WHAT'S REALLY UP WITH PEAK OIL? (Posted 2006-07-09 15:23:23 by Ray Lopez) What's up with Peak Oil? "Peak oil" is a topic that is slowly starting to make it's way into the common consciousness of the American public. Briefly, peak oil is all about the idea that the world is quickly depleting it's most easily accesible supplies of crude oil. The term "peak" comes from the fact that the supply of easily accessible crude oil (whether from a single oil field or the supply of the entire earth) may be graphed as a bell curve. Much oil is supplied as the peak of the curve is approached, and less and less oil is supplied post-peak. There is no doubt that crude oil is a finite resource. And there is no question that at some point in time we will run out of oil. The big questions are 1) When is all of this going to happen, and 2) What exactly with the depletion of oil resources look like? With regard to the first question, there are generally two large schools of thought. The first tells us that peak oil has already happened. We're already hit the peak of the bell curve and are starting to see the depletion of several key oil sites (e.g., the North Sea). If we had the truth from the Saudis, we'd know that they are also running out of oil as well. According to these folks, all of planet earth is already post-peak, and in a matter of years we're going to see increased global competion for the few remaining resources we have left. All of this I view as the more "pessimistic" of the peak oil prophesies. On the other end of the spectrum we have the more optimistic view, which tell us that the peak oil curve is anywhere from 25 to 50 years into the future. These peak oil prophets don't deny the reality of finite oil resources. Rather, they think that the oil supply will dwindle in a slow and predictable fashion, such that we'll have time to make arrangements to run our world on other sources of energy. In summary, we have an optimistic and pessimistic view of when peak oil will occur. What about the next question, regarding what will happen? Again, we have an optimistic and a pessimistic view. From the optimistic viewpoint, the bottom line seems to be that technology and markets will come to the rescue. These people tend to believe quite strongly in the power of the free market and human ingenuity. They argue that as oil supplies dwindle, the price of oil and oil by-products will greatly increase. This increase will necessarily make other forms of energy more marketable, and thus great amounts of capital will be spent on the development and deployment of new energy sources, all in time to thwart the effects of a dwindling oil supplu. On the other side, of course, are the pessimists. Their main line of argument is that since peak oil has already started, we've already lost much precious time needed to develop new energy sources. Even if we were to start today with a "Manhattan Project"-style program aimed at developing new replacements for crude oil, we would never have everything developed and deployed in time to aid us in dealing with the effects of peak oil Furthermore, we have the added complication regarding the incredible versatility of crude oil. It is used not only as a primary energy source, but also used to create an extremely wide variety of things, from plastics to agricultural chemicals. The most dire pessimists warn us that the "carrying capacity" (i.e., the number of people that can be sustained) of the planet earth has been artificially inflated by the use of oil to power modern economies and feed untold billions of people. When oil goes away, we will experience a massive "die off," the likes of which have never been seen in human history. To summarize, we again have two contrasting views of what will happen to us when peak oil hits. On the one side we'll be resued by free markets and technology. On the other side, we're too late to do anything about the problem. We have run out of time and resources needed to avert a catastrophe of biblical proportions. Of course the big question is, "Who's right?" If you go searching for information on peak oil, you come away with a mishmash of viewpoints, from the pessimistic views of people like Jim Kunstler (who is an excellent writer) and Matt Savinar, to the propaganda spread about by the oil multinationals. Over the last year or so I've spent a considerable amount of time studying all of these sources and have come to the conclusion that is similar to one that we see again and again everytime we're dealing with an extremely complex topic: The truth is likely somewhere in the middle. Thus, with regard to the idea of when peak oil is likely to occur, my best guess is that we are something like 10 to 15 years away from the world-wide oil peak. This means that around the year 2018, give or take a few years, we'll hit peak oil, and almost immediately will begin to see the effects of hitting that bleak milestone. I believe further that the effects of peak oil will be somewhere in the middle of the optimistic and pessimistic viewpoints. This middle ground will likely resemble a worldwide economic depression, with greatly reduced economic production, massive unemployment, food shortages, perhaps even large numbers of deaths in third world countries. I also think it possible that we'll see some wars break out, with the US and other global powers fighting for remaining resources. The real wild card in this scenario isn't really the what and when of peak oil. In my opinion the real wild card has to do with global warming and it's effects. Will global warming alter the climate so much that we'll face severe droughts and water shortages? If so, then we'll have the concurrent catastrophes of peak oil, no water, and no food. While there seem to be clearly optimistic versus pessimistic viewpoints in the world of peak oil, there are no such clear-cut views with regard to the ultimate effects of global warming. In sum, the end of the oil age will likely bring about an economic depression and hardship for the world's poor. It will mean the end of much of the American lifestyle. But I don't think it will mean a massive die-off of the world's population, and do belive that the economic depression will force the world to alter it's lifestyle and force both governments and free markets to come up with viable alternatives to the use of crude oil. This is all likely to happen about 15 years from now. The only question mark in all of this, and the thing we should be equally worried about, is global warming. By itself, peak oil would probably be a difficult but manageable problem. But if global warming ultimately causes a global reduction in the supply of fresh water and food, we're in for a rough ride, perhaps an apocalypse of unprecendented proportions. -------- There are no comments on this post. To submit a comment on this post, email rl@well.com or visit us on the web [ http://ratthing.com ]. .