Originally Posted by Americano

By the year 2020 US requirements oil are forecast, with no new energy sources and current consumption rate of increase, at 12-billion barrels/yr. We current import 63% of our requirements, which would rise to 87% in 2020. For an eye-opener, do the math to understand what the trade deficit on oil alone would be at that stage with $500/barrel oil.

FSU Editorial: "US Oil Reserves: Four Scenarios" by Chris Geerlings 07/24/2007

Originally Posted by Norrin Radd

Thanks for sharing that.

Well I was just looking for some info and I found this which I thought was very interesting....

CNN & Shell sponsored advert on peak oil, (jpg, 321 Kb)
TIME magazine Europe edition, 31 March 2008

http://www.odac-info.org/sites/odac....-08colourC.JPG

Be sure to read the part titled...

What Will Happen if the World Doesn't Embrace Alternative Energy?

Originally Posted by Americano

That's pretty much in line with with what most informed sources are stating. The question isn't whether or not there's going to be peak oil, the disaster point being the period from peak oil and how long it takes technology to supply viable substitutes for transportation, agriculture and industrial requirements. All most Americans are aware of is gasoline pump prices while viewing more oil and refining capability now as a feasible long-term solution to 'their' problem without further consideration.

I can't decide whether people believing there's enough undiscovered oil to avert the eventual crisis is, like opinions of fixing the US economy cost of labor problem by cutting business taxes, naive or pathetic.

Originally Posted by Alex

I think the concept of "peak oil" is highly dubious. There are a growing number of scientists who now believe that oil is not a fossil fuel, but rather oil is continuously generated by natural processes in the Earth's magma. Essentially that would mean there is an endless supply of oil. This seems to make far more sense that the infantile notion that oil comes from dinosaurs!

The existence of self-renewing oil fields, like Eugene Island off the coast of Louisiana, shatters the peak oil myth.

Here are a few article for anyone interested.
Abiogenic petroleum origin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Myth of "Peak Oil" - Charles Feathestone - Mises Institute
Discovery and development of oil & gas fields in Dnieper-Donets Basin (1994)
abiotic oil debate

Originally Posted by Andrewl

Even if abiotic oil was a reality (and it might be in the form of hydrocarbons on different moons and planets in the solar system) the fact is not one drop of 'abiotic' oil has ever been produced or consumed. All the oil we have ever consumed on earth is of the 'biotic' type.

Currently we are in a situation where oil production has flattened out since May 2005, and demand continues to grow.

There is a growing number of scientists, geologists, and oil execs who now say we have hit the peak.

Really the only debate about peak oil is when, not if. If the find in Brazil is true, (and it still is not clear what the size of their offshore field is) it does not impact peak oil at all as it takes at least a decade to produce new offshore deep sea oil, and in the meantime the existing sources are all in decline.

World demand for oil in 2030 is expected be 120 million barrels per day. We are currently struggling to produce any more than 85 million barrels per day.

Peak oil is a fact. Abiotic oil is a myth akin to the lost city of atlantis.


Andrew

Originally Posted by Alex

Then please explain for me the reason that once dormant oil wells are suddenly filled with new oil like at Eugene Island and literally hundreds of other places? Did you know that the Vietnamese have discovered a huge oil field in the waters off the coast called White Tiger Field? And also and in the nearby Black Bear and Black Lion fields, exploration companies are drilling more than a mile into solid granite--so-called basement rock--for oil. Oil isn't supposed to be found in basement rock, which never rose near the surface of the earth where ancient plants grew and dinosaurs walked. Yet oil is there. Last year the White Tiger Field and nearby areas produced 338,000 barrels per day, and they are estimated to hold about 600 million barrels more. If oil is a "fossil fuel" how could this be?

Originally Posted by Andrewl

lol... You sound like a conspiracy theorist.



Andrew

Originally Posted by AkDiesel

It is good to see that at least one person understands the story.

The last one to be built was the Marathon's Garyville, Louisiana facility in 1976. Now from that time to today there have been over 100 closed.

We have been on this lane reduction from the years of Carter and the other Dems that controled the halls of D.C.
Even when the other side of the coin got into power there was really no change , maybe a bit faster down hill but no stopping of the slide.

And now that more americans have stocks and 401ks that is putting a higher demand on better returns and higher stock prices. So thanks America for the greed on wall street....

There was a time that people said that man could not fly,, and today we are.
There was a time that people said that man could not go over 35mph, and today we are.
There was a time that people said that man could not sail the oceans, and today we are.
The list continues.... ways of drilling be it in the north sea, north slope, or any other place is better today than 50 years ago.
Refineries can be built better today but sadly people say not my back yard but we wish to have 1950's prices and 1990's stock returns...

Could we do better for energy? yes and one way would be to have the nut jobs and the government to get a new set of glasses to truely see what is going on.

Originally Posted by Alex

.....and you sound like a sheep bleating with the herd, or a lemming about to go over the cliff.

Originally Posted by AkDiesel

Greed, yes you are correct on Greed..
but that greed is not just the board rooms of america, but also the americans that have 401k's and other stocks with the energy companies, and the people that are betting on fuel prices going up and not down.
While people cry about the rich, they are trying to act like the rich by greed.

Originally Posted by chassisman

All I know is that I filled up my Pickup today with regular unleaded and it was $72.27
Good thing my job is only 5 blocks away and I have a nice bicycle. Bad thing is my motorhome gets 7MPG and I was planning to go to Michigan for a month this summer.
Honestly, no matter who finds what or where, I cannot see a return to $2 or even $2.75 gas in our future. What I do see is a second wave of the end of the gas guzzler (early 70's), and no, they cannot make an Escalade that gets 36mpg.

Originally Posted by goober

No one has applied to build a new refinery, but plenty have been closed down.
And refining margins are high now.

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