Petrol prices hit a new high

Kohoutek

Snooze wrote: »

I far from convinced with this "Peak Oil" stuff. In fact, I file it squarely in the tray labelled "BS"...

Very few/no credible sources debate the fact that peak "conventional oil" (which is what most people understand to be oil) occurred in the past, including some of the world's largest oil companies.

The International Energy Agency, which is the definitive provider of long term energy data and projections to the UK and other Western countries, recently confirmed peak conventional oil occurred in 2006.

What oil companies and IEA argue is that supply will grow or at least not fall because of greater exploitation of more complex, difficult to extract, expensive forms of oil, like the high controversial Canadian Tar Sands or turning natural gas into oil ("natural gas liquids").

Snooze

Kohoutek wrote: »

Very few/no credible sources debate the fact that peak "conventional oil" (which is what most people understand to be oil) occurred in the past, including some of the world's largest oil companies.

The International Energy Agency, which is the definitive provider of long term energy data and projections to the UK and other Western countries, recently confirmed peak conventional oil occurred in 2006.

What oil companies and IEA argue is that supply will grow or at least not fall because of greater exploitation of more complex, difficult to extract, expensive forms of oil, like the high controversial Canadian Tar Sands or turning natural gas into oil ("natural gas liquids").

One wonders how many of these so-called credible companies are receiving back-handers from the governments to say this though. :cool: Call me a sceptic if you wish but it all seems a bit too "convenient" for me, especially with the other stealth tax BS like carbon emissions, global warming, needing to "save" the planet etc etc.

I'm sat firmly on the fence re "Peak Oil"... :cool:

Kohoutek

Snooze wrote: »

One wonders how many of these so-called credible companies are receiving back-handers from the governments to say this though. :cool: Call me a sceptic if you wish but it all seems a bit too "convenient" for me, especially with the other stealth tax BS like carbon emissions, global warming, needing to "save" the planet etc etc.

I'm sat firmly on the fence re "Peak Oil"... :cool:

It's not just convenient for political purposes that a finite resource has a beginning, middle and end, it's a fact too. Commercial oil production started 150 years ago. With the exception of some blips caused by wars in the Middle East in the 1970s, we extracted more and more oil out of the ground every year until the world hit a plateau in 2004.

It's not because of backhanders or conspiracies theories that oil output in the UK, Norway, Mexico etc is crashing, that oil output peaked in the US in 1970, Iran 1976, Venezuela 1974 etc...it's unfortunately a geological fact.

At these oil prices anyway, the oil companies don't need backhanders...

Snooze

Kohoutek wrote: »

It's not just convenient for political purposes that a finite resource has a beginning, middle and end, it's a fact too. Commercial oil production started 150 years ago. With the exception of some blips caused by wars in the Middle East in the 1970s, we extracted more and more oil out of the ground every year until the world hit a plateau in 2004.

It's not because of backhanders or conspiracies theories that oil output in the UK, Norway, Mexico etc is crashing, that oil output peaked in the US in 1970, Iran 1976, Venezuela 1974 etc...it's unfortunately a geological fact.

At these oil prices anyway, the oil companies don't need backhanders...

I hear ya, but I'm still not convinced it's as clear cut as you make out. As I say, I'm on the fence. :cool:

Typhoon2000

Nuclear power stations are what we need, charging points everywhere for electric cars that dont have hydrogen fuel cells. That should leave enough oil for ships and planes.

worried_jim

Batchy wrote: »

its called inflation...

Lets hope you get plenty of wage inflation too.

I got myself a big diesel... changed from Hot hatch, either way im up in the pocket, would be better without increases.

Still running my car on free waste vegetable oil.In total so far this tear I have spent £96 on fuel stuffs and done 4000 miles. I only have to buy diesel when its really cold and veg solidifies.

A._Badger

Snooze wrote: »

I'm far from convinced with this "Peak Oil" stuff. In fact, I file it squarely in the tray labelled "BS" along with the CO2, carbon reduction, saving the planet etc etc etc, all of which are simple scare-mongering tactics by the collective governments to extract more money from us. Telling the masses there's only a couple of barrels of the stuff left in the ground is an excellent convincer for charging £5 per litre.

Likewise. It's hard to take the Chicken Littles too seriously when Reuters runs stories like the following:

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6AT68Q20101130

Snooze

worried_jim wrote: »

Still running my car on free waste vegetable oil.In total so far this tear I have spent £96 on fuel stuffs and done 4000 miles. I only have to buy diesel when its really cold and veg solidifies.

Hope you're not running that in a CRD engine otherwise you'll be looking at a big bill soon.

Snooze

A._Badger wrote: »

Likewise. It's hard to take the Chicken Littles too seriously when Reuters runs stories like the following:

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6AT68Q20101130

Yeah it's stories like this that make me think there is in fact no shortage of oil once they dust off and crank up their drills. It's much easier to keep everyone in the dark telling them there's only 2 cupfuls left and wind the price up to obscene levels to "justify" this, whilst laughing all the way to the bank knowing full well there's oceans of the stuff under their feet.

Sceptic, much? :cool:

Kohoutek

A._Badger wrote: »

Likewise. It's hard to take the Chicken Littles too seriously when Reuters runs stories like the following:

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6AT68Q20101130

If you think that disproves peak oil, then you don't understand peak oil.

"Peak oil" means a peak in oil production, not oil reserves. You don't run cars, ships and aeroplanes on the total amount of oil in the ground, you run it on the amount of oil that can be extracted every day. If you read about the source of many of these new reserve additions like tar sands and oil shale, for geological reasons they cannot be exploited as quickly as the older, higher quality deposits.

Despite these new discoveries, the US is hardly swimming in oil – they have the equivalent of about 12 times what they produce every year – far less than the Middle East (claims) to have.

No-one would seriously argue that peak oil production in the United States will ever be reversed....it would have to almost double from its present figure



Oil reserves will almost always rise with substantial increases in the price of oil because reserves just means the amount of oil that is commercially recoverable. There's certainly a lot of oil available at $200/barrel, whether the global economy could tolerate it is another thing.