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Peak oil and the ignorance of crowds

As our civilization proceeds down the slope of the post-peak-oil curve, global trade will become more and more expensive, so our economies will naturally localize. The energy-efficiency benefits of localized economies are obvious to us, but there are also social and even psycho-social benefits that aren’t often contemplated. I had the good fortune to work with respected crowd-behavior expert Alan Berkowitz several years ago on a film project about “bystander behavior.” Berkowitz is a psychologist and sociologist who advises, writes, and speaks on bystander behavior, as well as a number of other health and social justice subjects. He founded and edited the Report on Social Norms . I later interviewed him for my documentary, GrowthBusters: Hooked on Growth . I was curious about why human beings react so irrationally to evidence we are harming our planet and the life support systems on which […]

Posted On : Published By : ASPO-USA
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1000 researchers, 400 reports on fusion progress

Nearly 1,000 of the world’s preeminent fusion researchers from 45 countries gathered last week in San Diego to discuss the latest advances in fusion energy. The 24th International Atomic Energy Agency Fusion Energy Conference, organized by the IAEA in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Energy and General Atomics, aims to “provide a forum for the discussion of key physics and technology issues as well as innovative concepts of direct relevance to fusion as a source of nuclear energy.”   Those in attendance in San Diego included Nobel Prize-winning physicist Burton Richter; Physicist Steven Cowley, CEO of the United Kingdom’s Atomic Energy Authority; Frances Chen, a plasma physicist and UCLA professor emeritus who wrote the book An Indispensable Truth: How Fusion Power Can Save the Planet; and keynote speaker William Brinkman, director of the Office of Science in the US Department of Energy. […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Peak Oil: Reasoned Exuberance

The key take-away from the US EIA’s Annual Energy Outlook released [in December] jumps out in the graph below: US crude oil production should peak in 2016 at a level 26% higher than that projected just one year ago. That’s an additional 2 million barrels a day (mb/d), pushing the US total to 9.6 mb/d within three years—the same total that the US produced during its first peak in 1970, as an acquaintance at the EIA pointed out last week. That’s three more break-through years like the last two. Then flat. Finito. As some wag asked last week, is that really a recipe for a continuing oil revolution or an oil retirement party? [1]   Data: EIA’s Early Release Annual Energy Outlook, 2014.  From Ron Patterson. [A] full appraisal of the challenge posed by oil depletion must extend beyond geological assessments of resource size to […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Surge in U.S. Natural Gas Prices Deflates Hopes in Asia

The near doubling of U.S. natural gas prices this winter has damped Asian hopes of buying American gas on the cheap when exports begin in a couple of years. Winter storms and bitter cold in recent weeks boosted demand in the U.S. Prices have eased recently , but had surged to more than $6 per million British thermal units this month from around $3.70 per mBtu in late November. Although seasonal, this price surge has confirmed worries by some Asian gas buyers that much-hyped U.S. gas exports, when they begin, won’t be available at prices as low as previously expected. Asian power producers may now be reassessing the share of U.S. gas in their future energy mix, and reconsidering calls for the benchmarking of regional gas prices against the volatile U.S. gas market. "I think a lot of people were thinking that U.S. LNG export volumes were a no-brainer, […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Oil Futures Eased in Asia; Brent-WTI Spread Narrows Further

Crude-oil futures were slightly lower in Asian trading hours Thursday as oil prices continue to fluctuate this week on uncertainty over post-winter U.S. oil demand and supply issues in the Middle East. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in April traded at $102.29 a barrel at 0615 GMT, down $0.30 in the Globex electronic session. April Brent crude on London’s ICE Futures exchange fell $0.28 to $109.24 a barrel. Overall crude stockpiles in the U.S. grew for the sixth week in a row but the rise was less than expected, while supplies at the Nymex delivery point of Cushing declined for a fourth-straight week. "The other surprise was the first build in distillate inventories since the third of January, against forecasts of a further draw," ANZ Research said in a note. "The rise likely signals the start of a seasonal […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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WTI Crude Trims Monthly Gain After Rising Most in a Week

West Texas Intermediate crude trimmed its monthly advance after rising the most in a week. Brent slid in London . Futures fell as much as 0.4 percent in New York . Crude supplies at Cushing, Oklahoma , the largest U.S. oil-storage hub, fell by 1.08 million barrels to 34.8 million last week, the lowest level in four months, Energy Information Administration data showed yesterday. Distillate inventories, including heating oil and diesel, increased for the first time in seven weeks. “Despite the fact we saw a bit of a rally last night, crude is really still within the range of the last couple of days,” said Ric Spooner, a chief analyst at CMC Markets in Sydney. “There’s a chance we’ll see it lose a bit ground from here in the short term.” WTI for April delivery dropped as much as 37 cents to $102.22 a barrel in electronic trading on […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Iraq breaks ground on Karbala refinery

Iraq has started construction on a long-planned refinery in southern Karbala Province, 100 km south of Baghdad ( OGJ Online, Aug. 1, 2011 ). In a recent groundbreaking ceremony, Iraq’s Prime Minister Noori Al-Maliki laid the first cornerstone for the refinery, which is being built by a four-company consortium of South Korean companies led by Hyundai Engineering & Construction ( OGJ Online, Jan. 9, 2014 ), according to a Feb. 25 release from the Iraqi Ministry of Oil. Delayed construction on the $6.04 billion refinery resulted from political circumstances facing Iraq, particularly Baath regime policies of sabotage, Al-Maliki said during the ceremony. The planned 140,000-b/d Karbala refinery, which will contain more than 20 processing units to produce liquefied gas, gasoline, gas oil, fuel oil, jet fuel, and asphalt meeting international standards equivalent to European production, will serve growing domestic Iraqi demand, Iraq’s Minister of Oil Abdulkareem Liaybi said. The […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Syria Ships Mustard Gas to Port to Be Destroyed

After weeks of deepening foreign frustration over missed deadlines and other delays in Syria’s elimination of its chemical weapons, the international mission policing the process reported on Wednesday that Syria had delivered a significant consignment of mustard gas, one of the deadliest toxic agents, to the Syrian port of Latakia to be exported and destroyed. Sigrid Kaag, the coordinator of the international mission of the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, called the delivery “an important step” toward eliminating Syria’s chemical weapons in the middle of the three-year-old civil war there. Continue reading the main story The latest shipment came after a series of meetings at the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in recent days, aimed at resolving a rift between Syria and its allies, notably Russia, Iran and China, and most Western governments over how to deal with the […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Civilians Flee as Violence Worsens in South Sudan

PMartha Akuoch survived two offensives in the South Sudanese civil war, but the third pitched battle in the city of Malakal was more than she could take. She packed up and crossed the border into Sudan with her six children. “The rebels would come into homes, kill men, boys, take mobile phones, money, and now they are even killing women,” said Ms. Akuoch, 43, a secondary-school teacher who left her husband behind in South Sudan. “Even inside the church,” she added. So, like most of her neighbors, she decided it was time to leave Malakal, the capital of the oil-rich Upper Nile State. About 14,000 people have crowded into this remote Sudanese outpost, just a small […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple