing terribly useful either IMHO. But first I’ll jump on one of my favorite pet peeves: oil used to be easier to find but it isn’t now. Oil has never been easy to find. I know firsthand…I’ve been trying to do just that for 39 years. But there’s an undeniable fact: the technology we have today makes finding WHAT OIL/NG IS LEFT easier than ever before. I’ll offer just one example: 3d seismic. In just one month I can explore the same area that 5 geophysicists would have taken 6 months to do in 1975. And the quality and accuracy of my maps would be a magnitude better. The technology has made finding and producing oil/NG much easier today than ever before. The difficulty is the lack of oil/NG that’s economic to drill based on current prices.

I think most here already understand it has never been about whether there was oil in the ground to be found. Consider just one time period: 1978 to 1983. North American oil consumption fell from 21.5 million bopd to 17.9 million bopd. And it wasn’t due to unaffordability of oil during these times: the price of oil (adjusted for inflation) fell from $72/bbl to $20/bbl by the mid 80’s. It happened because of the global recession brought on by high oil prices in the 70’s.

We will “run out of oil” when no oil physically exists in the ground. That day will never come. When will we run out of affordable oil? First, who is “we”? There are a lot of “we’s” that ran out of affordable oil decades ago. There were a lot of “we’s” that suddenly ran out of affordable oil in 2008 when the price hit $146/bbl. There are a lot of “we’s” in the world today that can’t afford the current price of oil. But it doesn’t take high oil prices alone to make oil unaffordable for many. When oil prices fell about 75% in the 80’s oil consumption didn’t increase but fell almost 20%.

There will always be oil/NG to produce as long as someone can afford to pay the price. If the day should come when no one can afford to pay that price there will still be a lot of oil/NG left in the ground. IMHO the “we are (or are not) going to run out” of oil chatter at best does nothing to educate the public about the situation and, at worst, completely distorts their view of reality.

Aaron on Fri, 17th Jan 2014 1:39 pm 



We’ve been eating our way through the $100 portion for around 6 years or so. I wonder when the next leg up in price will be?
With current fields declining by around 4 million bpd, and demand increasing around 1 million bpd that’s a fair amount of extra production needed per year. US shale might add another 800K bpd this year, and there will no doubt be some more coming online from Iraq and possibly Iran (assuming a deal is reached). So i’ll stick my neck out and say we’ll stay around $90-100 this year, but next year we will start to move up into the $130-160 portion.

Be nice to see what others think. When will we move up into the next price zone?

mo on Fri, 17th Jan 2014 1:53 pm 



Boy, talk about a video that touches on a subject. I thought sci American was noted for doing a more thouro job. Good take on the video rockman, I think the ones who will come out ahead will be the ones who can pay the price for that (last barrel) China? Their per cap consumption is much lower than ours, therefore they can out bid us in the coming oil war? Compitition? What would you call it? Seems the military is very concerned about this.

rockman on Fri, 17th Jan 2014 1:54 pm 



Aaron – You’re a brave one…I would never stick my neck out that far. LOL. Not that one can use absolute prices over time but the last time prices reached the level of your forecast it knocked the world into a recession that caused oil prices to fall almost 70%. Granted it didn’t stay that low for long but we still are selling oil for about 30% less than that peak price…which is what you’re predicting.

But I’ll be honest and admit I would never have guessed we would see record breaking oil consumption with prices bouncing around $100/bbl.

sunweb on Fri, 17th Jan 2014 2:20 pm 



Rockman – I have long appreciated your expertise and most importantly your unfailing honesty. Thank you.
I would expand the concept of the price of oil/ng from dollars and cents to the wider focus of the several hundred year consequences of easily available energy. On the one hand, it has allowed unprecedented expansion of human knowledge, medicine (allowing me – cancer and stents to be alive) and technology that allows some of us more access to power than the pharoahs and kings of yore.
On the other hand, the unintended consequences are rife with danger for our species and all others as well as your children and grandchildren – climate change, environmental destruction, overshoot, weapons of war for global annihilation, acidification of the oceans and the list can go on.
There is simply no way to put a price on these, nor any way to stop them because of our vary humanness and because of inertia.
So we keep on doing until – pick a year or decade.
This is not doomerism it is reality.

J-Gav on Fri, 17th Jan 2014 4:53 pm 



The title is silly but, despite the video being pretty useless other than for those with no inkling, he does at least touch on a couple of reality-based points.

As for Aaron sticking his neck out, I’d say ‘not at all’ on the return of the price-range he indicates but ‘probably’ when he says it’s for 2014. Or is ‘next year’ 2015?

rollin on Fri, 17th Jan 2014 5:26 pm 



We will be running out of oil for the next fifty years. Total output of conventional oil has been falling for a while now. Unconventional oils or tars that can produce fuel are still there. NGL’s can be worked up into ICE fuels if need be. But plain old crude oil is on it’s way out, that should be a warning shot across the bow. Time to start moving on.

rockman on Fri, 17th Jan 2014 8:04 pm 



I’m going to mess with the terminology a bit. Of course we’ll be running out of oil in the next 50 years. We started running out of oil the first day we sucked a bbl of it out of an oil seep. So the question remains: when will mankind “run out of oil”. Simple answer: when no one can afford to buy what oil is available to produce. Again, there will always be oil left in the ground. I can point to just one field in Texas where there is 150 million bbls of proven oil left it. And there’s zero production coming out of it today. I can go into that field today and produce 100’s of thousands of bbl of oil with existing technology. Unfortunately it would cost me more to do so then I would get selling it. So it’s there and may be there for a very long time. And as long as it is we haven’t “run out of oil”.

So now let’s go back to what they may be trying to say: when will we run out of oil that anyone can pay for. That’s a tricky one since it depends as much on the financial well-being of the purchaser as well as the price of oil. Today there are hundreds of millions of folks who can’t afford to buy oil at its current price. Doest that mean we’ve already run out of oil since there are some folks unable to buy it? I suppose not. So as long as someone can pay for what oil is available we haven’t run out. If you think back to the days of $146/bbl oil while it may have plunged the global economy into recession there were still folks paying $146/bbl for oil. No telling how long they could continue to do so. But as I said earlier I’m amassed that there are enough folks in the world that can afford $100/bbl oil that we are now producing at record levels. Seems like the idea of “running out of oil” anytime soon doesn’t make much sense. And now go the other way: much lower oil prices. When the global economy collapsed in the 80’s and prices sank to almost $10/bbl there were enough folks around who could still buy over 75 million bopd. Granted there weren’t a lot of oil reserves added at that price but OTOH the world was still able to buy all the oil it could afford at that record low price.

I think I’ve come to the conclusion that a term such as “running out of oil” really doesn’t have any practical meaning.

J-Gav on Fri, 17th Jan 2014 9:15 pm 



Yeah, Rockman, I’m kind of amazed myself that so many people can still afford the stuff -especially here in Europe where prices are double or triple what they are in the States for gasoline. People don’t do as much long-distance driving here but still … (Some in my family in the States used to do 100 miles sometimes(round-trip)just to go to a good steakhouse).

rollin on Fri, 17th Jan 2014 10:41 pm 



Rockman, I get your assertion of using price as a limiting factor for production. Is that not only one of the limiting factors? Aren’t the geology and location the real limiting factors, the ones that determine whether the price of production will be high or low?

Also, as far aa always running out of oil, was there not a period where discoveries where occurring faster than production? The oil horizon was expanding. Now new discoveries appear to lag behind production, shrinking the oil horizon.
Sure we can go back to the old fields and try and push more out (if we have lots of CO2 and money) or we can attempt to use expensive new technology to bring oil out of more difficult rock. We could also go deep into the ocean and earth to find new oil. But is that not just geology and location defining the output with price being set by those two parameters?

Norm on Sat, 18th Jan 2014 12:17 am 



We wont ever run out of oil. My pastor explained it to me after the sermon. The wells replenish themselves. So I can keep driving my motor home to church outings.

HARM on Sat, 18th Jan 2014 12:46 am 



@Norm,

Yes, all the liberal hand-wringing about so called “fossil fuels” running out is just Marxist tree-hugger propaganda. Besides. everyone know the Devil planted those fossils to trick people into believing in Darwinism, amiright? And how can dinosaur bones turn into oil anyway? Ridiculous! Jesus is magically replacing all the abiotic oil the Righteous are burning on our young earth. And even if He weren’t, the Rapture can’t be far away.

–Proud Texas “Charter School” graduate

Newfie on Sat, 18th Jan 2014 7:20 am 



Running out of oil as we simultaneously fry the planet. What a way to go…

Norm on Sat, 18th Jan 2014 8:07 am 



Mr. HARM, yes exactly. While we pump the oil out, to drive the Escalade to church to hear the sermon, Jesus pumps an equal amount into the well again, and thats why we never run out. Only the yogurt eating egghead liberal professors will run out.

clueless on Sat, 18th Jan 2014 10:55 am 



@norm. what you don’t know can’t hurt you.lol

Richard on Sat, 18th Jan 2014 11:29 pm 



Norm you are wrong.

“I think its safe to say the surface was not formed yesterday” Harrison Schmitt, Taurus Littrow, moon valley. December 11-13 1972.

Get with the science and the geology!