Peak Oil- what it is and how it will impact your life

Well, maybe not lock it, but look at the balance for perspective.
-Collapsenik has a grand total of 23 posts, all in this thread and none related to survival or preparedness. Conclusion, Collapsenik has only one trick.
-Minuteman has over 4000 posts in a wide range of threads. Multifaceted would be an understatement.

Now, who would be the better companion if things went pear shaped? Alternatively, who would be most missed if they quit the site?

I'm willing to stipulate expertise in the industry for both. One of them I know well, the other via posturings. The stipulation has limits, however, and I'd make a small wager that the trolling/sniping will stop, either by the willing participants or the intervention of admins.

'Nuff said, gents?

 

One last comment. I'm sorry if members saw this as a pissing contest, it was never a mine is bigger than yours, it is exposing a poser who was trying to promote himself as something he's not. I would love to see a guy come on here and try to pose as a combat experienced vet when in fact they were a rear echelon bean counter. Our military monkeys would rip them a new one in short order.

 

So its about supply and demand when a price goes up or down? Or is it artificially affected by governments and countries? I'm confused... again..

 

It's supply and demand if the market were allowed to operate. Thing is, OPEC has a market share that is big enough that they can manipulate price, so the market can't operate freely.

 

Conspiracy theory has it that the U.S. and Saudi Arabia are working together to pull oil prices down to punish Russia.

OPEC Tells US To Pull Back. Airlines Cheer, Energies Tear - Asia Stocks to Watch - Barrons.com

Ghrit is right OPEC has the market share to manipulate prices, but not to control prices. They don't wield the power they did 20 years ago. And contrary to popular mythology we actually import very little (relatively) of our oil from OPEC nations. Our biggest foreign supplier of oil is Canada, followed by Mexico.

 

Ah, yes. Peak oil, or peak any petrochem. Or, for that matter, any fixed quantity commodity.

 

All the engineering gobbledygook aside the simple answer is that they are talking about production rates and how much they are replacing what is being sold. If you are selling 100 bushels of apples a day and your orchard is producing 100 bushels a day you are replacing 100% of your output. You don't replace apples with oranges, so any replacement stats are for current and future crude oil production levels. But as the article states that figure is commonly overinflated. Many companies world wide have been guilty of falsely inflating their "reserves" and fudging production figures. A few people have even gone to prison over it.
That is why these data bases and crystal ball predictions like oil in place or known reserves is all just smoke and mirrors and completely unreliable. The only way to gauge the strength of a company, the size of a field, the probable production and profits is by the past and current production levels. What is actually pulled out of the ground and sold. Everything else is just speculation and WAG.

 

I really like "The Prize" myself. Good book. I like it mostly for the history. There is also a 4 part documentary based on the book that is good as well. The only problem I have with Daniel Yergin is that he is a cornucopian and closely aligned with the oil companies. It is in their interest to deny any problems with production and depletion. They have stock holders to answer to and don't want anything devaluing their stocks. That is why there have been many cases of fraud in the industry where "known reserves", "oil in place" estimates and profit margins were greatly exaggerated or flat out falsified. Since you are new to the debate, here are some definitions of terms you will see.

A cornucopian is a futurist who believes that continued progress and provision of material items for mankind can be met by similarly continued advances in technology. Fundamentally they believe that there is enough matter and energy on the Earth to provide for the ever-rising population of the world.
In other words, go back to sleep all is well, there is no problem.

COLLAPSNIK : One who has given up the fight for a resilient future. A collapsenik believes that a collapse is inevitable and some even contend that we should do everything we can to hasten it. They are most associated with the environmental movement.

Peak Oiler a peak oiler is one who believes that the world is facing a peak of oil production(we actually have already reached the peak. Production levels have been declining for the last several years. Unless new production comes on line to push us past that previous level then world peak has already occurred.) and that we face a future of shortages and rising prices.

 

There is a war brewing. It may seem like good news for US consumers at first glance but the ramifications could ripple throughout the entire economy. Lower fuel prices may seem like a good thing at first but when all the money for investment starts to dry up and millions are out of work it is going to negatively impact the rest of the economy.

Here Comes $60 Oil as OPEC Tests U.S. Shale - Yahoo Finance

"At $60 you start to price out a lot of critical mass production around the world," said Marina Petroleka, an analyst at Business Monitor International, a unit of Fitch Group. "U.S. shale, deep water in the Gulf of Mexico is affected. It doesn't price out a lot of Middle East OPEC supply."

OPEC Policy Ensures U.S. Shale Crash, Russian Tycoon Says - Bloomberg

OPEC policy on crude production will ensure a crash in the U.S. shale industry, a Russian oil tycoon said.
American producers risk becoming victims of their own success. At today’s prices of just over $70 a barrel, drilling is close to becoming unprofitable for some explorers, Leonid Fedun, vice president and board member at OAO Lukoil (LKOD), said in an interview in London.

Oil Enters New Era as OPEC Faces Off Against Shale; Who Blinks as Price Slides Toward $70? - Yahoo Finance

OPEC's decision to cede no ground to rival producers underscored the price war in the crude market and the challenge to U.S. shale drillers.

The 12-nation Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries kept its output target unchanged even after the steepest slump in oil prices since the global recession, prompting speculation it has abandoned its role as a swing producer.

"We are entering a new era for oil prices, where the market itself will manage supply, no longer Saudi Arabia and OPEC," said Mike Wittner, the head of oil research at Societe Generale SA in New York. "It's huge. This is a signal that they're throwing in the towel.

"OPEC has chosen to abdicate its role as a swing producer, leaving it to the market to decide what the oil price should be," Harry Tchilinguirian, head of commodity markets at BNP Paribas SA in London

Conventional Producers
Conventional oil producers in OPEC can no longer dictate prices, United Arab Emirates Energy Minister Suhail Al-Mazrouei said in an interview in Vienna on Nov. 26. Newcomers to the market who have the highest costs and created the glut should be the ones to determine the price, he said.

"That is what OPEC is hoping for," Carsten Fritsch, a commodity analyst at Commerzbank AG in Frankfurt, said in an e-mail. "It's the question of who will blink first."

OPEC may now be prepared to let prices fall to force some drillers with higher production costs to stop pumping

Since the early 2000s, surging demand growth drove up prices allowing companies to apply new extraction techniques and develop deep-water and other costly oil. That ended an era that pervaded since the mid 1980s, which was characterized by low prices and OPEC regaining the market share that it had previously sacrificed in an attempt to preserve high prices

Middle Eastern exporters including Saudi Arabia, Iran and Iraq can break even on a cost basis at about $30 a barrel, Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. They need more to balance their budgets. Some U.S. producers need more than $80, the consulting firm said in a report last month.

OPEC's policy will spur a crash in the U.S. shale industry, Leonid Fedun, a vice president and board member at OAO Lukoil, Russia's second-largest oil producer, said in an interview in London before the group's decision.

"In 2016, when OPEC completes this objective of cleaning up the American marginal market, the oil price will start growing again," said Fedun. "The shale boom is on a par with the dot-com boom. The strong players will remain, the weak ones will vanish."

 

A good synopsis.

Oil prices keep plummeting as OPEC starts a price war with the US - Vox

 

Thanks MM that is a good synopsis.