Peak Oil Point of View

I disagree with most of your post, but I will make one factual observation (before going to bed).

500 million barrels is not a blip on Peak Oil.

The world uses a tad more than 85 million barrels of oil per day, just about a thousand barrels of oil per second (wrap your mind around that).

500/85 = 5.88 days, less than a week of oil for the world.

The USA uses just less than 21 million barrels of oil per day.

500/21 = 23.89 days, way short of a month for just the USA.

The reason that natural gas is reinjected into Prudhoe Bay oil field is to maintain pressure and keep SOME oil coming out (Prudhoe is down to just 200,000 barrels/day, 1% of US demand, and shrinking fast). When they build a gas pipeline to Prudhoe Bay, they will "blow off the gas cap" and any oil left will be stranded. Exactly what is happening today in the Brent oil field in the North Sea (I forgot to mention that the UK no longer exports oil and they will be importing oil soon).

Sadly, reality is tough,

Alan

 

The last oil company to be experimenting with extracting oil shales is Shell. The last method that has a chance of success (I think a low chance) is freezing a wall around the site (to keep the oil contained) and heating the center long enough (at least 4 years) to turn the kerogen into light oil. (something nature never did, the heat added completes the process). And then drain out the oil that cooking has formed.

The Hirsch Report (you can download and read yourself) was a report commissioned by the Dept.of Energy on what the USA could do about Peak Oil.

www.netl.doe.gov/publications/others/pdf/Oil_Peaking_NETL.pdf

says that first oil shale in a bit over a decade and significant production in 20 years. I think Hirsch is unrealistically optimistic. And this is a "cost no object", war-time footing makes $10/gallon look *WAY* too low.

The Shell process takes about as much energy to heat and freeze as the oil extracted produces. You have to burn part of the oil extracted to dig out the coal needed for the power plants for cooking & freezing, so oil shale consumes oil for a decade until the first oil shale flows, and a good percentage of the oil shale produced goes back into coal mining.

So oil shale is over a decade away, past 2018 in any quantity, and Peak Oil no later than 2012.

I have not heard of a "massive Russian oil find at 43,000' " and I follow this pretty close. Do you have a link ? (Actually organic matter, such as pond scum and swamps, are the raw source of crude oil).

Best Hopes for a Tough Future,

Alan

 

I have worked in Iceland (on a hydroelectric project) and visited 3 times with "Dr. Hydrogen", Dr. Bragi Arnason of the University of Iceland (Google him). I have seen the hydrogen filling station for the 3 experimental hydrogen buses in Reykjavik and talked with Straeto, the bus company operating them.

Straeto does NOT like the hydrogen fuel cell buses. The fuel cells need to be rebuilt every 10,000 km or so.

Iceland has very cheap electricity and even there hydrogen costs more than diesel.

Yes, you can make hydrogen easily, but NOT cheaply. $4 diesel looks VERY cheap in comparison. And rebuilding your fuel cell every 6,000 miles will not work well. Refill your hydrogen tank every couple of hundred miles.

Best Hopes for Tough Times Ahead,

Alan

 

Russia is the world's largest oil producer today, Saudi Arabia #2 and the USA #3. We just burn *WAY* too much.

Russia has all sorts of oil (mainly on-shore) at all sorts of depths.

The trend is that the deeper one goes, the hotter it gets. At high enough temperatures, for long enough, oil cooks out into asphalt and natural gas. NG can be found very deep, oil less so.

Unfortunately, Russian oil production looks like it will drop this year, after a decade of annual growth.

I was confused by the two types of "oil shale". The massive reserves are in kerogen (pre-oil that has not been cooked long enough) shale (but called oil shale). That is what Shell is working on.

There are large amounts (but not gigantic amounts) of real oil in shale and new procedures are getting a trickle out. Cracking the shale rock, insert sand to keep cracks open and let it trickle out. Best guess is that new processes will get out 1% of the oil in place. Production/well is low but such wells can trickle for along time (as I understand the Bakken and other plays). Send out a truck every few weeks and get a load of crude.

Shale is very "tight" rock and oil does not flow easily. Limestone and sandstone are MUCH better, but we are scrapping the bottom of the barrel.

One of my friends is a West Texas geologist who is completing a 1,000 barrel/day oil field (he will be a richer man) and searches for oil fields left over, but he is more pessimistic than I am about future US oil production.

*IF* you have the time, check out the articles and debate at http://www.theoildrum.com LONG learning curve and sharp debate. Scan old articles first would be my suggestion. The Oil Drum is the tech center of the Peak Oil movement. Many oil professionals and professors there.

Best Hopes for the Tough Future Ahead,

Alan

 

[/quote]And Alan, please tell me how BNSF is going to get my strawberries from Fla. to Cali. before they turn into goo? [/quote]

Bush's DoT asked for projects to reduce inter-city congestion for funding. He got 19 proposals for added lanes to interstates or new interstate highways plus one from CSX.

Grade separate their 1,200 miles from DC to Miami, two tracks for regular freight at 60 to 70 mph. And one track (two from Richmond to DC) for passengers and express freight at 100 to 100 mph.

www.railsolution.org/articles/Articles_Top_level/CSX_Corridors_of_the_Future.pdf

has problems Try http://secorridor.fra.dot.gov/docs/csx/CSX_CFP.pdf for shorter summary.

Electrification allows for reefer rail cars. Change in DC to Amtrak's Northeast Corridor and strawberries can make it from Florida to Boston in very good time and good shape. Transfer to trucks for cities off the electrified line.

Build, say, 7,000 miles of semi-High Speed rail and electrify and expand capacity on another 33,000 miles (operating speeds 50 to 79 mph). Canadian National is the only RR that runs scheduled trains routinely (short or long, they go). Much more of that type operation will be needed.

It will takes decades for a complete changeover, but results can happen in a few years.

Best Hopes,

Alan