Sea change coming for the Everglades

The road to Paradise Prairie, site of a grand plan to develop cheap land in a drained Everglades, was supposed to go through this former fishing village. That plan went bust decades ago, and the future here looks very, very soggy.
Now, Flamingo stands as the gateway to a more likely destiny: the coming century of global warming, one that climate researchers warn will bring higher temperatures, extreme weather and sea levels rising high enough to doom this toehold on the tip of South Florida.

( full story here )

Fill 'er up with corn and politics

"But the reality is actually much worse. Neither model captures how bad the situation is," Patzek told me. He thinks that quibbling about ethanol's net energy is a distraction from the real problem, which is that our industrial agricultural system is unsustainable because it destroys the environment and relies on massive subsidies of fossil fuels at every stage, from making fertilizers to driving machinery to drying, refrigerating and distilling crops.

( Full story here )

Ethanol Takes More Energy Than It Gives

The truth about ethanol, the wonder fuel that is supposed to replace U.S. dependence on "foreign oil," is that it takes more energy to produce the ethanol, than the resulting ethanol fuel will provide. And to replace imported oil with ethanol would require covering more than half the land area of the United States in corn or other biomass.

( Full story here )

PEAK OIL FEARS AND HYPE, PART 2

Let’s accept the idea that the era of cheap oil may be over. But also accept Austin Kiplinger’s premise (see last week’s Crier column) that the problem itself— the U.S. seen as held hostage to rising global energy demand and unreliable sources — suggests new trends. As an investor, you may wish to consider wealth-preservation and growth strategies within energy independence trends.

( Full story here )

The end of the 'age of oil'

That oil is a finite resource is a commonly known fact. Increasingly, however, oil experts and geologists are focusing less on the question of when global oil supplies will run out, but on when the supply of regular crude will have reached its half-life - i.e., the moment when global oil production will be at its absolute maximum. This historical moment is known as global peak oil.

( Full story here )

Post-Petroleum Woman

Two years ago when I was invited to watch the jaw-dropping DVD, The End Of Suburbia, I came away feeling terrified about the ramifications of Peak Oil, but only later did I reflect on the fact that there are virtually no women in the documentary—except the ditzy fifties caricatures who consumed everything that wasn’t nailed down. Subsequently, I began researching Peak Oil and then informing the students in my college history classes about what I consider the stellar historical event of the modern world, the end of hydrocarbon energy and probably the end of Western civilization.

( Full story here )

Low oil warning: planning starts now

Regardless of when you think global oil production will peak, planning for a low oil future starts now, writes Elliot Fishman.

( Full story here )

Peak-oil theory and its development implications

Denying the idea that Middle East oilfields are getting old and might soon go into decline has become an article of faith in local oil circles. But re-reading the controversial main text of the peak-oil theorists should perhaps be required by regional economic planners.
( Full story here )

Will we run out of oil?

It was on a 2003 trip to Saudi Arabia and tour of the country's oil fields that curiosity got the best of energy investment banker Matthew Simmons.

( Full story here )

Oil could top $105 in major supply outage: expert

A Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS - news) projection that oil prices could top $100 a barrel in the event of a major supply disruption could be conservative in the current tight market, said a senior executive with the investment bank.

( Full story here )

Another Day, Another Oil Field in Decline

Despite what you might have heard from the Beatles, it's not 'getting better all the time.' In fact, in the oil world, it's only getting worse.

As we quickly advance towards the end of cheap oil the world is faced with many increasingly complex issues.

Conflicts in Iran, Iraq, Nigeria and Venezuela, booming economies is China and India, as well as globalization and hurricanes have all taken their toll on the global oil market.

Now a new monster has come from under the bed: super-fast oil depletion.

( Full story here )

Commodity deflation? Not likely.

If the dollar collapses (say it corrects on the USX index down to the 70s) who knows what that will do to commodities? Commodities are priced internationally in dollars. It will throw the markets into utter confusion if no one really knows what a dollar is worth (if anything). Could commodity markets be created in other currencies? Yes, but these markets will be regional markets, not global ones.

( Full story here )

How will you live in a world without cheap oil?

Almost 20,000 years ago, a Stone Age tribe made camp under a sandstone overhang in a place south of Pittsburgh now called Meadowcroft Rock Shelter, in Washington County. Theirs was a world still in glacial throes, with the edge of a mile-thick sheet of ice not far to the north. On the edge of a frozen ice desert that covered half the continent, these ancients sought protection from the bitter elements. Today, visitors to Meadowcroft can enter an open excavation and view evidence of tools and campfires made by these wandering souls so long ago.

( Full story here )

Texas and US Lower 48 oil production as a model for Saudi Arabia and the world

As many people now know, 50 years ago this March M. King Hubbert predicted that US Lower 48 and Texas oil production would peak, and enter a terminal decline, somewhere between 1966 and 1971. Dr. Hubbert also predicted that world oil production would peak, and enter a terminal decline within 50 years, i.e., by 2006. To be clear, despite what is either a profound misunderstanding of or a misrepresentation of Dr. Hubber'ts work in some quarters, Dr. Hubbert was not predicting the end of world oil production by 2006; he was predicting that production peaks when producing regions have consumed about half of their recoverable conventional oil reserves.

( Full story here )

Organizing to energize the community

With the price of gas in this country flirting with $3 a gallon, Americans are hopping mad. Many promote boycotting the big oil companies as a way of bringing prices down. We've probably all seen the e-mail with the rallying cry: "Don't buy gas from Exxon or Mobil on Thursday." But will prices ever go down? There is a growing number of scientists who believe gas prices will continue to climb, as industrialized nations consume - in increasing quantities - the earth's finite supply of oil. Many believe the world is nearing its peak oil production capacity. An increasing number of people believe that the world will be facing an "energy famine" in the next five to 10 years, and that in addition to cultivating alternative sources of energy, people will have to adapt their way of life to reduce our country's dependence on oil. Bill and Sydney Blackwell of Willow Road, founders of Harvard Local, are two of those people

( Full story here )

THE WORLD AFTER OIL PEAKS

Peak oil is described as the point where oil production stops rising and begins its inevitable long-term decline. In the face of fast-growing demand, this means rising oil prices. But even if oil production growth simply slows or plateaus, the resulting tightening in supplies will still drive the price of oil upward, albeit less rapidly.

( Full story here )

The Suburban Fantasy

James Howard Kunstler

James Howard Kunstler is the author of The Long Emergency, just released in paperback by The Atlantic Monthly Press.

It’s actually kind of funny to hear Americans complain these days about the cost of gasoline and how it is affecting their lives. What did they expect after setting up an easy-motoring utopia of suburban metroplexes that make incessant driving inevitable? And how did they fail to register the basic facts of the world oil situation, which have been available to us for decades?

( full story here )

A Personal Peak Oil Discovery Process, Part I

A retired nuclear physicist traces his discovery of peak oil theory.

( Full story here )

Energy Geopolitics 2006

by Richard Heinberg

News reports flitting across computer screens these days seem increasingly to be related to the subject of energy. But what do they signify? The modern world affairs analyst is in little better position to discern the patterns and portents than was his or her ancient Roman counterpart, the reader of entrails. What is one to make of items like these?

( Full story here )

Ethanol and Peak Food

No sooner had the high-gas-prices frenzy on Capitol Hill died down than a new obsession emerged— ethanol. Everywhere one looked, there was ethanol. If you live in an "over-ozoned, non-attainment" region, then every gas pump you visit has the words "10% ethanol" affixed. Television ads, magazines, and newspapers are filled with pictures of corn-yellow SUVs filled with motorists happy in the knowledge that their vehicle can run on good old American grown E-85 (85% ethanol- 15% gasoline). Their fuel dollars are staying right here in the USA and are not filling the coffers of foreign potentates.

( Full story here )

Global oil production: Has it peaked?

Since Henry Ford rolled out the first Model T almost a century ago, the world has been riding a hydrocarbon bubble that transformed America's landscapes and lifestyles.

But some oil experts and economists warn global oil production is peaking. Oil production isn't going to drop off a cliff, they say, but the future is one in which annual supplies will for the first time begin gradually diminishing, precipitating even higher prices and perhaps shortages.

( Full story here )

Your electricity choices revealed

Renewables are the form of electricity generation favoured by users of the BBC News website's Electricity Calculator.

( Full story here )

The trouble with ethanol

As a means of reducing gasoline consumption, ethanol does not yet have a lot to recommend it.

There is nothing wrong with the actual product, which is made by fermenting sugar from corn or other plants into grain alcohol. It is non-polluting and comes from renewable resources and is safe for use in vehicles. Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government wants gasoline to contain at least 5 per cent ethanol by 2010; cars made since the 1980s are already capable of running on a mixture that contains up to 10 per cent ethanol.

( Full story here )

Facing a full-fledged energy crisis

The uh-oh letter came in a plain white envelope, no indication of the bolt of lightning inside.

It was from the electric company, announcing that the "average" residential customer's bill will increase 41 percent, meaning about $800 more a year. I am not average. My bill will go up about $1,500 a year - if I use no air conditioning at all this summer.

( Full story here )

Feeling the heat

Floods obliterate Wilmington, Norfolk, even New York. Millions of people relocate inland. America’s bread-basket — the world’s main producer of grain — returns to its Dust Bowl days. Hurricanes as wicked as Katrina regularly ravish the Southeast. East Coast weather imitates Ontario. Southern Europe swelters and then the North plunges into a deep freeze. Our global economy is shattered in one day. Sounds like the movie The Day After Tomorrow, which left scientists scoffing. Weather changes on a dime. Climate doesn’t. But it can change quicker than you might think.

( Full story here )

Running on empty?

Stephen Leeb edits an investment newsletter. Unsurprisingly, his new book, The Coming Economic Crisis, advises readers on what to buy and what to avoid "when oil costs $200 a barrel," which he predicts that it soon will.

Leeb cites geologist M. King Hubbert, who correctly forecast in the 1950s that oil production in the U.S. would peak in the early 1970s. Leeb thinks that Saudi Arabia, with the world's largest proven reserves, is now at or close to its peak production.
( Full story here )

New Estimate of Venezuela's Total Oil Reserves Makes It the Grandest of Grandest Prizes for US

New Estimate of Venezuela's Total Oil Reserves Makes It the Grandest of Grand Prizes for US - by Stephen Lendman

I just finished reading an important new book the author's publisher sent me, which I'll shortly be reviewing for publication. The book is investigative journalist (and in his words "forensic economist") Greg Palast's latest foray into exposing the hidden from view crimes and wrongdoings of the Bush administration. I'm very familiar with Palast's important work and can only wish many others of his profession did the same sort of it he does - his job. Sadly most don't, but luckily we have some who do, and we should pay close heed to what they tell us. They're our window to the dangerous world around us, and the information they provide is our protection from it.
( Full story here )

Experts Predict End of Oil Boom in Russia

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) released research on the state presence in the fuel and energy complex in CIS countries last week, claiming that the share of Russia, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan in the world growth of oil supply shrank to 30-35 percent by 2005, compared to 60 percent between 1984 and 2004. The OECD blames it on the regulating governmental policies in Russia and Kazakhstan.

( Full story here )

The 'peak oil' deja vu

From Wall Street to Main Street, concerns over the phenomenon known as "peak oil" have reached a fever pitch. "Peak oil", of course, is the hypothesis that global crude-oil production has peaked, or will soon, and is destined to start a permanent decline thereafter - with frightful consequences, it is usually argued, for Industrial Civilization as We Know It.

( Full story here )

Former McDonald’s cook confesses

McDonald’s got me to college. I don’t just mean that I saved money by consuming tons of their cheap hamburgers and fries and gallons of milkshakes, which I did. I also worked there for three years, beginning at about $1 an hour, during the middle of the 20th century—even before Elvis Presley and rock ‘n roll. Back then a buck bought something substantial. I could eat as many burgers as I wanted for free, so rampant, unconscious consumption is what I did.

( full story here )

Lundberg on the recent Peak Oil conferences

The clash of ecological economics and the technofix

Culture Change Letter #128
Conferences on petrocollapse, sustainable economics & ecology, and local solutions

The May 6th DC Petrocollapse Conference focused on the inevitability of collapse of the world economy due to the end of cheap oil and the lack of realistic technofixes. Solutions such as ecovillages and organic farming were emphasized, with all the concern and caveats that come from keen awareness of devastating climate change, the intransigence of the corporate state, and cultural change

( Fully Story here )

INFLATION: THE INVISIBLE TAX!

by Puru Saxena
Editor, Money Matters
May 12, 2006

THE PICTURE – Officially, the Federal Reserve’s purpose is to fight inflation and manage the economy. Meanwhile, my claim to fame is turning stone into gold! Presented below is the real agenda of the Federal Reserve.

( Full story here )

Peak Oil Passnotes: Wildebeest Mentality

Right around the world it has been impossible to miss the fall in commodities and equities. The Dow Jones, the FTSE, the Nasdaq, the AIM, the CAC, Dax, Mibtel and more have caught a dose of fear. With them went oil and gas.

( Full story here )

Raise gas tax $3 a gallon to promote fuel efficiency

Now that the $100 tax rebate proposed by the Senate Republican leadership as a response to rising gasoline prices has been discarded, it is time to get serious. Any effective response to climbing gas prices must recognize a geological reality -- namely, that the earth's oil reserves are shrinking.

( full story here )

Iran, Iraq scenarios: Similarities and dissimilarities

On April 28th, IAEA released its report on Iran. IAEA reported that: “the Agency cannot make a judgment about or reach a conclusion on, future compliance or intentions.” The report came as no surprise to those who have been following the ongoing dispute between Iran, the United States and the IAEA.

( Full story here )

Cost Of Building Rose 7 Percent In Last Year, Study Says

The slowdown in the housing market pushed prices of existing houses down a little bit, but new construction prices are going up.

So, for those who plan to build, now is the time to break ground to save some money, reported 5 On Your Side's Adam Shapiro.

( Full story here )

End Times

If Al Gore's documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" has a single message, it's that global warming is bad—very, very bad. Floods, droughts, famine, disease . . . a miasma of End Times calamity caused by the burning of fossil fuels.

Even at that, Gore is—at the risk of paraphrasing—a candy-assed optimist, according to James Howard Kunstler, author of "The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-First Century."

( Full story here )

Guest Column: Are we doomed for another oil shock?

Like most people, I feel the sting when it costs $55 to fill up the family minivan. As a result, I’ve been driving around town more often in our Civic, which gets twice the gas mileage. I suspect many of you are wrestling with similar choices.

( Full story here )

‘No oil impact on GDP growth’

Industry body ASSOCHAM today said rising oil prices are unlikely to affect India's GDP growth rate as the economy was no longer susceptible to oil shocks.
"With the changing contours of economic indicators, the relationship between crude oil consumption and the GDP has weakened in recent years and the GDP is being driven by other factors that offset the adverse impact of rising crude oil prices on it," it said in a release.

( Full story here )

Oil at $100? It's No Longer a Pipe Dream

It may not take a supply disruption to send prices higher. Amid geopolitical uncertainty, the futures market might just do the job on its own

( Full story here )

A Prophet Without Honor in Congress

I was supposed to go somewhere yesterday afternoon when I turned on C-Span and saw a somewhat stooped old guy on the House floor talking about the end of oil supplies, whipping out one chart after another. The guy was obviously too scientific to be a politician. He looked and sounded like a cross between Mr. Wizard and Johnny Appleseed, as he explained that the depletion of oil will cause great economic and possibly civic disruption unless we get on the stick now.

( Full story here )

It’s the End of the World as We Know It…

A specter is haunting global civilization: the specter of “carrying capacity.” In one forum after another, the idea that we are nearing Malthusian limits in terms of the development of highly organized societies and human habitation of earth is making itself heard. Scientists and sociologists point to different specific phenomena: species extinction and habitat destruction, over-population, global warming, peak oil, falling water tables, the proliferation of super-viruses, and so on, but the theme of most of these analyses is simple: things cannot, and will not, go on as they are much longer. Some of the thinking associated with this idea is rather timid and narrow, some of it is lyrical and reasoned, some of it is flat-out apocalyptic. Sometimes the same author exhibits more than one of these characteristics in the same article or book. Some of the proposed prescriptions for our plight are just about as frightening as the worst-case scenario themselves.

( Full story here )

Viewpoint: Who cares about our ‘sustainability’?

The headlines are commonplace today: “County Board OKs 223 upscale homes,” a sizeable subdivision is approved near Caledonia and another near Winnebago. Still others are announced in and around Rockford, along with commercial development projects.
We continue to build more and bigger roads to push the urban sprawl farther and farther out. Maybe that should not be too surprising. Oil is plentiful today because we are producing about as much of it as we ever will.

( Full story here )

Import - America's Achilles heel

Very few Americans realize how precarious their lifestyle has become in recent years, as the United States becomes increasingly dependent on imported oil. Every year our aging oilfields produce less oil, while newly virulent hurricanes will likely continue to tear up oil and gas fields in the Gulf of Mexico .

Of the 20+ million barrels we burn each day, some 12 million are now imported from nearly 70 different countries either as crude oil or refined products. These countries range from our friendly neighbors, Canada and Mexico , to quite a few who for, one reason or other, don’t like America one bit and who would like nothing better than to stop “their” oil from going into “our” tanks.

( Full story here )

Are Investors waking up ?

Are Investors Waking Up?
When will the second shoe drop? The 214-point nosedive in the Dow yesterday was again blamed on the impact of high oil prices, and signals what will happen whenever it finally sinks in that this problem is not going away and will wreak unfathomable havoc on the U.S. and global economy.

The domino effect of the “peak oil” crisis facing the globe is what sends market investors scurrying, even if up until now it has been only in fits and spurts. Yesterday, for example, a higher-than-expected rise in the core consumer price index (CPI) was interpreted, in Wall Street’s usual lemming-like fashion, to mean that high oil prices are, indeed, reverberating throughout the economy. The core CPI does not include direct energy costs, and its rise was interpreted as

( Full story here )

Making gold into lead

After the peak: Alternative fuel choices largely non-existent

( Full story here )

Dell Inc., Intel, Microsoft -- all will die with Moore's Law

Tech Wreck II in End of Moore's Law, $150 Comps from Asia Dell, Intel, and Microsoft stocks are in freefall. (Dell is getting a dead-cat bounce today on AMD news.) Like the last Tech Wreck (in 2000), this one has to do with Moore's Law. Moore's Law is a self-fulfilling prophecy financed by Intel, his company, as long as they can afford it.

( full story here )

Why this hike and who are behind? -II

What are the reasons behind the increase in the price of oil, Abid Mustafa sees the problem from a global perspective

Other factors such as the weakness of the dollar and the falsifying of oil reserve inventories by oil companies such as shell have added to market uncertainty over the past few years and have helped to push up the price of oil.
Whilst the aforementioned only tell part of the story the underlying causes foretell higher oil prices and conflicts between nations over the control of the remaining hydrocarbons. The underlying causes can be summarized as follows:-

( Full story here )

The Dollar/Oil-Price Connection

Seeking to shift blame away from the Federal Reserve and the Nixon White House for the oil shocks of the early 1970s, the late Herbert Stein said, “My devotion to the old-time religion is not so great as to make me believe that M1 or the full-employment budget deficit determines the amount of rainfall in the Russian wheat lands, the location of Peruvian anchovies or the decisions of the oil cartel.”

( Full story here )

Is a 1970s-type oil shock ahead?

A demand-driven price change works differently than a supply-driven change.

The higher prices are a result of increased domestic and international demand for gasoline. Price increases do not stop people from driving; the gas is still there, but the increases do cause people to spend more on gasoline.

Think of this as the circle of life: When I fill up, I get the gas I want and the station gets the dollars it wants.

Those dollars do not disappear — they are circulated throughout the economy. Gas-station owners take the dollars they receive and buy stuff that they want, which, in turn, becomes someone else’s income. This pattern repeats itself until these exchanges eventually peter out

( Full story here )

Peak Oil will change our lives

Most speakers agreed that Peak Oil could be the biggest problem America faces today - bigger than terrorism, health-care reform or immigration. And because it could disrupt our peace and prosperity in ways most of us had never imagined, Peak Oil could even be bigger than global warming in the short term. And it will affect these other issues, too.

Yet, if it's such a big problem, why don't we hear about much about Peak Oil in the media? I'll come back to this. But before that, I'd like to share three big things I learned about Peak Oil.

First, its absence from the 11 o'clock news doesn't mean Peak Oil isn't real.

( Full story here )

Triage for the post-peak oil age

When casualties overwhelm battlefield doctors, they are often forced to sort the wounded into three groups: those who will survive without treatment, those who will likely die even with treatment, and those who will probably live but only with treatment. In the post-peak oil age we will likely be faced with a similar situation in deciding which activities a lower-energy society can support.


( Full story here )

How to invest for a crash

I believe there is a correction coming – and potentially much more than a correction. While nothing is guaranteed, we could be lining up for a 1987-style market crash, with all that entails (though a crash is not guaranteed, either). If we see such an event, I doubt foreign stocks will be spared in the short term.

( Full story here )

Has the Long Peak-Oil Emergency Begun?

Interview: Writer and urbanist James Kunstler talks about America's auto-dependent culture, urban sprawl and what he sees beyond our dependence on oil.

( Full story here )

Peak Oil Debate Digresses Into Global Warming Argument

Petroleum engineer Michael Economides and Stephen Leeb, Editor of “The Complete Investor,” battled wits at the New York Hard Assets Investor Conference today in a heated debate on ‘peak oil.’ But the discussion took a bit of a turn.

( full story here )

Rocks, Rock Oil and Peak Oil

ALMOST 2,000 YEARS AGO, a Stone Age tribe made camp under a sandstone overhang in a place south of Pittsburgh now called Meadowcroft Rock Shelter, in Washington County. Theirs was a world still in glacial throes, with the edge of a mile-thick sheet of ice not far to the north. On the edge of a frozen ice desert that covered half the continent, these ancients sought protection from the bitter elements. Today, visitors to Meadowcroft can enter an open excavation and view evidence of tools and campfires made by these wandering souls so long ago.

( Full story here )

Why the United States Invaded Iraq and is Now Thinking About Invading Iran

On April 28, the IAEA released its report on Iran. The IAEA reported that: "the Agency cannot make a judgment about, or reach a conclusion on, future compliance or intentions." The report came as no surprise to those who have been following the ongoing dispute between Iran, United States and the IAEA.

( full story here )

No happy ending on oil fairy tale

Some would have Americans believe that the cause of the current high prices is a lack of refinery capacity, or new ethanol requirements, or any other minor barrier to what would otherwise be an unlimited gush of gasoline.

The problem is far simpler than any of that, but much harder to demagogue: The world is running out of oil.

( Full story here )

The factors behind the increase in price of oil

Today global crude oil prices are hovering around US$70 a barrel, compared with merely about US$20 in 2002. Earlier on April 21 and 24 the price of a barrel of oil reached $75.35 on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the highest since the contracts began trading in 1983. So what are the reasons for oil prices?

( Full story here )

The recurring fear of Russian gas dependency

US Vice President Dick Cheney's recent criticism of Russia for using natural gas as a political weapon is by no means new. Similar charges leveled 24 years ago during the Cold War resulted in an embargo on the sale of gas-extracting equipment to the Soviet Union and to the US Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA) purported destruction of a Soviet gas pipeline.

( Full story here )

No Quick Fixes For America's Energy Problems

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen, for quick fix solutions that will cure all our energy ills.

We'll suspend the federal gas tax. We can plant oil wells in the Arctic wilderness and off our coasts, assuring us years of worry-free guzzling. Did we mention the $100 rebate?

( Full story here )

'Obscene' profits polemics

"What are we gonna do about those obscene oil prices by Bush's oil buddies?"An architect friend told me a contractor said this to her. While the two of them discussed a commercial project, the contractor added for good measure, "Prices won't go down until Bush leaves office." When my friend told me the story, she sighed, "Can you believe supposedly intelligent people buy into that nonsense?"
Oh, I believe. Believe me, I believe.

( Full story here )

If you think we’re paying dearly for gas, look around

In “Drivers feel pain at the Pump” (AC-T, April 12), Dale Neal told us that Asheville has the highest gas prices in the state, that motorists are grumbling as they fill their tanks, and that prices are likely to rise.

But despite the high prices, we can still enjoy the benefits of gasoline use — personal travel in comfort, whenever we want and wherever we want to go. Others are less fortunate.

( Full story here )

Renowned energy strategist sees extraordinary changes ahead

As he prepared to discuss the future of the world's oil and natural gas business, Henry Groppe, a renowned oil and gas strategist and founder of the Groppe, Long & Littell consulting firm in Houston, urged his audience to keep two things in mind:

"One is the dominance of the oil and gas industry. It is part of everything in the world; it is vital to world economies and it has now passed agriculture as the biggest industry in the world. At a $60 price, the world's crude oil business is $1.75 trillion a year. Second, keep in mind that there are extraordinary changes ahead for Texas and for the United States."

( Full story here )

A peek at Peak Oil

The first half of the Age of Oil is drawing to a close, and possibly much sooner than projected

"Thirty years from now, oil will be little used as a source of energy... Our grandchildren will say, 'You burned it? All those beautiful molecules? You burned it?'"
- Kenneth Deffeyes, Professor Emeritus, Princeton University

( Full story here )

Peak Oil & Climate Change

PetroCollapse was where you might hear author Albert Bates (“The Post-Petroleum Survival Guide and Cookbook ”) describe the aftermath of Hurricane Wilma in Cancún—communities learning to live without major power infrastructure, relying on solar generators, and gathering each night to play music and dance. A collapse of our current civilization was the prevailing assumption—the discussion focused on how to build “lifeboats,” both metaphorical and quite physical, to survive what speakers described as almost certain catastrophe once our oil-driven economy collapsed. What speakers like Bates had to offer, though, was the theory that this would also “solve” the oil-driven problems of wars, social alienation and “political corruption and mindless intrigues.”


( Full story here )

Power Down or Collapse ?

Last weekend, I attended a conference in Washington entitled "Petrocollapse." The organizers of the conference believe at some point the price of oil suddenly will rise so rapidly and will become so scarce that much of the world's current economic system will be unable to function. A corollary seems to be that beyond that unhappy day, governments as currently constituted won't be able to do much to help the situation.

( Full story here )

CIBC World Markets report predicts natural gas prices will rise along with summer temperatures in North America

Consumers who benefited from cheaper home heating costs this past winter due to record warm temperatures are likely to need those savings to pay their electricity bills this summer, states a new report from CIBC World Markets.

( Full story here )

Oil, Gas, Lies and Corruption - Profiting from Unscrupulous Governments

Winston Churchill said “truth is so precious that she should be attended by a bodyguard of lies.” When it comes to Saudi Arabia’s oil resources no truer words can reflect how Saudi’s power elite have hidden the truth about their misguided stewardship of our planet’s biggest oil deposits.

( Full story here )

Norway's oil production falls in April

Norway's oil companies are reporting record first-quarter profits based on high prices, but a new study suggests production took a dive in April, said reports reaching Stockholm from Oslo on Tuesday.

( Full story here )

Nigeria's rebel militants warn attacks on oil facilities

Nigeria's militants in oil-rich Niger Delta region on Tuesday warned the public that they would soon resume land-based attacks on petroleum related installations.

( Full story here )

No quick fixes

American wells already supply 8 percent of world oil production. Since America holds only 2 percent of world oil reserves, we are, in effect, draining domestic oil reserves four times faster than the rest of the world.

( Full story here )

Iran to be given options of benefits or sanctions

European officials on Tuesday worked on a package of carrots and sticks for Iran after major powers failed to agree on a U.N. resolution aimed at curbing Tehran's nuclear ambitions, diplomats said.

( Full story here )

Political bluster no way to handle a fuel crisis

You don’t have to have your ear to the tracks to hear the hullabaloo blaming “big oil” and Americans’ “addiction” to foreign oil for alarmingly high energy prices. Once again, snake-oil salesmen are out-shouting reasoned discussions about three-dollar gas.

The clamor from Capitol Hill is one example. Capitalism has become a dirty word. Congressional leaders from both sides are demanding investigations of oil companies for “price-fixing,” “price-gouging” and “windfall” profits.

( Full story here )

Fear Not, Oil Traders -- It's Hugo Chavez to the Rescue!

As I write in the upcoming (tomorrow's) Money and Markets...

It is in the interests of both Iran and Venezuela to keep oil prices high, and one way to do that is to inject as much fear as possible in the global oil markets. Every dollar rise in the price of a barrel of oil is more money in their coffers.

( Full story here )

Author David Goodstein's lecture explores peak oil

He warns of an energy crisis and the shortcomings of alternative fuels in talk at Cal Poly; some in the audience wanted more on how to avoid maximum oil usage

( Full story here )

The Decline of Oil

When the price of oil climbed above $50 a barrel in late 2004, public attention began to focus on the adequacy of world oil supplies - and specifically on when production would peak and begin to decline. Analysts are far from a consensus on this issue, but several prominent ones now believe that the oil peak is imminent," says Lester Brown, President of the Earth Policy Institute. (See http://www.earthpolicy.org/Books/Seg/PB2ch02_ss2.htm.)

( Full story here )

Peak oil letter from UK energy minister

The Energy Minister Malcolm Wicks has recently responded to a letter from energy awareness organisation PowerSwitch. The letter directly addresses peak oil, dismissing peak before 2030 provided the necessary investments are made. On discovery he believes the decline in discovery since the sixties was due to lack of drilling in the Middle East and FSU caused by the large proved reserves but he expects this trend to change, with more and larger fields being discovered as drilling picks up.

( Full story here )

For Sound Energy Policy, Don't Look to Congress

Congress thinks we're stupid. Maybe we are. We, most of us, refuse to accept that we are living in a world of rapidly increasing demand for declining fossil fuel resources.

We believe more oil is to be found around the corner, in the next country, beneath the ocean, under or in the next rock. Maybe it is.

( Full story here )

India fast losing energy

In its quest for energy, New Delhi is in danger of falling between two stools in its dealings with the US and Iran. Ratification of the India-US nuclear deal over civilian nuclear energy cooperation has hit major roadblocks in Congress, with sharp differences emerging over various definitions of the deal.

( Full story here )

A frenzy in Washington

( Full story here )

Peak Oil Passnotes: Volatility Redux

Everyone was expecting a draw down in U.S. gasoline stocks. If you have been following our previous articles, you should understand why. Hurricanes smashed refineries. Refineries could not make petrol. Other refineries made lots to make up. Then they in turn were repaired this year. Ok, now you have been caught up.

Demand has not stopped growing in any major way. Therefore, the whole complex was sucking up as much as it could. In general, although to some extent it does not make sense, it means the price of oil goes up. So we smashed all records. We smashed the NYMEX, Brent, OPEC basket, Mexican basket and everyone else’s record price.

( Full story here )

Substituting petrol

The Iraq conflict has led to a steady rise in crude prices and the prospect of conflict with Iran has triggered a big spike. Crude prices have jumped 25 per cent in the last two months.

Even if Iran-Iraq cools off, it’s difficult to envisage long-term scenarios where prices reduce dramatically. Demand from growth economies like India and China is up. “Peak Oil” theorists are projecting near-future scenarios where global oil supply peaks and demand continues to grow.

( Full story here )

Has oil production peaked?

Herrera: Statistics point to peak production; prices likely to go higher

It’s well known that U.S. oil production has been declining for many years. And, in Alaska, oil production is well past its peak. But has worldwide oil production peaked? And what impact might worldwide oil production capacity have on already soaring oil prices?

( Full story here )

Oil production's peaking? Snag a Hummer

Royal Dutch Shell, the world's fourth-largest publicly traded oil company, reported a tiny, 3% increase in first-quarter earnings from a year ago, but said the high cost of sucking oil and natural gas out of the ground could delay some exploration projects, especially long-term developments, including one planned for the Gulf of Mexico. Shell also said it could no longer promise to replace 100% of the reserves it depletes this year.

( Full story here )

The Real Oil Story: The Oil in Iraq

Oil is pretty slippery stuff. The press is playing up $3 a gallon gasoline, record oil company profits, and the $400 million retirement package for Exxon’s former CEO. But these stories are trivial compared to the oil story they have ignored all along. The war in Iraq. It’s an oil war. And you don’t have to take my word for it. Read former Republican strategist Kevin Phillips new book, “American Theocracy: the Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century.” The corporate media may have failed us but authors like Phillips are providing the needed analysis.

( Full story here )

Russia, China Oppose UN Draft Resolution on Iran

Russia and China opposed on Friday key provisions in a UN draft resolution that orders Iran to curb its nuclear ambitions.

Both nations objected to the use of Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, used in dozens of Security Council resolutions for peacekeeping missions and other legally-binding actions, Reuters reported. Although Chapter 7 allows for sanctions and even war, a separate resolution is required to specify either step.

( Full story here )

Computer pioneer lives low-tech, smalltown life

Some might call James Van Bokkelen a simple guy.

He disagrees.

"When people ask, I say I'm complicated," Van Bokkelen said. "I'm not at all simple."

He might not be simple, but Van Bokkelen isn't interested in leading a complicated life. His home operates on solar energy power and he lives off his land as much as possible, growing his own vegetables, getting eggs from his chickens, and harvesting wheat to make his own bread. He uses a wood-burning stove and he and his wife, Jocelyn, drive hybrid cars.

( Full story here )

Computer pioneer lives low-tech, smalltown life

Some might call James Van Bokkelen a simple guy.

He disagrees.

"When people ask, I say I'm complicated," Van Bokkelen said. "I'm not at all simple."

He might not be simple, but Van Bokkelen isn't interested in leading a complicated life. His home operates on solar energy power and he lives off his land as much as possible, growing his own vegetables, getting eggs from his chickens, and harvesting wheat to make his own bread. He uses a wood-burning stove and he and his wife, Jocelyn, drive hybrid cars.

( Full story here )

Computer pioneer lives low-tech, smalltown life

Some might call James Van Bokkelen a simple guy.

He disagrees.

"When people ask, I say I'm complicated," Van Bokkelen said. "I'm not at all simple."

He might not be simple, but Van Bokkelen isn't interested in leading a complicated life. His home operates on solar energy power and he lives off his land as much as possible, growing his own vegetables, getting eggs from his chickens, and harvesting wheat to make his own bread. He uses a wood-burning stove and he and his wife, Jocelyn, drive hybrid cars.

( Full story here )

An energy crisis of our own making

Record gasoline prices, heating oil so high that families cannot afford to heat their homes, and the highest natural gas prices in the world point to one inescapable conclusion: America is suffering an energy crisis. The unfortunate truth is that this crisis was not only predictable but also largely preventable.

( Full story here )

Peak Oil and Darwinism: The New Denial Industry

Today in Spring 2006 we are sliding into a genuine Oil Shock, even admitted by our admired and respected democratic leaders in the shape of emergency G7 Finance minister meetings, and the upcoming Summer Energy Security Summit of G8.

( Full story here )

Why You Should Worry About Big Oil

Beyond the fat profits, the giants are surprisingly vulnerable worldwide. That's bad news for business -- and consumers

( full story here )

An Economist response, or is it a techie Sunday?

Oh, dear it looks as though I have to disagree with an economist again. But this time it is the magazine rather than an individual. As has been pointed out, and to an extent discussed in recent comments thanks to which I was able to read the initial article, the Economist came out with an article this past week that suggested that the current problems with the supply of oil are not really serious, or long-term.

( Full story here )

Lee residents pawning jewelry for gas money

Southwest Florida pawn shops have become stop-offs for some residents looking for a few extra bucks to fill their gas tanks.

With most unleaded regular fuel prices hovering around $3 a gallon, pawn shops are being hit up for cash to offset the high costs. Pawn shops are one of the few places where people can get money as fast as gas prices are rising.

( Full story here )

Oil Spiel

James Howard Kunstler
Oil Spiel
President Bush says Americans guzzle too much petroleum, and James Howard Kunstler would certainly agree. But the flamethrowing author of The Long Emergency—a wickedly entertaining and terrifying look into a future without cheap fuel—thinks the world isn't doing nearly enough to get ready, and nobody is safe from his wrath.

( Full story here )

ExxonMobil chair, CEO to NBC: No 'help' is on the way

Responding today to questions by NBC's Today show host Matt Lauer on the topic of high gas prices and peak oil, Exxonmobil Chairman and CEO Rex Tillerson has stated consumers shouldn't be expecting any relief on the way from big oil.

( Full story here )

Crisistunity!

Peak oil is the theory that says that we’ve passed the halfway mark of the planet’s oil supplies. Since making new oil requires dinosaurs, pressure and a whole lot of time, the world’s oil supply isn’t going anywhere but down. I’m not going to get into the details here because I’m betting most people are familiar with the concept. If you aren’t, Wikipedia has a good entry about it, which includes statements from critics of the theory.

( Full story here )

The camels are coming, the camels are coming

At a recent meeting of the Social Planning Council a participant at one of the discussion tables raised the subject of "Peak Oil". Two of the eight people at the table had no idea what it meant.

( Full story here )

Experts Ponder Peak of Global Oil Production

Six years into the 21st century, the United States and the world remain heavily dependent on the fuel that powered the last 100 years: oil. President Bush has gone so far as to call that dependence an "addiction."

( Full story here )

The Energy Wars

The rise of a new global energy elite means high oil and gas prices are here to stay.

( Full story here )

Peak oil acknowledgement a breath of fresh air

The Green Party is welcoming Prime Minister Helen Clark's acknowledgement that the Earth may have already reached peak oil production or that this point is very near.

"Helen Clark is the first New Zealand Prime Minister to grasp this fundamental driver of our future, and I commend her for this. Still, New Zealanders continue to wait with bated breath for some real action on this issue," Green Party Co-Leader Jeanette Fitzsimons says.

( Full story here )

Oil: The party is over

Welcome to the world of 70-dollars-plus-per-barrel oil. That’s if there is no crisis in the Gulf over Iran’s nuclear ambitions. If there is, then get ready for 140 dollars a barrel. Oil briefly breached the 70-dollar barrier eight months ago, but this time it’s going up for good.

( Full story here )

The next Oil War ... a complex, troubled background

The imperial, royal and religious dynasty of the Bourbons was a long-lived European power elite, episodically holding many different powers through the 11th to 16th centuries. Legend has it that the family had one severe weakness: ”Forgetting nothing, and learning nothing.”

( Full story here )

The War on Terror: The Energy Front

The following speech was given as part of Restoration Weekend 2006, at the Arizona Biltmore in Phoenix, Feb. 23-26, 2006 -- The Editors.

I'm honored to be invited but, to tell you the truth, since I was a Washington lawyer for 22 years and then I was with the CIA during the Clinton administration, I'm pretty well honored to be invited into any polite company for any purposes whatsoever.

( Full story here )

The Bolivian seizure

Not unexpectedly, the Bolivian government has seized the production facilities of the various gas and oil producers within their borders. The companies have 180 days to accept new terms or be evicted from Bolivia. In a continued socializing of natural resources in South America, higher oil prices are causing governments across the world to eye profit rich oil companies with envy.

( Full story here )

Peak Oil to Prematurely Prevent the Perilous Pursuit of a Precarious Paradise…

The Independent on Sunday this week had a supplement with it called “Overseas Property” full of ways that British folks can buy their ‘dream holiday house’ in Spain or Portugal. The giveaway of course was in smaller print on the cover, “produced in association with British Airways”. Yes, of course. It is the cheap air travel that makes “buying your dream home by the sea” even a starter. I have got to feeling that there is something terribly undesirable and impendingly disastrous about all this. I’m sure some people will disagree, but I think there is something very important at issue here.

( Full story here )

BOLIVIA, OIL AND GOLD

Not unexpectedly, the Bolivian government has seized the production facilities of the various gas and oil producers within their borders. The companies have 180 days to accept new terms or be evicted from Bolivia. In a continued socializing of natural resources in South America, higher oil prices are causing governments across the world to eye profit rich oil companies with envy.


( Full story here )

Snake oil rhetoric masks big-oil issues

to foreign oil for alarmingly high energy prices. Once again, snake-oil salesmen are outshouting reasoned discussions about $3 gas.

The clamor from Capitol Hill is one example. Capitalism has become a dirty word. Congressional leaders from both sides are demanding investigations of oil companies for "price-fixing," "price-gouging" and "windfall" profits. In response, President Bush ordered an investigation into gouging, urged an end to tax breaks for oil companies and suspended deliveries to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve through the fall. Suspending deposits will keep about 25,000 barrels more a day on the summer market, according to Bloomberg News — a drop in the ocean considering U.S. petroleum consumption averaged 20.7 million barrels a day in 2004.

( Full story here )

U.S., UK, France to take Iran proposal to U.N.

The United States, Britain and France were set to brief the United Nations Security Council on Wednesday on their proposed resolution that would give Iran another chance to curb its nuclear program.

But the Western allies probably will not distribute a text that Russia and China still oppose. Moscow and Beijing fear it would be a step toward sanctions or even military action, although the draft will not threaten either measure.

( Full story here )

Crude realties: Iran sounds alarm

With the threat of a war between Iran and the US, oil concerns are only getting worse.

Iran's Deputy Oil Minister has warned that crude could soon cross the dreaded $100 mark.

"We do not like the high oil prices but it is possible that oil may touch $100 because the market shows that there is greater demand than supply and supply in the short term cannot be increased," said Mohammed H N Hosseinian, Deputy Oil Minister, Iran.

( Full story here )

On the Flip Side - Escalating U.S. Energy Crisis a Delight to Others

The U.S. government has recognized the worldwide oil crisis of today and has spent billions of dollars researching and developing alternative energy sources. In 2005, the Bush Administration signed the first energy bill to be passed in over 10 years, and today a mad rush to find cost-efficient fuel for America’s demand is in high effect.

For many years the popular talk of the day has been global warming and the greenhouse effect, how industrialized nations are emitting endless amounts of carbon dioxide and other toxins into the atmosphere, burning holes straight through the ozone layer. But why is it that only recently people are being concerned with the other side of the coin, the possibility that soon we will no longer be spewing greenhouse gases from our cars because we will have run out of CO2-releasing fuels to consume?

( Full story here )

The Economics of the Oil “Crisis”

A great many “solutions” to the oil/gasoline-price “problem” have surfaced in recent days, each of which will ostensibly drive the price of energy back down to levels that will satisfy consumers. But it’s funny (or not so funny) how each of these “solutions” will do exactly the opposite.


( Full story here )

World Oil Price Peak Disputed

watch World Oil Peak report / Real broadband - download

watch World Oil Peak report / Real broadband

watch World Oil Peak report / Real dialup - download

watch World Oil Peak report / Real dialup

( Link here )

Where is the global oil shock?

With oil priced at over $70 a barrel many are asking why the impact is not as severe as the two OPEC-induced oil shocks that struck the world economy in 1973 and 1979.

( Full story here )

Edward Lotterman: Oil prices are beyond control of U.S. government policy

Oil price posturing is a waste of time.

President Bush's speech on gasoline prices last Tuesday danced around peripheral issues but failed to address the underlying problems.

Congressional responses were about as irrelevant.

( Full story here )

Can current oil 'crisis' be good for America?

Frank Zarb still shakes his head and smiles when he tells the story. It was back in 1975 when he was the nation's energy czar. All the Sturm und Drang over the first Arab oil embargo and gasoline lines had died down, and those great plans he had for a national energy policy had dropped off the political radar.

( Full story here )

Principles for the post-peak oil job market

Many types of jobs will cease to exist: public relations executive, marketing directors, et cetera. I think work will be very hands-on, and a lot of it will revolve around food production.
-- James Howard Kunstler, 2003
When I speak before college audiences about peak oil, I often ask if there are any engineers present. I suggest that they concentrate on jobs that will produce rather than consume energy, particularly energy that is renewable and doesn't create greenhouse gas emissions. While it is difficult to tell exactly what kinds of jobs will be available in the post-peak oil age, inklings of some broad principles are coming into view.

( Full story here )