Can we get a translation of that review? Does anyone who reads this site happen to speak/read German?

Thanks for the link fizure. Page was understandable for the most part. I didn't really state much that wasn't already covered in this article except the part about oil consumption per capita in china and india vs mexico. That was interesting. It seems really unlikely that we could increase global production by 50% considering that oil production is several areas is declining.

So who is surprised by this? We knew it was just a matter of time before the $100/barrel threshold was crossed. The $200 and $300 had to follow.

The CTL pilot plants are looking like better and better investments with news like this.

I see more clean Diesel powered vehicles in our future.

Stu. Spot on. It's really hard to know what we're dealing with because several of the major players have good reasons to be evasive when it comes to stating accurate reserve numbers. Why would the Saudis or any other major oil producer want their customers to know that their production is waning or that their peak production is imminent? That would give us (the customers) time to develop migiation/migration strategies that might very well make the producers' oil fairly irrelevant. The oil producers don't want that. Doesn't make good business sense. So, we're probably going to get reasonably inflated reserve values from them. That makes it hard to know what's really going on.

In all likelyhood, peak oil will fall somewhere in the middle of the doomsday ("The sky is falling!!") vs. ostrich ("I can't hear you lalalalalala") predictions.

Agreed. The horizon for market driven events is too short. A few years at best. The market isn't capable of driving policy when changes are more than a few years out. That's just not how it works. It's up to people working and thinking outside the market paradigm to solve problems like this. The federal gov't is not showing any real leadership in this area and it's pathetic.

If Oil consumption goes up to over 100 million b/dy by end of 2007 and if the Irak on-going war and Iran nuclear question are not solved, it could push the price over $100. This may not be all bad news but the type of medecine required to convince North Americans to transition more rapidly to efficient alternate energy vehicles. Much higher Oil prices will extend peak oil for a few more decades and could reduce pollution if we don't switch to dirty coal. Energy will cost more and we will feel it in the pocket book unless we start consuming less.

It is true that we don't know for certain when oil will peak, but the CERA estimates have been widely criticized as being unrealistic. They don't take depletion into account for one thing - they assume that oilfields that currently exist can keep pumping oil at the same rate.

Nose around over at http://www.theoildrum.com for more detailed discussion of all of this.

As Stu mentioned "because several of the major players have good reasons to be evasive when it comes to stating accurate reserve numbers.". There's an even bigger reason for OPEC players to have inaccurate reserve numbers than what was mentioned previously.

Something interesting that was noted in "Twilight in the Desert" is that the OPEC oil cartel reserve estimates, determine the rate at which individual OPEC countries get to pump/export (by OPEC). Now if you follow this, they all have incentive to overinflate their reserve estimates (alot), because that's how you get to sell more oil (within OPEC)at the moment.

Remarkably, shortly after this system went into place (long ago), many of the OPEC countries reserve estimate numbers jumped alot, without new reserves being located in these countries. Leads to many interesting questions about OPEC reserve numbers (that everyone counts on), eh?

Something just occurred to me reading the above posts. First, consider what just happened in the wake of Katrina: world production declined by only a few percent and yet prices shot up to give, for example, Exxon/Mobil the most profitable quarter of any company in history.

Now think about two possible future scenarios: 1) the world develops alternatives to oil in anticipation of the peak (i.e., starting today) and gradually moves away from it before production declines and the resulting price increases become severe. Oil is "left in the ground" as demand pressure disappears.

Or 2) The world continues on its present course of increasing demand, denying that there's a peak issue until we're fully into it. Prices go through the roof. Alternatives are developed but not before we're struggling to produce oil from tar sands and everywhere else, while pumping the last drops of "easy" oil at prices far exceeding their actual costs of production (which is what resulted in the huge profits achieved last quarter).

Recognizing that oil is eventually going away under any scenario, which of these two presents more of a "golden parachute" to an oil industry executive, or for that matter anyone invested in the oil industry?

Sure, there is a great deal of variability in the different projections of peak oil. But it's probably naive to believe that they are all equally credible.

I just came back here...

haha! Ummm, Patrick, you wrote

"Oil didnt cross $100/barrel and never will.... others make the point clearly. Simmons is a geologist not an economist and the *price* of oil is based on political and economic factors that go far beyond depletion rates of oil fields. Simmons himself admits that he has made WILD CLAIMS PRECISELY TO DRAW ATTENTION TO THE ISSUE EVEN THOUGH HE DOESNT FULL BELIEVE THE SCARE SCENARIOS."

Don't correct people's factual mistakes when you are apt to make them the second after correcting them... Matthew Simmons is *NOT* a geologist. He is an investmenr banker, and the bastard is filthy rich. Yeah, you're right--your point stands tall, he must no nearly nothing about economics to have the most successful private energy investment bank in the world.

Irony is never lost anywhere...

Simmons corporate website:

http://www.simmonsco-intl.com/

Patrick, as for your blind faith in "CERA" and "the best experts in the field" (whatever that means--you mean the corporations?!) perhaps you should read something other than free-market fairytales about the crude oil supply/demand merry-go-round. First off, the US has already fully industrialized and is now actually passed the point of real increases in its energy consumption. However!! That does not change the fact that China and India will be industrializing (India is presently building massive highway systems all over their country) and the demand growth that will occur in China and India will not be able to be sustained by supply increases with present technology. It is simply impossible to get another few hundred million people (more than that if China wants to join the party...) driving around--even with small fuel efficient cars. Not to mention doing it *cheaply*.

Your optimism about potential global declines ranging from 2-6% after we're off the plateau is only an indication of how frightening our future will be... And the sad thing is you're probably quite educated in the subject of energy, and still have a "happy-go-lucky" hooray for the free-market attitude, while vast majority of people just have no clue whatsoever, about anything energy (or market) related.

Here's hoping we have less people like you in power in our awfully run, corrupt to the core federal/centralized government.

Good day sir.

2012-2013 $1000-$2000 per barrel

$10-12 per gallon is not to much I think $250 per barrel is a comfortable price for 2008

I think oil real price is above $200-$350 per barrel and it could reach $386, but 386 per barrel is not too expensive, oil above $400 per barrel is too expensive