Robert Hirsch On Gas Prices

[Roger]

Look at the source for that graph; they're a peak oil study group; it's not very reliable.

So much hand waving, those are EIA numbers.

And drilling 28k ft, like at Jack, thru a mile of ocean has never been done before

No one's ever built a working fusion reactor either.

But a working Polywell means the equivalent of what? 80Mbpd in 2030? compared to what ...1.5Mbpd for Jack. Thats a stupid comparison.

Polywell's upside is colonizing the solar system.

Back to the EIA
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/servicerpt/ ... sults.html

ANWR Production Uncertainties

There is much uncertainty regarding the impact of opening ANWR on U.S. oil production and imports, due to several factors:

* The size of the underlying resource base. There is little direct knowledge regarding the petroleum geology of the ANWR region. The USGS oil resource estimates are based largely on the oil productivity of geologic formations that exist in the neighboring State lands and which continue into ANWR. Consequently, there is considerable uncertainty regarding both the size and quality of the oil resources that exist in ANWR. Thus, the potential ultimate oil recovery and potential yearly production are highly uncertain.
* Oil field sizes. The size of the oil fields found in ANWR is one factor that will determine the rate at which ANWR oil resources are developed and produced. If the reservoirs are larger than expected, then production would be greater in the 2018 through 2025 timeframe. Similarly, if the reservoirs are smaller than expected, then production would be less.
* The quality of the oil and the characteristics of the oil reservoirs. Oil field production rates are also determined by the quality of oil found, e.g., viscosity and paraffin content, and the field’s reservoir characteristics, i.e., its depth, permeability, faulting, and water saturation. This analysis assumes oil quality and reservoir characteristics similar to those associated with the Prudhoe Bay field. If, for example, the oil discovered in ANWR has a considerably higher viscosity than the Prudhoe Bay field oil, e.g., over 10,000 centipoise, then oil production rates would be lower than projected in this analysis.

Thats what you get from KIC#1, drilled in 1985, results never made public.
http://www.csa.com/discoveryguides/ern/01aug/arctic.php

Remember Badami ? Turned out to be a a fragmented field, with heavy oil
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&clie ... il&spell=1

And Badami is what 30 miles from ANWAR ? Low porosity and heavy oil means low production.

[OneWayTraffic]

70% of the earth is covered with ocean. There are a lot of places that have not yet been explored, Most are really hard to get to, but that is beside the point. There may well be lots of large fields in the deep ocean.

Probably be cheaper to grow algae than drill that deep.

[TallDave]

So much hand waving, those are EIA numbers.

I highly doubt they are an unbiased representation of EIA numbers. More likely, those are selectively culled numbers that support peak oil theory, much like the 170K bpd figure you cited for ANWR that directly contradicts the USGS estimates, even the lowest of which is around four times that.

Typically, peak oil doomsayers cite certain kinds of oil discoveries but ignore others. It's a shell game. No one doubts that the cheaply extractable/processable reserves are dwindling, but oil sands and oil shale are now legitimate reserves at today's prices, and extraction tech keeps getting better.

But a working Polywell means the equivalent of what? ... Thats a stupid comparison.

Ask an engineer which would be a harder challenge: drilling through a mile of ocean or building a working fusion reactor. I don't doubt a working fusion reactor has more upside in the long run, but oil only has to be profitably extractable. And no one knows how much more oil is available at those depths.

There's no question we need to move toward renewable sources like cellulosic ethanol, biodiesel, algae farming, and alternate sources like coal-methanol. But don't place too much credence in the peak oil theorists' visions of imminent apocalypse. It's very, very unlikely. Oil will get more expensive but isn't going to run out anytime soon.

Also, a lot of places still haven't been explored, such as Greenland.
And the western half of Iraq too. But the geology doesnt look promising in the first place.

Not true, the geology is quite promising, according to USGS estimates.

http://peakoildebunked.blogspot.com/200 ... nland.html

The main reasons we haven't drilled in Greenland are that production would be expensive and shipping would be difficult.

[Roger]

I highly doubt they are an unbiased representation of EIA numbers. More likely, those are selectively culled numbers that support peak oil theory,

Spend some time at TOD, you will change your mind in a very short time, TOD is home to some doom sayers, its also home to more responsible people, many of the editors are geologists, oil patch folks in the industry. So you can have your opinion, but it seems to me your exposure to the TOD is extremely limited, daily posts are very well sourced.

Here is a TOD post from 2 days ago, I think you will find it is well written and very well sourced:

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/4038#more

I don't doubt a working fusion reactor has more upside in the long run,

darn straight it is.

But don't place too much credence in the peak oil theorists' visions of imminent apocalypse. It's very, very unlikely. Oil will get more expensive but isn't going to run out anytime soon.

Tell me something I dont know.

Also, a lot of places still haven't been explored, such as Greenland.
And the western half of Iraq too. But the geology doesnt look promising in the first place.

Oh yeah, thats USG Greenland report from 2000 Funny stuff raised a lot of laffs at the time. USG was wrong in 1970, Hubbert was right, good frick record. Try the USGS report from 2005, they ended up acknowledging they predicted 22 billion barrels per year until 2025, industry has only found 9 billion annually.

Let me ask you TallDave how much drilling does the USGS do ?
So go ahead and site the USGS, whose predictions have been off 50% over 40 yrs. frick brilliant citation.

Back to ANWAR, KC1 was drilled in 1985, by the Indians, the drilling report is proprietary, something the USG has never seen. Nor the EIA. Their studys are likely from seismic studys done in the '95-'98 timeframe.

Badami 8 rsevoir penatrations:

http://www.petroleumnews.com/pntruncate/369854151.shtml
BP said they would get 35kbpd

newsbank - really long url
But Badami produced 5k bpd, then declined to 1350bpd, then shut down

http://www.petroleumnews.com/pntruncate/369854151.shtml

Only 30 miles away Anwar is supposed to produce 1.4bpd ? Based on a USGS survey that never pushed a drill bit 5 inches.....frick brilliant citation.

This is why I laff my ass off when someone mentions Anwar as some sort of cure all, and how the enviromentalists refuse to allow drilling nearly anywhere. And for the same reason I laff my ass off about the peak oil doomsayers. They're both asses.

[Roger]

The main reasons we haven't drilled in Greenland are that production would be expensive and shipping would be difficult.

Or is the USGS just bullshit ?

By the way Cheney is real hot on western Iraq, they divided it up already. Google up Judicial Watch, you remember them, they took on Bill CLinton.



http://www.judicialwatch.org/IraqOilFrgnSuitors.pdf

http://www.judicialwatch.org/IraqOilGasProj.pdf

Remember Dave, the USGS has been wrong for 40 years.

I just happen to have these on my photobucket account, just for shits and giiggles..

[Roger]

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petr ... mmary.html

Just what is that based on ? Core samples ? Seismic studies ? Actually oil brought up ?

DO you even know ?

[TallDave]

The Oil Drum is a bit loony; I've read them before. Occasionally they produce something interesting, but overall not impressed. It's basically a gathering place for Malthusians.

Today, top post: they have a girl doing a striptease to sell Peak Oil. I'm guessing the USGS doesn't.

Just what is that based on ? Core samples ? Seismic studies ? Actually oil brought up ?

Gelogic survey.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petr ... assessment

Remember Dave, the USGS has been wrong for 40 years.

They've been wrong on the upside too. That's why they're called estimates.

Anyways, the PO doomsayers have been wrong for a century and a half (some of them actually at USGS):

Apocalypse Yesterday
Predictions of imminent catastrophic depletion are almost as old as the oil industry. An 1855 advertisement for Kier’s Rock Oil, a patent medicine whose key ingredient was petroleum bubbling up from salt wells near Pittsburgh, urged customers to buy soon before “this wonderful product is depleted from Nature’s laboratory.” The ad appeared four years before Pennsylvania’s first oil well was drilled. In 1919 David White of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) predicted that world oil production would peak in nine years. And in 1943 the Standard Oil geologist Wallace Pratt calculated that the world would ultimately produce 600 billion barrels of oil. (In fact, more than 1 trillion barrels of oil had been pumped by 2006.)

During the 1970s, the Club of Rome report The Limits to Growth projected that, assuming consumption remained flat, all known oil reserves would be entirely consumed in just 31 years. With exponential growth in consumption, it added, all the known oil reserves would be consumed in 20 years. These dour predictions gained credibility when the Arab oil crisis of 1973 quadrupled prices from $3 to $12 per barrel (from $16 to $48 in 2006 dollars) and when the Iranian oil crisis more than doubled oil prices from $14 per barrel in 1978 to $35 per barrel by 1981 (from $45 to $98 in 2006 dollars).

In response, the federal government imposed price controls on oil and gas in the 1970s and established fuel economy standards to encourage the sale of more efficient automobiles. The sense of doom did not dissolve. In 1979 Energy Secretary Schlesinger proclaimed, “The energy future is bleak and is likely to grow bleaker in the decade ahead.” The Global 2000 Report to President Carter, issued in 1980, predicted that the price of oil would rise by 50 percent, reaching $100 per barrel by 2000.

http://www.reason.com/news/show/36645.html

By the way Cheney is real hot on western Iraq, they divided it up already.

That's up to the Iraqis, who (thanks to Cheney) will actually see some of that oil money spent by an elected government and going toward improving their lives. So far, they've already got China and Europe signed to deals.

But don't place too much credence in the peak oil theorists' visions of imminent apocalypse. It's very, very unlikely. Oil will get more expensive but isn't going to run out anytime soon.
...
Tell me something I dont know.

I'm not sure what we disagree over then. Most analysts think oil production will peak in about 25 years. Between now and then we'll likely develop alternatives.

[MSimon]

ANWAR a cure all? I don't think so.

But, the more oil on the market, (we could use a few more refineries too) the lower the prices. Add in that it goes to us and not some ME oil tic and you have a twofer.

A little bit of blatant self promotion:

No Blood For Oil or No Drilling For Oil?

A drop in oil prices might not end the oil war, I do think it would reduce its intensity. (BTW - it is not just about oil - it is about how the oil money is used - a question I do not wish to address here.)

[rcain]

Amish solution - 1 Horse per family = 50km per day plus 1 bag (compressed) methane for 1 Bag Oats per day

Great value...

Do I get a research grant?

[TallDave]

The Taliban also has a plan to reduce oil consumption and greenhouse emission to AD 700 levels.

I notice Al Gore has grown a beard...

[Roger]

ANWAR a cure all? I don't think so.

Exactly.

[Roger]

Gelogic survey.

I'll start with Aurora.

http://www.searchanddiscovery.com/docum ... keller.htm

http://www.dog.dnr.state.ak.us/oil/prod ... t_well.pdf

As you can see Aurora was an off shore well, quite close to KIC.

However, since ANWR was established in 1960, exploration in the region has been restricted to surface geological investigations, aeromagnetic surveys, and two winter seismic surveys (in 1983-84 and 1984-85). No exploratory drilling has been accomplished in the area except for one well commenced in the winter of 1984-85 on Kaktovik Inupiat Corporation and Arctic Slope Regional Corporation lands southeast of Kaktovik on the Coastal Plain.
http://www.anwr.org/backgrnd/potent.html

The only drilling data the USGS claims to have is from slant or offset drilling, because the only 2 wells ever drilled in Anwar, are private, the USGS cites recent offset drilling in the 1999 report. Your guess is as good as mine which off shore rig they used. Warthog, Stimson Aurora, I dont know. I cant find any indication any of these rigs are even still there.

Its clear Anwar at best is fragmented, and of low quality, API as low as 19.
http://www.dog.dnr.state.ak.us/oil/prod ... t_well.pdf

Compounding production problems are the numerous fractures, meaning water injection cannot be used, as the water will follow the cracks and destroy the ability to any reasonable production.

The case for drilling is that the same formations at Prudhoe Bay continue into area 1002.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petr ... background


Fractured anticlines and fingering says this isnt so. Badami maybe an example of this.

[TallDave]

Well, sure, that kind of detail is why they have different estimates.

[TallDave]

http://john-whitehead.net/PDF/anwr032405.pdf

The government geologists and engineers who first estimated the numbers are by turns amused and exasperated by the numerical hijinks. "Most of the numbers that you see cited by the media and discussed by advocates on either side of thedebate represent spin of our numbers," says Dave Houseknecht, a U.S. Geological Survey research geologist and co-project chief for USGS's work in the North Slope of Alaska, which includes ANWR.

That sounds about right.

I'm sure the people with a stake in drilling have their own pie-in-the-sky numbers. It's best to just work with the USGS numbers.

The truth is no one really knows, and we won't for a long time even after the first wells are sunk. It might be 5B barrels (the low end), it might be 15B (the high end). Most likely it's around 10B.

[MSimon]

ANWAR a cure all? I don't think so.

Exactly.

Roger,

That was a cheap shot given the next sentence. ;-)