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Recent Posts
- The Green New Deal is not a solution for the real problem: Overshoot
- A transition from fossil fuels to renewables could take a century – if it ever happens
- Electrifying freight trains in the U.S. is a bad idea
- Why Nuclear Power can’t replace fossil fuels
- Energy, Water, & Climate Change are interdependent
- Why fusion power is Forever Away
- Climate Change dominates news coverage at expense of other existential planetary boundaries
- Excerpt from “The Geopolitics of Resource Wars”
- Homes & Buildings
- Book Review “The Outlawed Ocean” by Ian Urbina
- Underestimating the Challenges of Avoiding a Ghastly Future
- Motherboards: too complicated to make after oil
- “More and More and More” one of the best books on energy ever written
- The staggering destruction of knowledge by Christians in the Roman Empire
- Why the R/P Reserves to Production ratio does not show when oil will run out
Category Archives: Oil
Climate Change dominates news coverage at expense of other existential planetary boundaries
Preface. Almost all environmental stories in the media are about greenhouse gases. Yet there are dozens of others in the meta/polycrisis and existential boundaries (Rockström 2009). Overpopulation is the driver, but the severity and magnitude is made possible by fossil … Continue reading
Why the R/P Reserves to Production ratio does not show when oil will run out
Venezuela has an incredibly high oil reserves-to-production ratio This is calculated b dividing proved oil reserves by its annual production. That tells us how many years proved reserves would last if production stayed constant, and no new reserves were discovered … Continue reading
Posted in How Much Left, Peak Oil
Tagged R/P ratio, reserves to production ratio
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What would happen if trucks stopped running?
Preface. In “Why You Should Love Trucks” I showed that essential supply chains depend on trucks nearly completely. Because of little inventory and dependence on just-in-time deliveries, our civilization would almost immediately feel the repercussions of trucks stopping. In fact, … Continue reading
Posted in Cascading Failure, Dependence on Oil, Electric & Hydrogen trucks impossible, Infrastructure & Fast Crash, Oil Shocks, Transportation Infrastructure, Transportation Supply chain, Trucks, When Trucks Stop Running
Tagged civilization, electric trucks, life without lorries, trucks, trucks stop running
2 Comments
Peak crude oil did not happen in 2018. But we are running out of time
Preface. Using EIA International Data for world crude oil + condensate oil monthly production to compare January through October in 2024 and 2025, it looks like about 850 million more barrels will be produced in 2025 than in 2024. And … Continue reading
Aside
Preface. After seeing the film “The Power of Community: How Cuba survived Peak Oil” in 2006, I thought about how those lessons might apply to California, which grows about a third of U.S. food. Much of what follows in the … Continue reading
Telling others about peak oil and limits to growth
Preface. Obviously the planet is finite. World crude oil production peaked in 2018, and been on a plateau since 2008. Other resources, such as food, are peaking while the polycrisis depletes fisheries, forests, groundwater and more. Yet this reality is … Continue reading
Posted in Critical Thinking, Limits To Growth, Peak Oil
Tagged denial, limits to growth, peak oil, population, telling others
9 Comments
The deep sea is a desperate place to drill for more
Preface. Peak crude oil is on a plateau that is likely to peak soon, but when it happens we won’t be out of oil, just halfway through. Giant fields continue to be found, but in the deep ocean or arctic … Continue reading
Net Energy Cliff & the Collapse of Civilization
figure 1. The remaining oil is poor quality, and the energy to get this often remote oil so great that more and more energy (blue) goes into oil production itself, leaving far less — the grey area — available to … Continue reading
Giant oil field decline rates, peak oil, & reserves
Preface. Of the roughly 47,500 oil fields in the world, 507 of them, about 1%, are giant oil fields holding nearly two-thirds of all the oil that has ever been, or ever will be produced, with the largest 100 giants, … Continue reading
Posted in Flow Rate, How Much Left, Peak Oil
Tagged deline rates, depletion, giant oil fields, land, non-opec, offshore, OPEC, peak oil
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