Peak oil - July 28
by Staff
Click on the headline (link) for the full text. Many more articles are available through the Energy Bulletin homepage
This and many other episodes of Peak Moment Television can be found here.
Responding to the Challenge of Peak Oil by Richard Heinberg Peak Oil and Alternative Energy by Jack Santa-Barbara Scouring Scum and Tar from the Bottom of the Pit by Petr Cizek
The New Statesman is one of two main political magazines in the UK. I suspect that its publication of a series of articles on the scarcity of oil may make discussion of the subject in the UK easier, and more acceptable: Note: the New Statesman website allows free access to only one article per day. The New Statesmen is a left-of-centre political magazine published in the UK, with a wide readership amongst the politically motivated. Two weeks ago it ran a front-cover story with the title 'Oil - A lethal addiction', covering oil scarcity issues. Peak oil and oil depletion are not mentioned explicitly. The main article Oil: We're addicted largely compares and contrasts the current oil crisis with that of 1973/4: "Soaring prices for crude oil, falling production surpluses, wild speculation in commodities, a rush into the precious metals, turmoil in the Middle East, assertive oil producers: it is 1973-74 all over again, and at dictation speed. From a low of $16 a barrel in the winter of 2001, the price of crude oil has risen to $75 a barrel. That is a fourfold rise, which mirrors the quadrupling of prices in 1973-74... The supply of crude oil has become stretched." The second article asks When will the oil run out?, a good question with a very good answer: "It won't. Certainly not in the sense that humans will ever empty the last oil well of the last drop. Yes, the supply must be finite, and yes, we are using it at an alarming rate, but long, long before we get to that last well the stuff will have become so expensive that all but a tiny minority of us will be living without it. That process may have begun, as the huge jump in demand, particularly from China, combined with the Iraq war and other political uncertainties, have driven prices up sharply... So the higher the price, the more oil will turn up. But that doesn't mean we are off the hook, because higher prices will mean hard choices. First, this oil may be too precious to use for film DVDs and Evian bottles. Then it will be non-essential travel such as school runs and holidays. Then mobile phones and computers will jump in price. Poor countries and poor people will struggle to pay for oil and oil products. The world will begin to change." The third article Stuff of dreams suggests that while the dismantling of Yukos and jailing of Khodorkovsky has 'shocked many in the business world outside Russia', Russians in general are happy with the prosperity that oil and gas production has brought: "High oil prices have given Russia renewed power, frightening the west but bringing hope to ordinary Russians."
Take, for instance, the impending global Oil Peak, which many respected petroleum geologists believe will occur between 2006 and 2012. One searches in vain for any reference to a phenomenon that promises to subject the nations of the world to a profoundly wrenching and traumatic transition as supplies of gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel become less available and more expensive. How should Wisconsin, which is bereft of any fossil fuel reserves and therefore must import all its coal, oil and natural gas, go about preparing for an energy-constrained future? It’s a question worthy of public discussion and debate, but one the PSC, notwithstanding the first word in its name, lacks the stomach for, or so it would appear. Coal prices provide one obvious clue as to how the oil peak might affect utility operations. Right now, transportation costs account for about half the price of coal that is delivered to Wisconsin power plants. Therefore, when diesel fuel prices increase, as they have over the last 12 months, so too will the cost of coal generation. Yet the report omits any discussion of likely coal price behavior over the next six years. How is the public served by ignoring the relationship between escalating fuel costs and the delivered cost of coal for power generation? Natural gas prices will also have a bearing on the economics of coal, the principal source of electricity in Wisconsin. Escalating natural gas prices provides coal producers with more headroom in bidding up their prices, a strategic opportunity they seldom fail to capitalize on. |
news by category
- Resources
- Regions
- Related Issues
featured content
- Authors
- Dan Allen
- Cecile Andrews
- Sharon Astyk
- Megan Quinn Bachman
- Albert Bates
- Ugo Bardi
- Dan Bednarz
- Rebecca Burgess
- Sarah Byrnes
- Molly Scott Cato
- Kurt Cobb
- Dave Cohen
- Erik Curren
- Lindsay Curren
- Andrew Curry
- Herman Daly
- Kris De Decker
- Rob Dietz
- Charlotte Du Cann
- Rahul Goswami
- John Michael Greer
- Nate Hagens
- Richard Heinberg
- Øyvind Holmstad
- Rob Hopkins
- Robert Jensen
- Brian Kaller
- Frank Kaminski
- Paul Kingsnorth
- Amanda Kovattana
- Ellen LaConte
- Gene Logsdon
- Kathy McMahon
- Asher Miller
- Bill McKibben
- Rick Munroe
- Tom Murphy
- Andrew Nikiforuk
- Dmitry Orlov
- Christine Patton
- Damien Perrotin
- Dave Pollard
- Joanne Poyourow
- Barath Raghavan
- Wayne Roberts
- Stuart Staniford
- John Thackara
- Gail Tverberg
- Tom Whipple
- More authors...
- Publishers
- ASPO-USA
- Civil Eats
- Climate Progress
- Culture Change
- Energy Bulletin
- Fernand Braudel Center
- Feasta
- Nourishing the Planet
- Oil Depletion Analysis Centre
- On the Commons
- OpenDemocracy
- OpenEconomy
- Post Carbon Institute
- Shareable
- Solutions
- The Daly News
- The Oil Drum
- Shareable
- TomDispatch.com
- Transition Milwaukee
- Transition Voice
- Yale Environment 360
- Yes! Magazine
- Media Publishers
- Reviews
- Web chats
The Post Carbon Reader
A must-read collection by some of the world’s most provocative thinkers on the key issues shaping our new century. Buy now and receive a 20% discount.







