Mar 172008

THIS PAGE HAS BEEN ACTIVATED AS THE NEW STATESMAN BLOG IS NOW CLOSED FOR COMMENTS

At 10am this morning, the New Statesman finally closed the Mark Lynas thread on their website after 1715 comments had been added over a period of five months. I don’t know whether this constitutes any kind of a record, but gratitude is certainly due to the editor of of the New Statesman for hosting the discussion so patiently and also for publishing articles from Dr David Whitehouse and Mark Lynas that have created so much interest.

This page is now live, and anyone who would like to continue the discussion here is welcome to do so. I have copied the most recent contributions at the New Statesman as the first comment for the sake of convenience. If you want to refer back to either of the original threads, then you can find them here:

Dr David Whitehouse’s article can be found here with all 1289 comments.

Mark Lynas’ attempted refutation can be found here with 1715 comments.

Welcome to Harmless Sky, and happy blogging.

(Click the ‘comments’ link below if the input box does not appear)

 

10,000 Responses to “Continuation of the New Statesman Whitehouse/Lynas blogs.”

  1. Max, your 1013:

    Yes, while I haven’t personally written my congressman, he is fully onboard with the idea of “all the above” plan the Republicans wanted a vote on before their long August recess. I have never before been an advocate of offshore drilling along the California coast, but things change and as technology improves my attitudes must also change.

    Though the news coverage is nearly non-existent, right now the Republicans in the US House of Representatives are staging what some would call a “stunt” by continuing to work in the now-adjourned House chamber calling for more drilling. The Democrats are the majority party in the House, and therefore control it completely. So they adjourned for the summer without taking a vote on drilling, since the Democrat leadership knows more drilling has the overwhelming support of the American people. The leaders of the House don’t want their party members having to vote against the people on this issue before the November elections. They are willing to short change the people, but their their financial supporters in the green and environmental movements. Too bad for us all.

  2. It isn’t just the fossil fuels that I, or any other particular person, are using that is causing the problem of CO2 emissions being too high. It’s everyone’s.

    Pete,

    Ahhh, I see. Everyone has to conform to the green religious doctrine, not just the greens.

    It seems as if Alarmists want “everyone” except themselves to conform to THEIR beliefs, judging by watching the Lifestyles of the Rich and Hypocritical. “Do as I say, not as I do”…..is that the Alarmist creedo?

    How convenient that this “commitment” must be compulsory. Spoken like a true Totalitarian.

  3. Totalitarian:

    Centralized & Dictatorial……

    Relating to or operating a centralized government system in which a single party without opposition rules over political, economic, social, and cultural life………

    Is this what you’re advocating Pete? Seems to fit the model that you’re advocating quite well.

  4. MONDAY, AUGUST 11, 2008

    New poll shows CO2 hysteria fading in the U.S.

    A few notes:

    Only 25% (question 2) of those surveyed thought that global warming was the world’s single biggest environmental problem (multiple responses accepted). This is down from 33% last year.

    Only 30% (question 3) trust the things that scientists say about the environment “completely” or “a lot”.

    Only 33% (question 8) thought that a rise in the world’s temperatures was caused by “things people do”, down from 41% last year.

    Only 33% (question 18) thought that “most scientists” agree with one another about the causes of global warming, and only 33% thought that “most scientists” agree with one another about how much of a threat global warming poses.

  5. JZSmith,

    Well I’m sure that, most Americans would like to think that at some point the debt will be repaid but, it’s pretty big just about $9 trillion. It works out at about $30k per person in the USA. Can you imagine if the good citizens of the USA received final demand notices for that amount through their letter boxes?

    Its much easier for everyone, not just Americans, to pretend that the debt is sustainable than state that it isn’t. The alternative to the pretence is to invite a worldwide financial meltdown. Up until now everyone accepted dollars because dollars can buy oil. The debt has largely arisen because the dollar is the world’s de facto reserve currency and recycling of petrodollars is the price the US has extracted from oil-producing countries for US tolerance of the oil-exporting cartel since 1973.

    However, the introduction of the Euro is a significant new factor, and appears to be the primary threat to US economic dominance. If that does become the new reserve currency, which many countries would like, the supply of free money for the US government would end.

    It has been remarked that Saddam Hussein signed his own death warrant when he made the decision to price Iraqi oil in Euros in 2000! Nothing to do with the so-called ‘War on Terror’.

    One way out of the debt problem for the USA is to devalue it against other currencies and real assets such as Gold and Oil which you might have noticed is already happening. However this will only increase the desire of countries, with large US$ bonds holdings, like China, Iran , Venezuela, maybe even Saudi Arabia in the future, to get out of dollars and into Euros.

    So you could be right, the debt might eventually be repaid, but in a substantially devalued currency.

  6. Brute,
    I think you asked up there somewhere the rhetorical question how much of the vast area of the ocean floors have been explored for oil? (That being an extremely difficult and unwarranted technical challenge at this time)

    Well, guess what! Hydrocarbons have recently been found in Mid Atlantic, as per extract:

    A study published in Science Magazine today [February 01, 2008] presents new evidence supporting the abiotic theory for the origin of oil… …The lead scientist on the study ? Giora Proskurowski of the School of Oceanography at the University of Washington in Seattle …
    Lost City is a hypothermal field some 2,100 feet below sea level that sits along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge at the center of the Atlantic Ocean, noted for strange 90 to 200 foot white towers on the sea bottom.
    In 2003 and again in 2005, Proskurowski and his team descended in a scientific submarine to collect liquid bubbling up from Lost City sea vents. (<I suggest Google this)^
    Proskurowski found hydrocarbons containing carbon-13 isotopes that appeared to be formed from the mantle of the Earth, rather than from biological material settled on the ocean floor.

    Methinks that rather puts paid to the idea that oil originated exclusively on the continental shelves, either as dinosaurs and land plant life, OR as the more popular idea of plankton in warm shallow seas, as espoused by Pete.

    ^This word search will also take you to; extract:
    Deep sea ‘black smoker’ vents give rise to exotic biochemistry. Often featuring great depths, boiling water temperatures and high methane concentration. Often looked to for alternatives to water-oxygen life.

  7. PeterM, 1045, you wrote in part:

    I think you [Bob_FJ] are getting yourself too worked up over this. I’m just trying to give you the established scientific view on how oil was formed and which I suspect that you’ve had no problems with up until now, if you had any real interest in the subject at all.

    I don’t know if your waffle is out of forgetfulness on your part, or maybe an attempt to evade some very clearly identified questions and issues that you don’t want to admit could well be true. (and not in accord with your church)
    For instance, via the magic of word-search on ‘Velikovsky‘, you can find at post 885 that my scepticism on the standard (Western) explanation (and thus yours) for the genesis of oil started in the 70’s. That scepticism of mine has never waned over the decades, because to me the several standard “Western” explanations all seem highly implausible. Furthermore I have stated severally that I find the recent abiotic theory discussions to be very interesting. Yet, you accuse of me: if you had any real interest in the subject at all.
    Would you care to repeat that at two paces wearing chain-link gauntlets?

    You have also inferred that abiotic = idiotic.
    Are you saying that the Russian Academy of the Sciences, and some “Western” scientists are idiotic?
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    Meanwhile, just a few tips for your contemplation:
    1) Although oil has reportedly been found by Russians in bedrock, (below the proposed sedimentary biotic levels), in Russia, Viet Nam^, and I think India, the search using conventional geological technologies probably remains generally the most cost effective to date, because the dome-cap-rocking of oil reservoirs at relatively shallow depths, works equally well regardless of whether the genesis of the oil is biotic OR abiotic. American geophysicist Gold, also found uncommercial quantities of abiotic oil in a bedrock bore in Sweden.
    2) Concerning the Mid Atlantic Ridge, please note a brief Wiki extract: The Mid-Atlantic Ridge includes a deep rift valley which runs along the axis of the ridge along nearly its entire length. This rift marks the actual boundary between adjacent tectonic plates, where magma from the mantle reaches the seafloor, erupting as lava and producing new crustal material for the [diverging] plates.
    3) If you read-up on the big white structures in “The Lost City” which have vents releasing hydrocarbons, you will find that they are made of primordial carbonate rock formations

    ^ a tectonic “explanation” that this could be biotic oil, somehow below sedimentary rocks has been claimed, but ho hum

  8. Hi Brute,

    Your #1054 shows that in the USA people have not fallen for the AGW hysteria despite Al Gore, James E. Hansen and the other false prophets of doom.

    Good for them!

    In Switzerland the number is about the same. Polls showed that less than 40% believe AGW is a problem and a recent study made for the Swiss Federal Environmental Department recommends against “mitigation” actions that will reduce GDP as a poor investment, proposing instead to follow the USA plan of principally private research into new energy-saving technologies with some selected governmental research grants to support these efforts.

    I believe Robin Guenier referred to earlier polls showing the same trend in the general population of the UK (as well as in many other countries).

    It’s refreshing to see that the trend is moving away from AGW hysteria. Time is definitely not on Gore’s or Hansen’s side as people begin to see that the AGW story has been exaggerated with pseudoscientific feedback assumptions being fed into computer models to result in virtual disaster predictions, which are then trumpeted as imminent catastrophe scenarios.

    Cooling temperature is not helping AGW hysteria, either.

    Looks like people are basically not that stupid (at least most people).

    Regards,

    Max

  9. Hi JZ Smith,

    Am currently in the USA so I saw with amazement the recent congressional cop-out on offshore drilling on local news. Saw House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi give her take on this in a recent TV interview. She tried to fog up the real issue here, bringing the old story that new offshore drilling today will not ease today’s oil crisis in the USA, since new fields take on average 12 years to come on, and for this reason offshore drilling should continue to be blocked by Congress.

    Of course, this is a ridiculous argument and it is too bad for the American people, who would like to see drilling restart.

    Had the governments of Norway and the UK been as shortsighted back in the 1970s, the UK would have remained under the yoke of the coal miners’ union (Scargill et al.) and the “British malaise” of the early 1980s would have continued. Norway would never have seen itself becoming a wealthy oil exporter that is not dependent on EU membership (no, thank you) to maintain its prosperity.

    But, then again, the 1970s and 1980s were a different (and more innocent) time. Rachael Carson’s “Silent Spring” had only been published a few years earlier (in 1962). Radical environmental political activist groups with bevies of lawyers lobbying the politicians and attempting to block any move by “evil industry” to increase their revenues (and the World GDP) were unknown at the time.

    Write your congressman (or woman). Tell him/her how disappointed you are in the Democratic Party congressional cop-out on this issue, which is all the more reprehensible since it is occurring in a presidential election year, and is being done to keep the Democratic candidate from having to take a stand and show the American people where he stands on offshore drilling.

    In Switzerland the people can call for a local, cantonal or national referendum with only very few signatures. (Of course, there is no oil and gas in Switzerland, as there are no “offshore” continental shelves.) I believe you have the same possibility in California to call for a state referendum on a proposition. Could this be done for offshore drilling or could the federal government block this? Would it have a good chance of passing a popular vote there?

    Regards,

    Max

  10. Hi Max,

    Yes, here in California we have a robust referendum process, especially useful since our state legislature is so corrupt. Even more than the federal legislature, we have the best government money can buy, as they say!

    The federal government cannot block a referendum vote in California, though state law cannot conflict with federal, as federal law is the “supreme law of the land”, as is stated in our constitution.

    I am not sure how, specifically, ownership of and sale of offshore oil leases work, but I am highly confident that the federal government controls the leasing and drilling throughout the USA. It is especially tricky on offshore drilling since state territorial waters, I don’t think, extend very far out to sea. There is some legal precedent that federal courts (9th circuit) have found that states have the right to block federal offshore drilling, but I’m not certain that the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) has ruled on the merits of this case.

    In any event, today’s news says Nancy Pelosi is now willing (she’s a politician, for crying out loud!) to bring the issue to a vote, albeit packaged up with a bunch of other energy “solutions” that will likely take the sting out of voting for (or against) it.

    In the end, this will be a BIG issue for the Republicans this November, and an BIG problem for the Democrats.

  11. Brute,

    “Everyone has to conform….. not just the greens” Yes. You’ve got it now. We all have to conform to anti-pollution laws, in fact all laws in general, whether we like them or disagree with them. At least that’s the way things work here in Australia. Has it ever been any different in the USA? I suspect you’re confusing democracy with anarchism.

    If you aren’t, I suggest that you stay away from a ‘totalitarian’ country like Australia :-). Even if you disagree with our 60 kph road limits, even if you’re an American and have mistaken the signs for 60mph , the cops will book you for speeding if given half a chance.

    Bob_FJ,

    So maybe we can solve the energy crisis by drilling for oil in the Mid-Atlantic? I thought that the abiotic oil theory meant that we just have to drill a little deeper on land? And that the production of oil is unlimited? If abiotic oil exists in significant quantities, where is it? How is it that USA production has just about halved since 1970? and I hope you aren’t going to blame it all on ‘greenie groups’. Instead of having to go to Alaska or the Arctic wouldn’t it be easier and cheaper to drill a bit deeper in Texas?

    Max,

    I would like there to be more environmental interest with US voters, sure. But it seems that there is more this coming election, than there was in 2004 where it hardly got a mention at all. In fact both major candidates have positive policies on the AGW issue so to suggest that the USA is inhabited soly by right wing AGW sceptics, but somehow, maybe in a moment of madness, they’ve mistakenly elected these dreadful Democrats to represent them in Congress, is clearly not true.

    BTW. You can pick an ‘American accent’ even with the written word. Use of words such as ‘gotten’, dropping of prepositions such as in phrases like ‘write your Congressman’ are indicative of an American writer. You like to make out you are Swiss, but you are more than just an occasional visitor to the States. If you hadn’t indicated otherwise I would have said you were brought up there.

  12. Hi Peter,

    You wrote (1061), “to suggest that the USA is inhabited soly by right wing AGW sceptics, but somehow, maybe in a moment of madness, they’ve mistakenly elected these dreadful Democrats to represent them in Congress, is clearly not true”.

    I find this statement rather curious. You insinuate that “AGW skeptics” are by definition “right wing”. I see no such connection, although some pro-AGW blogsites have tried to draw this connection in silly and irrelevant articles that claim “more Republicans than Democrats question global warming”.

    Let’s not discuss the beliefs of individual US politicians. My experience is that politicians all over the world “go with the flow” on beliefs. Some may try to force their beliefs on their populations, but generally this does not work very well for very long in democratic societies.

    But if those questioning global warming as a serious threat represent 67% of the polled individuals, Peter, as Brute has shown, then this is more than just “right wing” skeptics. It covers a broad spectrum, as it does in many other countries.

    And the really good news here, Peter, is that this percentage of skeptics is growing, just as the dire predictions of the doomsayers are getting increasingly shrill and unbelievable (and people realize that it isn’t warming at all anymore).

    That’s the way “crying wolf” has always worked out, Peter. People eventually catch on to the ruse and go back to common sense.

    Regards,

    Max

    PS Yes, I learned my English in the USA.

  13. Hi Peter,

    Sorry for cutting in to your interesting exchange with Bob_FJ but your remark on oil drilling caught my eye. Since I have had an indirect involvement in this field and know a bit about it, I can see that you are under some misconceptions.

    You wrote: “If abiotic oil exists in significant quantities, where is it? How is it that USA production has just about halved since 1970? and I hope you aren’t going to blame it all on ‘greenie groups’. Instead of having to go to Alaska or the Arctic wouldn’t it be easier and cheaper to drill a bit deeper in Texas?”

    First of all, the oil companies know their stuff. They know their capabilities. They know their risks. They do everything to minimize these risks. They realize that a major spill from an offshore well or exploration/development rig would represent (in addition to the impact on the environment) a major financial disaster for them, so they do everything possible to avoid this. They know that a major mishap that causes loss of life also represents (in addition to the loss of life) a major financial disaster for them, so they do everything possible to avoid this. They know the limits of their technology, which they (together with their service companies) are constantly challenging and expanding in order to find more oil.

    Drilling “a little deeper” for (maybe) finding abiotic oil is easier said than done. Theory says abiotic oil can only be formed at conditions prevailing in the upper mantle (generally saying this is at around 100 km depth). This is not “a little deeper”. The deepest oil wells are less than 10 km deep (below the land surface). That is the current state of the art of drilling technology, Peter. To extend this depth 10-fold is maybe not out of the question some day, but currently impossible.

    Ignoring how it may have gotten to these formations for now, you have to limit yourself to the oil that is in permeable formations no deeper than 10km today. That’s it for now.

    For a good article on “peak oil” read:
    http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=41613

    It suggests that the current USGS world estimate of 3,000 billion barrels of conventional crude is probably conservative.

    It states that oil shale reserves in the USA alone represent an additional 2,000 billion barrels of recoverable oil, and that this is sufficient to provide 100 percent of U.S. crude oil consumed at current usage for over 200 years.

    Worldwide oil shale reserves are stated to be 14,000 billion barrels, which would be sufficient to provide the world’s crude oil requirements for at least several hundred years.

    It suggests that there have been many “oil scares” (even before WWII), but that these were all proven to be wrong, just as the current “peak oil” scare is wrong.

    Interesting reading.

    Regards,

    Max

  14. Max,

    Well I did try at one time to argue for separation of the science from politics. It would be good if the only disagreement was political and that those on the right claimed that free market economics offered the best solution to the AGW problem whereas those on the left argued for a more collective approach.

    Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to be working quite like that. There are quite a few rightish politicians who do accept the science on the AGW issue, you’ll know that the US Republicans have actually chosen one as their presidential candidate, but he might be somewhat unusual these days. But, how many leftish AGW sceptics can you name? They are even more unusual.

    That is not to say that many working class Labor voters, who may well also be members of a Trade Union, even what’s left of the British NUM who you’ve singled out for special mention, aren’t suspicious of politicians’ motives, but by and large they don’t come across like Brute and yourself in their attitudes. They do understand the saying that ‘no man is an island…..’.

    67% of US opinion isn’t quite the same thing as 67% of world opinion, and I do feel that the good citizens of the USA do need reminding of that from time to time. There wouldn’t be a 67% result in Australia. The Australian Labor Party had ‘climate change ‘ high on its agenda at the last election. They are usually pretty smart political operators and they would have calculated that they had more to gain than lose on the issue.

    Unfortunately, and even though there may be a few in the USA who believe otherwise , I’d have to say that we can’t rely on the Gods of the universe to intervene to ensure a climatic outcome which will satisfy a majority opinion. Even a 67% US one.

  15. We all have to conform to anti-pollution laws, in fact all laws in general, whether we like them or disagree with them.

    Pete,

    I didn’t mention laws, I mentioned commitment. Commitment, or adherence to an ideal, speak to integrity and character which seems to be sorely lacking by the most vocal advocates of the green movement……..that is, unless you can buy your way out of it with “carbon credits” in the bizarre world of the Global Warming Kook.

    Apparently, if you have enough money, you can “pollute” to your heart’s content and receive “Carbon Absolution” from the Church of Gaia.

    I’m surprised at your stance. You seem to be a “progressive” anti-establishment type…..this entire Global Warming movement reeks of establishment and elitism. I’m astonished that you can’t see through it. Minimalism, Environmentalism, Naturalism seem to be the ultimate Utopian lifestyle of the green movement and your High Priests are conducting their lives in complete contradiction to these principles….. yet, you still pray at their altars…………

  16. Pete,

    RE: # 1064

    Yes, the majority of Americans voted for George Bush….tht’s the way a DEMOCRACY works.

    I don’t give a damn what the “rest of the world” thinks or does and I care even less about “world opinion”. I am not a “citizen of the world”. I am a citizen of the United States of America and subject to its laws and Constitution, not some world political body.

    You seem to be obsessed with the goings on of the United States. Why not concentrate on your own country’s problems and policies. When you’ve solved all of the problems in your own country and those of the remainder of the world then come ask how you can help us…….We’ll tell you that we don’t need your help.

    See if you can study and grasp the concept of national sovereignty.

    I happen to think that Australia has too much land for the few people that inhabit it. I think that we should mandate through the UN that a few billion Chinese need to take possession of some of Australia’s property….make more productive use of it. I’m certain that I could find a “consensus” of “world citizens” that would agree. After all, what yours is theirs, right?

    The average Australian has it “too soft” according to me and my “consensus”. Every Australian should be required to pay additional taxes to the citizens of……..North Korea & the Philippines or the “citizens of the world”. That’d be alright with you wouldn’t it?

    Your house is too large for just you and your family………there ideally should be an additional family living in your house……better use of the resources you know.

    Your company makes too much money…..your employees make more money than the average person living in Botswana…..therefore as their employer, you must garnish their wages and transfer a portion of their earnings to the “world political body” to provide for the citizenry of the world that don’t earn as much or have a lower standard of living than you presently enjoy.

    Life isn’t “fair”……get used to it.

    God, what a whining panty waist………………….

  17. PeterM, 1061, you wrote in part:

    So maybe we can solve the energy crisis by drilling for oil in the Mid-Atlantic? I thought that the abiotic oil theory meant that we just have to drill a little deeper on land? And that the production of oil is unlimited? If abiotic oil exists in significant quantities, where is it? How is it that USA production has just about halved since 1970? and I hope you aren’t going to blame it all on ‘greenie groups’. Instead of having to go to Alaska or the Arctic wouldn’t it be easier and cheaper to drill a bit deeper in Texas?

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    Max, 1063,
    Thanks for your comments on the extreme difficulty of ultra-deep drilling. The Russians took 19 years to reach a depth of a little over 12,000m through sedimentary rock only, including disappointments with irrecoverable drill tube failures and restarts. They abandoned the original plan to go 15,000m into bedrock in 1989. The Kola Peninsula was chosen for its known geological stability, but come 1989, they estimated future rock T’s of ~300C and concluded it was not-on.
    I read somewhere that the Chinese have recently commissioned four rigs that are designed to go to 12,000m, but into what kind of formations, and why, I forget now.
    What Pete, overlooks is that if abiotic oil is available in quantity, the best place to find it, is in the same reservoirs that are attributed to contain biotic oil, since at this time it is plain common commercial sense to do so. As I understand it, such formations are relatively easy to find, (regardless of where the oil comes from), but if there are significant pathways from way-down in the mantel, or deep lying “chambers”, it is entirely a different science and technical challenge. (uncommercial in the West)
    Another thing that Pete overlooks is the lead-time and investment issues, plus politics, in oil field ventures, and the fact that oil prices have only recently escalated. Was there not a loss of interest in USA with local oil when plentiful “cheap oil” was available from o/seas? What does shale-oil cost? Is it $100 compared with what moving price crude and for how long? When are you able to go-ahead and spend billions on shale-oil over how many years? Meanwhile, are high oil prices hurting the oil companies?
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    Pete,
    Do you agree that:
    ONE: There is no satisfactory hypothesis for a biotic origin for oil
    TWO: There has been no laboratory demonstration or chemical theory that biota can be converted to oil
    THREE: There has been laboratory demonstration and chemical theory that oil can be formed in the Earth’s mantel
    FOUR: There are known earth sources of hydrocarbons that cannot be of biotic origin.

  18. Brute,

    I seem to have rattled your cage unintentionally. But, 1064 was addressed to Max and he seems to have remained calmer. Maybe that’s because he’s Swiss? Sorry about that! You Americans are such sensitive creatures!

    But, as you’ve now well and truly grasped the bars, and are now raging away at me with a fury, I might just say a few words.

    Firstly the USA does figure prominently in this blog but that’s because most contributors are American. And I think its fair to include Max too, even though he might have some Swiss connections.

    Secondly, I’m all in favour of countries ‘minding their own’ business, if that is a fair enough description of what you are advocating.However, I do seem to remember that you had more than a few words to say yourself over the goings on in the UK and even the London congestion charge , if I remember rightly. Is that because the USA has diplomats there and American tourist go on holidays there from time to time that?

    I’m happy to let the Poms decide these things, and even let the Iraqis and Venezuelans decide what they’d like to do with their oil free from all foreign interference. Would you disagree?

    Max,

    I think you have it right about the oil companies. They do know what they are doing. I find it hard to believe that you contarians have suddenly acquired a scientific curiosity over the origin of oil. Rather you are using the abiotic theory to justify your opposition to ‘peak oil’ theory. But, even if it turns out that there may be some scientific truth in what the proponents of the theory are saying, there is precious little evidence that it has been or will ever be of any use in finding new commercially viable supplies.

    There may have been premature announcements of peak oil in previous decades. But , now, it’s not just ‘tree hugging’ environmentalists who are talking about the oil peak. It seems to have gained general acceptance, including right through the oil industry. You are right, oil isn’t going to run out as such, and that’s the theory of peak oil too. There is lots of oil in shale and sands, but its not going to be the cheap plentiful alternative to conventional supplies.

  19. Since it seems to be a “Slag-a-Septic-Tank” day, then just for FUN, I’ll chuck-in my tuppeth. (BTW; Septic-tank is English-Cockney-slang for a US citizen; Yank)
    My observations over the decades are that many “business decisions” are stumbled upon sometimes in appalling incompetence, and even in fraud, yet sometimes they are successful and sometimes unbelievably unsuccessful. In the USA, because of the sheer size and import of the economy to the world, these business decisions are especially noteworthy and highly visible. An excellent example was the decision of certain vested interests in and around the US administration to invade Iraq in order to secure continued low cost oil supplies. (against the advice of most of the ROTW) The outcome, putting aside the trivia of huge loss of life and dismemberment and other mutilations and loss to many thousands of people, several million refugees, etc, has been a loss of oil production and price escalation. Another highly spectacular debacle, was that the top executives of the big three US auto manufacturers, and their cronies, (all taking vast remunerations), were unable to see what was coming, some 20 years ago. The whole of the rest of the world was doing something else! The overseas arms (not too sure about Chrysler though) have been doing very well thankyou, especially in Europe despite more diverse effective competition!
    Given just these two examples, and the fact that the oil companies have some immense difficulties with forecasting some terribly complicated things, involving risk/political/environmental/investment issues galore, I don’t think they have a clue what to do. The real BALL-TEARER is the lead-time required to bring some major project on-stream, during which everything could change! GM and Ford have it real easy in comparison!

    P.S. We have some head-shaking stuff happen in Oz too, but it is much smaller in consequence to the world.

  20. I’m happy to let the Poms decide these things, and even let the Iraqis and Venezuelans decide what they’d like to do with their oil free from all foreign interference. Would you disagree?

    Nope, wouldn’t disagree at all; which is partly why oil prices are where they are today. If the Iraq invasion were about greedy Americans getting their hands on the Iraqi oilfields to fill up their gluttonous SUV’s for free, then we would have just taken and secured the oilfields/pipelines and stolen the oil.

    We wouldn’t have bothered to occupy cities/towns of no consequence and risk American lives and capital to build/rebuild schools, mosques, highways, airports, power plants, water treatment facilities, dams, bridges, hospitals, factories, port facilities, etc. We would have simply looted the country’s wealth and left the people to fend for themselves.

    You see, there is more to it than oil. There is freedom and liberty, human rights and dignity. The ability to live in peace and become responsible for one’s own destiny…..these things I’m afraid are concepts that you will never understand as long as you look to someone/something else to resolve life’s tribulations.

  21. Hi Peter,

    In your last blog (1068) concerning the “peak oil” hypothesis floating around out there, you wrote, “I find it hard to believe that you contrarians have suddenly acquired a scientific curiosity over the origin of oil. Rather you are using the abiotic theory to justify your opposition to ‘peak oil’ theory.”

    “Contrarians”? Isn’t that a bit simple-minded to put Brute, Bob_FJ, JZSmith, Robin Guenier, myself and other bloggers who are not in agreement with the currently fashionable “disastrous AGW mantra” (for lack of a better description) in the same box, and label them “contrarians”?

    To your point, “But, now, it’s not just ‘tree hugging’ environmentalists who are talking about the oil peak. It seems to have gained general acceptance, including right through the oil industry. You are right, oil isn’t going to run out as such, and that’s the theory of peak oil too. There is lots of oil in shale and sands, but its not going to be the cheap plentiful alternative to conventional supplies.”

    I can agree with your statement that developing new resources, such as tar sands and shale, is “not going to be cheap”. And that oil companies tell us “oil is getting increasingly scarce” (how better to justify the current high prices?).

    “Peak oil theory” has been proposed by some and countered by others. I posted you a link to an article on the subject by a renowned body of experts on this subject, which concluded that there was no “peak oil” crisis today, and that the known reserves of today (including oil shales in the USA plus elsewhere in the world, as well as presently unexploited conventional oil deposits in the Arctic, the OCS and elsewhere) would cover world demand (at today’s rate) for over 200 years.

    Energy conservation actions make more sense at $100/bbl crude than they did at $30/bbl crude, so they will accelerate (as they already have in most developed economies). Proof of this is the fact that CO2 emissions have increased at a far lower rate than GDP in most of the developed economies, and even reversed most recently.

    Oil shale has been calculated to be very attractive at $100 per barrel. The same is certainly true for tar sands (already in operation) and the currently unexploited, more difficult to develop, conventional oil reserves in the Arctic, the OCS and elsewhere.

    Oil will probably remain at $100+ per barrel indefinitely, so that it will make economic sense to develop all these currently unexploited resources. It will also make sense to continue looking at all energy savings investments.

    Will $100+/bbl oil force the development of more attractive alternates? You bet.

    Will these “more attractive alternates” include bio-fuels? Probably, particularly in locations where high ethanol yielding crops can be grown (ex. Brazilian sugar cane).
    Queensland once had a flourishing sugar cane industry. Will this come back? Who knows? But there are many tropical regions of the world that can generate sugar cane-based ethanol. And other sources are also being considered. In the USA, corn-based ethanol got off to a bad start, largely because the government stepped in with massive subsidies to try to politically make an otherwise non-viable source economically viable, ignoring the impact that this would have on other users of corn (an excellent example of why the government should stay out of the process, except for awarding limited research grants to support real long-term R+D efforts in selected areas).

    Is hydrogen as a motor fuel, based on water hydrolysis using electrical power generated by large modern nuclear plants and new fuel cells a viable alternate when compared with $100/bbl oil? I personally sort of doubt it, particularly if one considers the safety hazards and potential disasters inherent in using the rocket fuel, hydrogen, in normal motor vehicles on a day-to-day basis. But who knows? I may be wrong.

    Electrical automobiles are probably a safer and more cost-effective alternate than hydrogen, but they will require the development of batteries that are more viable than those of today. Will these be developed? I am almost certain that they will, because there is a lot of money to be made there. Even the oil companies are researching this.

    Solar-driven or wind-driven automobiles? A real long shot, but who knows? Just don’t stick billions of taxpayer funds into politically “forcing” these technologies to be viable when they are not.

    Will synthetic motor fuels (and petrochemical feedstocks) from coal become competitive with $100/bbl crude oil? Ask the South Africans (SASOL), who have been doing this for years. Does this generate more CO2 that natural crude oil? Absolutely. Otherwise, why would South Africa be one of the nations with the lowest “carbon efficiencies”, at only $558 GDP per mt CO2 emitted (compared to Australia at $1,815, the US at $2,107, Brazil at $2,358 and the EU at $3,154 GDP per mt CO2 emitted). But CO2 emissions may wane in importance if the current AGW scare dies down, particularly if our planet begins to cool off, due to a less active sun, for example.

    So you see that $100/bbl oil actually represents an opportunity.

    It will encourage the exploration and development of oilfields in more difficult “conventional” locations as well as the development of oil shale reserves. It will encourage efforts to find alternate sources of motor fuels, including bio-fuels as well as syn-fuels from coal.

    And the really good news is that all this will not require “big government” involvement in order to happen (except in the roles of continuing to establish environmental rules, regulations and controls to ensure that no real harm to the environment results and possibly to give limited research grants for basic R+D efforts for developing new technologies).

    Think positive, Peter. There are loads of opportunities out there. “Peak oil” may be a challenge, but it is not a “disaster-in-the-making” requiring immediate action by governments, any more than the virtual computer-generated AGW crisis.

    Keep the government bureaucrats out of the process wherever possible, Peter, (except for the specific exceptions I mentioned above) and the basic laws of economics in a free society will take care of the process very well by adapting to the challenges and opportunities that arise when they do so.

    That’s my opinion and I’d be curious what you, Brute, JZSmith, Bob_FJ and the others on this site think about this.

    Regards,

    Max

  22. Bob_FJ: Sorry, I have to disagree on this:

    Another highly spectacular debacle, was that the top executives of the big three US auto manufacturers, and their cronies, (all taking vast remunerations), were unable to see what was coming, some 20 years ago. The whole of the rest of the world was doing something else! The overseas arms (not too sure about Chrysler though) have been doing very well thankyou, especially in Europe despite more diverse effective competition!

    You’re right, the USA economy is one of the largest, and definitely the most important market on Earth. I would argue that one of the key reasons for that is liberty and the free market. US businesses have been so enormously successful over many, many decades because, in my view, they FOLLOW consumer demand rather than try to LEAD it. I am constantly struck by the attitude of many—but certainly not all—EU businesses that despite being a “free market” economy, they have a distinct proclivity to want to LEAD the consumer through central planning and regulation.

    Most Americans believe in the fee market and letting the market react to changing consumer desires and needs. For sure, sometimes business fails to foresee sometimes rapidly changing markets and is left sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars of SUV inventory, but they built all that inventory because WE the CONSUMER wanted it. That is what was selling in this country for years. Small, energy efficient vehicles sat collecting dust on dealer lots. No one but a few very dedicated Greenies bought them.

    The point is that while we occasionally have great failures and problems here in The States, we have far more great victories, and the reason, I believe, is because we as a people prefer to live as individuals not bound by some central planning bureaucracy that decides what kind of car we should drive nor how far from work we can live. There are those kind of people here, mostly working in government and urban planning jobs, but they are a tiny minority.

    I’ll take liberty and the fluctuations and imperfections of it any day over any of the alternatives.

  23. Max, great post as always (your 1071).

    I didn’t see your post until AFTER I’d posted my 1072, but how interestingly well do they mesh!

    I was talking about my strong preference to free market solutions relative to private enterprise, but it can and does easily apply to future energy solutions, as you discuss. Where we always have problems is when governments try to get involved ahead of the market.

    Take the recent oil price spike for an example. Here in the USA, government at every level thinks only GOVERNMENT can solve the “problem” of high fuel prices, and thrash about trying to come to the ‘rescue’ of their voters. The only government action that I know of that had a real, immediate effect on oil prices was the announcement by the Bush administration that they were lifting the executive order prohibiting offshore oil drilling. Oil prices began to come down almost immediately thereafter.

    But the real driver of lower prices was lower demand. The market couldn’t sustain oil prices over $140/bbl, and probably not much over $120/bbl. People began to drive less, buy less, and fly less. Demand softened, prices began to fall, etc., etc. A changing market condition caused an opposing market reaction. Had government actually gotten involved, who knows how screwed up things could have gotten?

    There is an old saying that those who seek government positions are the least qualified to hold those positions. It seems like those who are incapable of producing anything of real value (goods, services, etc.) seek positions of power to control those who actually produce. This parasitic relationship works to the detriment of everyone. I fear those who seek government “solutions” to our future energy needs, as well as “solutions” to AGW (assuming such a need actually exists) are the people least qualified to provide them. (Real solutions, that is.)

  24. Correction to my 1072 above:

    “Most Americans believe in the fee market…”

    I meant to write “Most Americans believe in the free market…” of course!

    Sorry for the typo.

  25. Forgot about a link I meant to post from Bishop Hill via Watts Up With That.

    It’s a great summary of the Hockey Stick debunking, written so that us dummy laymen can understand it.

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