I doubt this irrational exuberance over unconventional oil in N. America will last more than a decade. The US still imports 50% of its oil, the net energy is declining (e.g. boiling up tubs of bitumen), u.o. seems to need an $80 floor price and fracked wells decline after two years, not two decades. True people are driving less and cars are getting smaller but any finite resource must dwindle.

As to the US exporting coal that hardly helps the mitigation effort. It shows Europe and China aren't that serious about cutting back. Cheap natural gas may not last long. The Canadians need it to melt tar sands and the US finds gas powered stations easier to build and run than nukes. However if the US gets into LNG export the domestic gas price could double or triple. By the second half of the century we will need nukes to make synthetic fuel to keep planes in the air. Unconventional oil provides only a brief respite.

Like most of these articles, the interview is long on generalities, but then its difficult to say anything specific about the oil market which won't be contradicted by events tomorrow..

That said, it looks as if the OPEC states will keep the oil price about where it is - very high - with those high prices to stimulate major increases in production from the Canadian oil sand fields, and the big offshore fields now being discovered where the oil is more difficult to extract, as well as fracking..

Forecasting anything beyond about five years in the energy industry, however, is a waste of time.

Hi James,

It’s disappointing that you had no summary or opinion of your own to wrap up your interview.

The energy world in already standing on its head and Michael Levi makes many valid points but seems extraordinarily timid about outcomes. Even if some industry predictions available are questionable or in need a margin of error, the overall mix of the worlds economic/energy parameters are now reset.

The USA has announced it has enough shale oil and gas reserves to meet domestic demand for 600 years, the UK passed shale production legislation this week, the USA is on target to out-produce Saudi Arabia in oil production by 2017, Canada has commenced Shale oil/gas production, Japan has tied it’s gas price to the USA at 30% less than conventional gas supplies, Germany’s new build program is for 22 coal fired power stations (Lignite at 26%, god bless ‘em) and the UK’s similar program is for 30 gas power stations by 2030, with nine in production by 2019. Wow?

So now we know why the UK Greens have this week supported nuclear power generation, which is a bit catastrophic for their credibility after they spent the last 20 years destroying it. Thrashing anyone?

As they say in the ancient Chinese Curse, may you live in interesting times? Sadly for the warmertariat, it seems they never saw any of this coming. Perhaps a case of none so blind……..?

I suppose we can now relegate “peak oil” to the trash can along with, dead polar bears, rising sea levels, polar ice depletion, lost Himalayan glaciers and CO2 is a pollutant. On the other hand we might see a fresh round of “forecasts”.

I am sure everyone here wishes 'Peak Oil' dead, how about reviewing this link and the assoicated links within to gain a real sense of reality on our energy future

http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2012-12-09/the-one-chart-about-oil-s-future-everyone-should-see

Cheers

Geoff

Geoff of Perth
for heaven sake go back to the chart you link in that story and take another look at it. You will see the way that it has all sources of oil declining after 2012 - not just one or a couple, but all. Teh assumption that unconventional oil would decline, in particular, is utterly absurd. After making that arbitrary assumption back in 2009, before the present boom, your analyst was then able to say we'd need huge new sources of oil.

Whoever put the chart together in 2009 would not dare do so now because the exact opposite is proving to be the case, yet some fool decided to write about in 2012. They probably used that chart, now that I think about it, because nothing else more recent suited the point they wanted to make.

Its always a good idea not to link outdated propaganda.

Curmudgeon, let me guess. You went to the link. Looked at the chart and had an emotional response that the author of the chart is a whacko because it does support your cornucopian world view then responded to Geoff of Perth.

I suggest that you go back and actually read the article so that you understand what the chart is saying. It is not saying that all sources of oil will be declining.

The chart simply says, based on the observed average decline rates from oil fields currently in production (the figure of 4% or thereabouts is generally accepted by organisations such as CERA and the IEA) that in 2030 oil production from existing producing fields will fall from current levels (approx 85mb/d) to 43 mb/d.

To meet projected demand requires an additional 62mb/d worth of new projects to come online (This is why the IEA keeps banging on about needing to find a couple of new Saudi Arabia's worth of oil over the next few decades). The point of the chart is that this oil will have to come from unidentified projects, not that any one type or all types of oil will be in decline. The key questions are of course whether these unidentified projects will come on line, in what timeframe and what oil price is required to make them viable.

As far as propaganda goes, the chart author is from the US Government's Energy Information Administration, hardly an organisation that is of the 'peak oil is a real concern' camp.