Discussion on:

U.S. will not surpass Saudi Arabia's oil production by 2020

Extraction of unconventional oil and fracking for NGL consumes a lot of fresh water, which is scarce in Utah. And once the water has been contaminated, the best available technology (according to the producers) is to dump it into toxic sludge ponds. Look at what happened to Alberta from oilsands extraction -- that will not be tolerated, especially where the end result is to ship the oil or refined products overseas. The water-energy nexus is being ignored in these EIA projections, and it will be a major constraint on production.

There are already several processes that allow fracking without the use of water. This only reduces some of the hazards of fracking and it doesn't add to the limited affect that fracking will have on the overall longevity of the fossil energy paradigm. It's just one of the last desperate acts of dependent consumption of a finite declining resource. Unfortunately, we are only in the early stages of this phase and we'll see quite a bit more before we make the transition (apparently with minimum preparation) to a more sustainable energy source.

"..we'll see quite a bit more before we make the transition (apparently with minimum preparation) to a more sustainable energy source. "

I think the key to the expanded use of renewable energy has always been making it more affordable.

You cannot expect a large number of the worlds population to become destitute by forcing a switch to expensive energy sources.

Poverty is not the answer, although some people posting here seem to have the 'throw away all technology and go sustainable agrarian' mentality when it comes to energy usage.

Personally I think the installation prices of key renewable technologies, wind and solar, have been kept artificially high by people in the industry who still feel they are a niche market that can ask a premium price. Few renewable energy companies have taken the step to making their products affordable to install and operate.

If the cost of renewable energy were to come down, many ordinary people like myself, would install renewable power where applicable. In my case because grid power almost always fails in a storm. Leaving me without power, often for days.

And please do not tell me solar has become so cheap recently. I have been shopping and this alleged glut of cheap solar panels is not reaching the consumer. Prices for the systems I have looked at have dropped less than 10% in the past 3 years.

That hardly covers one year of the property tax increase I will see from an installed solar unit. So forget about how it impacts overall system ROI.

I agree with the idea that if the cost of installing solar was lower then everyone would be able to reduce their energy needs on fossile fuels. This would be a better step towards energy independance .

What's amazing to me is that we argue over the numbers of where and when we run out of all economically accessible fossil fuels. The fact is that at some point (which has to be in the near term based on current production cost increase slopes) the cost of developing and processing fossil fuels will exceed their value to society. The volumes and dating is of little consequence, unless we aren't prepared to replace them with other energy sources - before this happens.

It's amazing that the first warnings of our fossil fuel tank approaching empty happened forty years ago - the little yellow light started flashing. Fossil fuel producers being the clever people they are - used the warning as marketing ploy to raise prices far beyond actual production/availability costs - and do still. This has created an artificial elasticity in fossil energy pricing. This does two things - it makes fossil fuel producers unimaginably wealthy and it allows fossil energy producers to stave off the competition from alternative energy producers by lowering the prices of their fossil energy products when alternative energy production costs approaches the market prices of fossil energy. The supply side economist - capitalist, see this as a normal function of the market place and that everything will fall into place - as fossil energy runs out alternative energy will smoothly replace it.

Unfortunately, the supply side economist aren't energy technicians and they over simplify the complexity of fossil energy product web. Many, many components of our modern society come from fossil derivatives - plastics and countless manufacturing and processing chemicals and 95% of our food supply is dependent on fossil dependent fertilizers, food processing chemicals and harvest energy. Moving to sustainable energy source doesn't provide these fossil products either at all, or within the same economic paradigms as fossil energy has. Therein in lies the potential for underestimating the difficulty of transitioning from fossil to alternative energies in a non-disruptive fashion. By failing to address the difficulties of this transition and postponing it ever closer to the finite end of fossil energy only shrinks the technical solution windows for the transition and compounds the disruptive affects of failure to replace fossil energy and its derivative products equally with alternative energy.

The "yellow light" started blinking long before the artificial oil shocks of the 1973 Yom Kippur war. I remember reading articles in the '60s that pointed to increasing reliance on oil imports by the US. But the truth is that despite the dire outlook of the time, global oil reserves have increased significantly since then because of better technology. Back then according to the "Club of Rome" predictions of rising shortages in all commodities, by 2000 we were supposed to all be dying of famine in a hopelessly polluted world. Somehow it just never happened, which the greens today always overlook. You talk about learning from the past, but somehow the greens never do.

Fossil fuel producers don't have nearly the profit margins other industries have. It's consistently under 10%, which is puny compared to Apple and other high tech companies. They make a lot of money in absolute terms because energy is the biggest business on the planet, not because they are forcing us to pay artificially high prices. Besides, even if they did, isn't this a good thing? How often do you hear greens clamor for the government to raise prices artificially high through taxation? You seem to be arguing on the one hand that energy companies are ripping us off with artificially high prices while on the other hand saying that everybody is "failing to address the difficulties of this transition". You make claims without citing any examples that the oil companies artificially lower prices anytime alternatives threaten them. Have you been to the gas pump, in say, the last 10 years????

Look at economic history. Rising prices are the one thing that effectively causes the transition to new technologies. Mr. Neider seems to think that there is an absolute cap on what consumers will pay. But back in the '60s, nobody would *ever* have paid as much as 35 cents per gallon. That's about $2.50 today, and yet everybody today would be quite happy with that price. The truth is that our cars are much more efficient today, and people make other adjustments.

The history of commodity depletion is that we never somehow actually do fall off that cliff. Centuries ago Europe faced a shortage of wood to heat its homes, but managed to develop coal mining with increasing technological sophistication (the steam engine was originally developed to pump water out of coal mines). In the 1850s the world was running out of whale oil to light its lamps. First kerosene was developed as a substitute, and then electric lighting was invented. People who see continual disaster always lurking around the corner ignore history and are actually the ones who most easily fall prey to their emotions.

While I doubt we will actually become oil exporters as we once were (look it up, we were) I do think that combined with other sources we might become more self sufficient. And, we might still end up exporting refined gas and the like if it makes sense.

As to the keeping the consumption under some arbitrary amount I say "Ha!".

The simple truth is people are going to continue to use what they enjoy. While those at the top would be quite content to reduce what the rest of the world uses, they are not about to give up "their" limos, private planes, over sized homes, and other toys.
And since the "little people" like to ape "their betters" I can't see them easily giving them up either. Many of the wealthy have their wealth based on such consumption, so they have a vested interest in continuing along that path.

Over time, if prices rise, more people will switch to more efficient vehicles, public transportation, etc. provided it actually makes sense for them to do so. More people
would use public transportation if it got them where they needed to go in a timely/safe fashion.

Really, the world we live in has too many competing interests to really know what tomorrow will bring. We can make educated guesses, but our models had better be able to be adjusted. In other words, the theory that we will become a net exporter is NOT impossible, I just would not count on it.

I was told we were in a critical energy crisis in 1974. I was told in 1980 that gasoline would cost $10 per gallon within 5 years. In 1985 it was 67 cents per gallon. We were not lied to, the truth is the future is unwritten.
One thing I can say is that we have the brains to prevent us from poisoning ourselves and running out of space. The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.
I hear a lot of good ideas but see no political will. One thing I know for certain, that is our reduced carbon resources are limited both in supply and utilization. The time for sustainability is now.
It does not really matter, in the long run, who produces the most oil in 2020. What does matter is Human Nature and its need to kill each other over scarce essential resources. This is what really needs to be changed. Our greedy nature must change or we will commit collective suicide.

It will be a great day for the planet and all who inhabit it, when the dinosaurs that push and make outrageous profits from Coal, Oil and Nuclear become extinct. I consider the cost of the military, the Coastguard overseeing cleanups, the groups that study areas after spills, the environmental damage and the costs to fisherman and others as hidden subsidies. These costs should all be in the price at pump so the true cost is seen. If we drill at home, these costs are still there. There was a time when people hunted whales for their oil. Like it or not times change. Time and money would be better spent switching to renewable energies. This is a jobs program waiting to happen. Even if you do not believe in global warming, doesn't it make sense to use items that will not pollute the oceans, rivers, lakes, land and air? We know our ways of producing energy with fossil fuels and nuclear have negative impacts on water, air, land, fish and wild life. We didnt realize this when we started but now that we know it would be irresponsible to keep doing things that we know have a negative impact. I understand we cannot change overnight but we should be replacing old facilities with renewable sources be it solar, wind, geothermal or some other undiscovered source that will come along. We are a very creative species we just have to decide to do it.

here in america, the oil companies are the government.

If Nelder is right and everyone else wrong, then oil is dramatically underpriced right now.

Well nelder put his money where his mouth is, in the oil futures market? I doubt it.

Will he even make a public bet (proceeds going to charity) with me? Or anyone else? I doubt it.

Once this prediction is proved false, Nelder will have moved on to some new bit of nonsense.

But maybe he'll prove me wrong. Public bet Chris? How about it?

Only Steve Jobs had greater arrogance than Chris Nelder does and he died while hallucinating about Samsung stealing Cell Technology Samsung had developed years before helping Apple make their 1st cell phone.

This won't be the first time Chris gets has gotten his nose rubbed in another "Missed Prediction" on the future of Oil as compared to IEA. So don't expect him to take you up on that bet any time soon. But... you can bet that he will indeed have dug up something new to be Hyperbolic and Negative about by then! ;-P

Is the IEA based where smoking marijuana is legal?

...that marijuana causes cognitive difficulty is silly and wrong, as is the supposition that now legal somewhere, *everybody* will start....so, if crystal meth was suddenly legal in your state, you think YOU would start up with it?! Lay off the flouride and aluminum, jon6er, and try to stay on topic. Thank you.

The development of cheaper onsite electricity generators has been largely neglected as governments have focussed on the requirements of the existing energy suppliers. Electrochemical energy conversion is twice as efficient as the combustion process, but cheaper alkaline fuel cells have received little backing. There may also be potential for small wind energy collectors, which operate in variable wind conditions, to provide cheaper onsite electricity. Highly efficient drive trains developed by the electric vehicle industry have received no backing. Proper evaluation and demonstration is needed of a variety of small scale energy technologies developed by innovative engineerng companies.

Great job summarizing current EIA estimates. You guys at Smart Planet sure do a good job.

As the price of raw material rising, plastic recycling is more and more important, how to reduce the plastic recycling cost is also a important part, for this purpose, Harden Industries Ltd manufacture series environmental protection machine, maybe is a good choice for plastic recycling business.

Although Nelder takes his usual self-righteous tone, calling everyone else a hype artist, his discussion does raise valuable concerns about IEA's new projection. Back when Peak Oil advocates were arguing more consistently over crude oil production, I performed an expert elicitation using techniques developed for the nuclear waste disposal program in the U. S. I concluded that the uncertainties were such that the Peak of global oil production would most likely occur after 2005 (when I did the analysis) and before 2060. My best estimate at the time was 2018, which is in reasonable accord with Mr. Nelder's 2015, given the very large uncertainties that actually exist. At about the same time, I applied the famous Hubbert curve to U. S. crude production as if I were making a prediction each year since 1879. When the curve gave a real answer (sometimes it did not), the prediction was consistently that the peak was past or would happen in less than ten years. Even after the peak, the peak year continues to slide outward in time as a consequence of the asymmetry of the production history. No other predictive model that I am aware of has been subjected to such an analysis. I would suggest that most predictions of the future I have read do not even consider whether their prediction is uncertain, and the actual future is likely to lie within the range of the hotly defended prognostications of the pundits. Humans are addicted to energy, and they will get the cheapest street fix they can. They will also argue that their preferred energy source is the ultimate answer. Advocates of crash programs to convert to renewables should beware that many crash programs do just that - crash. There is an Arab proverb that goes something like, "If you think the problem will be solved in your lifetime, you have not taken on a big enough challenge." The energy transition we are in does not suffer this flaw. I personally have seen enough progress in the past 40 years that, despite the messy complications of capitalism and global and national politics, I have some faith that we will make that transition without the dire consequences of the Club of Rome predictions, but not without some hardship. We certainly will not arrive there without there being more pious and ardent proclamations from pundits like Mr. Nelder.

Chris, did you really write this entire gigantic article? Wow!!
You did miss the point lost to most freedom loving people - the Wahabis (saudi religious dictators) have an agenda to spread their ferocious form of Islam throughout the entire world. The money we send them each and every minute (we say, "Fill'er up!) is converted to mosque building, school building, budgetary support for militant (jihadist) groups here, in Europe, and everywhere. It's a bit like that idea - every system contains the tools of its destruction, it's called dialectical materialism.
Similar to the idea that the oh so properous fossil fuel "industry" will kill off all life before Nuclear Winter.

How does Venezuela fit in this Wahabi model of yours?

My little piece was a comment on the main article.

I guess there are still those in this World, who can only see the Future of Oil in our Glass as only ever being HALF FULL!!! ....Chris Nelder is one of those. Of course his writing career depends on no glass ever being full in this World! ;-P

The industry is at a point now, where it's finally saying, "hey.... those rocks in our own backyard have a ton of energy hidden in them if we just took a better look at getting it out". Canada seems to be the only country on earth to have realized that years before we did. While we waste time looking for every reason not to develop our own resources and instead dwell on spending more money on foreign oil first and making them richer.

Our Future Lies in Deep Waters in Natural Gas!!!
His point on Natural Gas reserves and it's not producing as much energy as oil, is just as ludicrous and pessimistic. There again we're running in last place to foreign oil companies spending more money on developing the means to extract, compress and store it more economically. Samsung right now (built largest Offshore Oil Platforms) is in a 1st ever venture in co-operation with Royal Dutch Shell. They will be forming the hull of a vessel 6 Times the weight class of a Nimitz Class Carrier to compress and store offshore Natural Gas.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-09-19/shell-leads-lng-competitors-out-to-sea-with-biggest-ship-energy.html

They are designing and building this first Compressed Natural Gas Storage Facility on the planet, at a cost of $55 Billion Dollars (there's profit in it's future or they wouldn't be doing it). That'll be capable of producing and storing a massive amount of LNG for the Japanese market. Where cleaner burning natural gas is used more widely than any place in the World for years now! ......and yet this author attempts to minimize the impact of the future of Natural Gas in itself, as less valuable than Crude Oil and foreign at that. But pulled from the bottom of the ocean, it's just as valuable as the oil Samsung is again about to be pulling up out of the deep oceans, in conjunction with some Smarter Foreign Countries and Oil Companies!

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-11-01/shell-profit-rises-2-dot-3-percent-on-income-from-liquefied-natural-gas

Royal Dutch Shell's profits are up, despite the fact that this will be the first year they'll be pumping more Natural Gas, than Crude Oil for this year!!! ......so therefore I think your "Glass is only Half Full" pessimistic scenario is really more half full of hyperbolic FUD and misinformation than truth. This DumbPlanet forecast, rather than looking at the whole Brighter Picture that's possible, is a rather narrow look at it. If we'd (like Royal Dutch Shell) took the time to look around our own deep water back yard and pessimistic view of Natural Gas hidden resources laying just out of our ignorant reach. All because of People like you... always looking for the negatives to write about. Always ever seeing our glass as being only half full, instead of searching for ways to fill it up instead! ......excluding LNG is yours and our country's biggest mistake!

I have been reading Nelder's columns for a while. They all boil down to this:
1. Conventional crude resources are playing out(agreed).
2. We must transition to something else or we are in big trouble(sort of agreed).
3. And then he's off to the races with smart grids, and wind and solar, blah, blah, blah.

My gripe with Nelder starts with item 2. He acts as if we haven't started to transition away. But we are transitioning away from conventional crude to other hydrocarbons. But he doesn't like that and insists that non-traditional hydrocarbons just don't count. And new cost-effective production and refining techniques don't count either. Nothing counts if it's a hydrocarbon. The only thing that counts as a transition is his preferred wind-solar-smartgrid mode.