The EIA has released its latest Drilling Productivity Report. There were some interesting data presented in the report.
They say the Bakken peaked at 1,311,703 barrels per day in March and will have declined by 74,763 bpd in July.
The EIA says the Bakken will get 51,000 barrels per day in July from new wells but legacy wells will decline by 80,000 barrels per day leaving a decline of 29,000 bpd.
The EIA says Eagle Ford peaked in 1,711,376 barrels per day in March and will have declined by a total of 117,971 bpd in July.
The EIA says Eagle Ford will get 90,000 bpd from new wells in July but the decline from legacy wells will be 139,000 bpd leaving a decline of 49,000 bpd.
The EIA says Niobrara peaked in March at 459,861 bpd and will have declined by 49,712 bpd by July.
The EIA says Niobrara got 25,000 bpd from new wells but the legacy wells will decline by 42,000 bpd resulting in a decline of 17,000 bpd.
The EIA has the Permian not yet peaking but production leveling out. Production from the Permian in July, the EIA says, will be 2,059,851 bpd.
The EIA says production from new wells will equal 74,000 bpd in July and the decline from legacy wells will be 71,000 bpd leaving a net gain of 3,000 bpd. Almost half the Permian production comes from conventional wells therefore the legacy decline is not nearly as great as from pure LTO plays.
The other three shale plays are mostly gas plays and don’t contribute a lot to the total. Nevertheless the EIA says they will peak this month, June, at 181,538 bpd and will decline by 106 bpd in July.
The EIA says the total of all seven shale plays peaked in April at 5,694,580 bpd and will have declined by 208,782 bpd in July. The one month decline, June to July, the EIA says, will be 93,027 bpd. These July numbers are still 142,720 bpd above the production numbers they have for December. However if the decline they they predict in July continues, then production in December 2015 will about 322,000 bpd below the December 2014 numbers.
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“… if the decline they predict in July continues, then production in December 2015 will about 322,000 bpd below the December 2014 numbers. ”
The EIA in its May STEO had actually projected a 310kbd decline in the Lower 48 (ex GoM) production in December 2015 vs. December 2014
The G7 have released a statement in which they say the world by 2050 has to realize a reduction in use of fossil fuels 40à70%. And within “this century” has to fall back to zero. Let’s simulate that for a moment. I model falling back to 50% by 2050 (that is between 40 and 70, so that’s alllright.)
As the use of fossil fuels is still increasing now at 2.1%, globally, on an annual basis, I project a 1% increase for the next 5 years, and 5 years of status quo. This order not to shock too violently. From then onwards:
2025 -> 2030: -1%
2031 -> 2035: -2%
2036 -> 2040: -3%
2041 -> 2045: -4%
2046 -> 2050: -5% (and I’m almost at 50% reduction compared to now!)
and so to a decrease of -8% from 2060 onwards. A sharper decline does not seem feasible to me. And then I arrive at around 0 in AD 2100.
Meanwhile, nuclear also shrinks by 1% annually (the current trend is a sharper decline).
Hydro grows at 1%, continuing current trend. This until 2050, because each stream, worthy of the name, will have a turbine by then.
Sun, wind and geothermal grows at a blistering rate of 8% over the next 35 years and remains stable from then onwards. (That seems overly optimistic.)
Biomass I don’t touch. More forests felled is not really an option. And cultivate more bioethanol or biodiesel will bring agriculture (further) into trouble.
See the result of the exercise:
The left graph is the world energy consumption from 1830 to 2010. The right chart shows the already accomplished growth for the first 5 years (2010->2015). And then begins the simulation.
Have fun on the slide!
“Sun, wind and geothermal grows at a blistering rate of 8% over the next 35 years ..”
8% would be a massive slowdown from average growth for solar PV.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Growth_of_photovoltaics
This says 2014 growth was 14% vs. the 5 of the wiki article.
http://www.pv-tech.org/news/global_solar_demand_in_2015_to_hit_57gw_on_strong_30_growth_rate_ihs
More on exponential growth:
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/07/22/exponential-growth-global-solar-pv-production-installation/
Wind is capable of these kinds (40-50%/year) of growth too.
http://www.gwec.net/global-figures/wind-energy-global-status/
Now – the 64 trillion $ question – will people quit subsidizing fossil fuels and otherwise get behind renewables?
I hear you on hydropower.
Only 12.1 GW technical at non-powered dams, but that’s nothing to sneeze at:
http://nhaap.ornl.gov/content/non-powered-dam-potential
New stream reach is 65.5 GW giving 346 TWh/yr (excluding wild and scenic rivers…),
a 128% increase from existing hydro.
http://nhaap.ornl.gov/nsd
n.b. US uses 4,000 TWh/year currently, so we’d need massive efficiency and renewables growth to replace fossil fuels in transport, domestic heating, manufacturing, etc.
Geothermal needs “enhanced” (aka “hot dry rock”) and/or geopressurized systems to get way more widespread.
Otherwise conventional hydrothermal locations are fairly limited.
http://mitei.mit.edu/publications/reports-studies/future-geothermal-energy
Remember that Solar and Wind don’t have the thermal losses of fossil fuels, but to take care of intermittency the installed capacity needs to be higher unless there is hydro or some other form of backup, possibly thermal storage for heating and cooling needs.
I doubt we will get to zero fossil fuels by 2100, if equilibrium climate sensitivity is 3 C, we might be ok at 1200 Gt of total Carbon emissions from 1750 to 2150. It will be cutting close, the G7 plan is safer.
Not sure how much natural gas is used for heating in the US, maybe 50%? Using ground source heat pumps in colder climates and air source in warmer climates only about 33% to 40% of the energy is needed because we can get 2.5 to 3 J of heat for every 1J of electrical energy used by the heat pump.
Better building envelopes, more insulation and passive solar design will also help reduce heating needs.
I don’t pretend to know how long exponential growth of wind and solar power can continue. At some point we will hit a limit on how much can be built in any given year even if building it is undertaken on a wartime type of economic footing.
Beyond that as the amount that could be be usefully utilized IS built out, the manufacturing and construction industries doing wind and solar will have to stop expanding. Nobody is going to voluntarily build extensive new manufacturing facilities or train lots of new workers for an industry that is peaking..
For a wild ass guess I will say that significant additional new manufacturing capacity will not be built any less than five to ten years from the peak estimated deployment rate. Recovering the investment in any less time than that would probably be impossible.
But I can’t see any real reason why the wind and solar power cannot expand for a decade or more at an extremely fast rate, maybe as high as twenty five or more percent annually.
As a matter of fact I will not be surprised to see this to happen due to the combined effects of oil and gas and maybe even coal supply shocks.
Depletion and a lack of investment can bring on oil and gas shortage troubles as fast as a minor oversupply combined with a soft economy brought on a price collapse. War could bring on a gas , oil AND coal supply crisis given that all three must be shipped via blue water freighters. My retired buddies in the armed forces tell me that just about any gray haired old fighter jockey driving just about any obsolete old fighter equipped with air to ground rockets could easily sink just about any freighter afloat.
Such ships don’t have the fire fighting capacity necessary to deal with multiple fires started by rockets designed to penetrate armor – and …… they don’t HAVE any armor.
If freighters sail in time of war , they will necessarily sail with naval escorts. There are not very many escorts available and there would not be time to build them.We no longer have a robust ship building industry in the western countries.
With the costs of wind and solar continuing to fall and the price of oil and gas eventually spiking again, the NEXT BIG THING may very well be a BOOM in renewables comparable to the dot com boom or the housing booms of recent decades.
Every body will pile in with every dime they are currently throwing at other desperate attempts to earn more than one or two percent annually.
In addition the possibility of various national governments going flat out on renewables as a matter of national security policy is SUBSTANTIAL.
Some of these governments are going to find themselves frozen out of oil and gas markets for various reasons. When this comes to pass, they will necessarily go pedal to the metal on renewables and or nukes – to whatever extent they are capable of.
UNLESS -UNLESS just maybe they are strong enough to ” go a viking” in quest of some oil and gas.
Not many are going to be in a position to do so.
I doubt all the countries in Western Europe together could muster enough diesel fuel and uniformed troops and equipment to invade Russia- not that anybody is going to invade nuclear armed Russia for the foreseeable future.
IF -Repeat IF they were to start selling like ice water in hell, I wonder how fast the production of plug in hybrid cars could be ramped up.
I suppose a DUPLICATE of Musks giga battery factory could be built in not much more than half the time it is taking him given that the research and development has already been done and the supply chain is or will be in place for the machinery needed .
I say plug in hybrid because a car such as a VOLT needs a battery only a third or so the size of a LEAF battery, never mind a TESLA S battery.
Above I suggested 50% of US natural gas is used for heating. Only about 20% of natural gas use is residential use, most of this is space and water heating. Another 14% of natural gas is used for space and water heating in commercial buildings for a total of 34%, so the 50% estimate was not very good.
Another 34% of natural gas is used for power generation, and about 32% is used in industry for heating and as an input for fertilizer, plastic, fabric, anti-freeze, and other chemicals.
About 3 times less energy would be consumed by converting to heat pumps for space and water heating and roughly 2.5 times less energy would be needed by replacing natural gas power generation (40% efficiency) with wind and solar where these thermal losses are eliminated. So only 37% of the energy would be needed for the space and water heating needs currently provided by natural gas and the total energy needed would be reduced by 43%.
About 70% of US petroleum use is for transportation, the internal combustion engine and associated systems (friction in power train) are about 25% efficient, if we assume EVs and other electric transport (light rail, electrified rail) are about 75% efficient (including transmission and distribution losses in the grid), then the 70% of petroleum used for transport can be reduced by a factor of 3.
In total the energy currently provided by petroleum could be reduced by 47%.
For US coal about 87% is used for electric power, by switching to Wind and solar the thermal losses are eliminated and less energy would be needed by 40% of the 87% in the electric power sector, an overall reduction of 52.2% in needed energy.
For US fossil fuel consumption, about 22% is coal, 34% is natural gas, and 43.5% is petroleum. Fossil fuels are about 81% of all US energy consumption.
All of the reductions together would reduce fossil fuel use to 53% of the previous level and overall energy use would be reduced to 62% of the previous level (or a reduction of 38% in total energy). Fossil fuel use would be reduced by 47%.
Main point is that less wind and solar is needed to replace fossil fuels.
To deal with intermittency however the total capacity will need to be similar or maybe somewhat larger, excess capacity of 2 to 3 times average electric load tends to minimize system cost.
Note that there are a host of solutions not covered here such as better building codes, passive solar heat, demand management through peak pricing, better urban design, significantly less fuel use with better light rail, rail, and other public transportation systems. All of these strategies will reduce energy consumption and will be used as fossil energy prices rise.
There will however be great difficulty in accomplishing such a transition and no doubt severe economic disruption for 10 to 20 years (2030 to 2050).
Those are good thoughts. Here are a few more:
The average US car gets about 22MPG. That’s about 1.6 kWhs per mile. EVs get 3-4 miles per kWh. If we assume .33 kWh per mile, that’s a ratio of about 5 to 1. Even if we allocate transmission and conversion losses to electricity, but don’t allocate refining and transportation losses to oil, EVs would still reduce joules consumed by 75%.
We have one pretty good model that suggests that 2-3x overbuilding of wind and solar would be cost effective. I’d say that’s very preliminary. The model says that would work, but I’d say that a lower level of overbuilding (perhaps 1.5-2x) is much more likely to be the optimal level. Remember, they didn’t take into account the dramatic impact such overbuilding would have on the price of electricity. Very cheap power would shift the economics towards much cheaper (and less efficient) forms of storage.
Finally, keep in mind that our primary economic problem right now is lack of aggregate demand. Building wind, solar and EVs would help with that.
There’s another factor to think about- the ignorance of the average car buyer of the merits of EV’s.
Example. I have a couple of relatively young guys working for me in my gadget shop, one of whom is a real expert on all sorts of cars, bulldozers and anything related to an IC engine. The other is an average car lover and has an average knowledge of them, and never heard of an EV.
I overheard a conversation between them. The expert mentioned how incredibly simple an electric motor was in comparison to the engine in the other’s toyota.
The proud toyota owner then began to ask for details- “well, how often do you have to change the transmission oil?”
“Ain’t no oil, and no transmission, either” —
“What!”
And so on from there.
My point. When people began to realize the merit of EV’s, there might be a sudden and big demand for them.
Hey Wimbi,
Just want to say thanks for the links in your comment to the previous lead post, especially the second one. It lead me to look up pyrolysis, something I’ve heard about but not seriously looked into.
In another comment in this thread I wrote about a bush fire last year at my late father’s homestead and the need for a more efficient way of producing charcoal and bio-char from the waste biomass on the property.
My plan is to replace the felled trees with high value lumber trees like Spanish Elm, Mahogany, Spanish Cedar (Cedrela odorata) and even the very slow growing Lignum Vitae.
I recently discovered that Lignum Vitae, a tree indigenous to Jamaica, is the most dense wood known, so dense it will not float in water. While attending the Renewable Energy World trade show in Orlando in 2013, I ran into a company that makes bearings for hydroelectric turbine shafts, out of lignum vitae wood that, it claims are superior to bearings made from other materials! So, if you ever need really long lasting, water lubricated bearings, now you know where to look.
Hi Dennis,
You may find this study of interest:
100% clean and renewable wind, water, and sunlight (WWS) all-sector energy roadmaps for the 50 United States
web.stanford.edu/group/efmh/jacobson/Articles/I/USStatesWWS.pdf
For some time now on this blog I have noted that the issue with renewable energy is not technological. The issues are political and social. The intermittent problem of solar and wind energy is not as big as many claim. Of course battery technology is expanding fast, but I posit we do not need any new technological breakthroughs to solve this problem. On multiple occasions I have provided evidence of technologies and working companies that are using solar thermal to produce electricity 24/7. I have also pointed out that we can produce hydrogen from sunlight with 10 times the efficiency that plants convert sunlight to sugar; doing so with off the shelf technology–no fancy catalysts added.
I don’t know why we keep believing the coal and oil company’s propaganda about renewable energy, but believe we do.
Best,
Tom
Hi CaveBio (Tom),
I am an optimist, but try to be a bit of a pessimist in the sense that a transition may well be possible, but is by no means assured. Mr. Murphy always has his monkey wrench in hand, the best laid plans of mice and men and all that. It is nice to have Fernando telling us that it can’t be done, but when we suggest solutions I wish he would do more than say, I don’t think so.
Sam Taylor has an excellent suggestion that the cost minimized solution of Budischak should be run against a longer wind and electric load data set to see how it fares. I agree but don’t know how to get the data to try it, maybe I should see if the author would share some of his data.
That is the kind of criticism that is useful and necessary to move forward. Thanks Sam. I will read the paper you linked and comment later, I think there are many solutions to intermittent output. Widely dispersed wind turbines and overbuilding capacity by 2 to 3 times load, Vehicle to grid, thermal storage, demand management, fuel cells, and batteries.
Hi Dennis,
I completely agree that a transition is not assured, but what frustrates me is how so many seem to think it is impossible.
Let’s hope the pessimists won’t be in charge of trying to get us through the transition.
Best,
Tom
Let’s hope the pessimists won’t be in charge of trying to get us through the transition.
I don’t see any value in assuming a transition is impossible. It may well be, but what use is it to give up even before you have to? Might as well give it your best shot, even if you fail at it, than not to try at all.
For some time now on this blog I have noted that the issue with renewable energy is not technological. The issues are political and social.
You got that right!
“For some time now on this blog I have noted that the issue with renewable energy is not technological. The issues are political and social.”
It’s also an economical issue. Costs for renewables are substantially higher than fossil fuels. Few people can afford to replace thier fossil fuel consumption with renewable systems.
Once the cost of fossil fuels become expensive and they are rationed, investment in renewables will vanish as the economy tanks and collapses.
Costs for renewables are substantially higher than fossil fuels.
That’s just plain not so.
First of all, the primary solution to Peak Oil isn’t renewables (except for the 10% or so of oil that’s used for power generation), it’s EVs. And EVs are cheaper then ICEs, right now.
Second, wind and solar are in the same ballpark as fossil fuels, even before you include external costs like pollution and security of supply. Land-based wind is cheaper than new coal in the US, right now: it costs less than 4 cents per kWh in places like Iowa. Solar is at 6 cents per kWh in places with very good sunlight.
3rd, pollution and security of supply are real costs. Asthma is real. Mercury contamination is real, and has real costs. Climate Change is real. And, what about the two trillion dollars we spent on our recent oil war??
investment in renewables will vanish as the economy tanks”
The economy needs more spending, not less. Spending on renewable infrastructure and EVs would stimulate the economy, not harm it.
And, when the Great Depression hit (in part due to farmers buying tractors that threw people off the land and made food prices fall), farmers didn’t stop buying tractors: they bought more, to try to cope with their new economic troubles.
That last paragraph about excess of tractors causing great depression, where do you learn about that staff: in Ivy league schools?, some books?, CNN?
That’s a great question.
I can’t claim that I invented the idea – I’ve seen oblique references to the idea somewhere (though I partly put it together on my own).
Yet, I’ve looked through histories of the Great Depression and seen no reference to the fundamental causes. You see discussion of bank failures, and gold standard problems, and stock-market bubbles, but little discussion of farm labor productivity, labor surpluses, and falling farm commodity prices.
But, if you look at the statistics for farm automation: numbers of tractors bought, etc., it becomes very clear:
The Okies were moving to California because they were no longer needed on the farm.
“but little discussion of farm labor productivity, labor surpluses, and falling farm commodity prices.”
Nick,
That is also a symptom, not a cause. Cause has to be in inherent flaw of monetary system. and that is constant lack of sufficient purchasing power. Did you read anything from CH Douglas?
Cause has to be in inherent flaw of monetary system
Well, that’s part of it. It’s certainly an necessary part, but it’s not sufficient.
Rising farm labor productivity meant that many laborers lost income. At the same time, small farms were no longer viable: their owners had to go bankrupt, and the land combined with other properties to gain the necessary economies of scale.
A large volume of unemployment and farm bankruptcies stressed the banking system: Many banks failed, which reduced the money supply. And…we were off to the races…
It’s not sufficient but it is a foundation and you can not built house without good foundation. Technological advances that increase labour productivity are default in this life. They will always happen. It’s like sun always come out every day. You can not fight that.
the primary solution to Peak Oil is to use less oil
“the primary solution to Peak Oil is to use less oil”
Is that like the solution to running out of air in a sealed room? Breath less! OR, walking through a desert with no water: Sweat less!
No, it’s more like Pepsi gets expensive, so you switch to something cheaper and healthier, like water or fruit juice.
Once the cost of fossil fuels become expensive and they are rationed, investment in renewables will vanish as the economy tanks and collapses.
I doubt that will happen. The Silicon Valley folks are both interested in renewable energy and are very wealthy. They should be able to do renewable energy for themselves even if the rest of the world doesn’t have it.
As I have maintained, the increasing income inequality allows a small percentage of people to amass wealth and resources enough to sustain themselves. It would be easier for them to have renewable energy than to depend on coal, oil, and nuclear power because those are massive operations. Solar can work on whatever size they need for themselves.
Boomer Wrote:
“I doubt that will happen. The Silicon Valley folks are both interested in renewable energy and are very wealthy. They should be able to do renewable energy for themselves even if the rest of the world doesn’t have it.”
I am sure the Wealthly will take care of themselves. its the rest of the 99.9% that have to worry about it. Of course when the middle class can’t afford to buy Sillicon valley’s silly gadgets, they too will become poor.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/panicked-super-rich-buying-boltholes-5044084
http://www.theguardian.com/public-leaders-network/2015/jan/23/nervous-super-rich-planning-escapes-davos-2015
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/9223975/Surge-in-rich-gaining-NZ-residency
Of course when the middle class can’t afford to buy Sillicon valley’s silly gadgets, they too will become poor.
The smart ones are already changing those paper fortunes into real assets. Sell some stock, buy some farmable land.
If they have more useful stuff then the rest of us, they should do better than the rest of us. How is that poverty?
I think it might be comforting to think that if a collapse comes, the rich will suffer as much as the poor. But I don’t know why that should be the case. If they plan well, they should be able to much better than the average person.
You should start a business building and selling 50 mw self contained power plants able to deliver 5000 volt AC power 24 hours per day for 7 days in a row. If I can get electricity for 20 U.S. Cents per kWh at 3 % financing I’ll buy the first 300 plants.
You should start a business building and selling 50 mw self contained power plants able to deliver 5000 volt AC power 24 hours per day for 7 days in a row. If I can get electricity for 20 U.S. Cents per kWh at 3 % financing I’ll buy the first 300 plants.
I’m sure something like that is the goal for some folks. Remember when cellphones were big, heavy, and expensive? The fact that they weren’t practical for the mass population didn’t stop the industry from improving them.
High tech items go from expensive products for a small market, to commodities for the mass market. That’s the way it goes.
“I’m sure something like that is the goal for some folks. Remember when cellphones were big, heavy, and expensive?”
Unfortunately, you’re fooling yourself, believing that power consumption devices can be applied to power generation systems. It far more easily to build a cheaper consumption device than it to build a cheaper power source. The reason why electronics got cheaper is that the materials used in construction got a lot smaller.
Replacing Fossil Power systems with renewable power systems are the exact opposite. You are switching from a concentrated high energy resource (fossil fuel) to a low density energy source (Solar or Wind). Imagine if the size of consumer electronics grew every year. The cost for those devices would rise.
Nick G. Wrote:
“It’s far cheaper for the grid to provide that service.”
Bingo! Fossil fuels are considerably cheaper than renewables. When Fossil fuels become expensive the economy will collapse. When the economy collapse there will be no money to fund renewable projects.
Replacing Fossil Power systems with renewable power systems are the exact opposite. You are switching from a concentrated high energy resource (fossil fuel) to a low density energy source (Solar or Wind).
There is so much waste in the way we burn fossil fuels that we can get by with less energy use with better design and lifestyle changes. We don’t need renewable energy to replace how we use fossil fuels. So they don’t have to be the energy equivalent of fossil fuels.
You are switching from a concentrated high energy resource (fossil fuel) to a low density energy source (Solar or Wind).
Sunlight, at 1kW per meter, is far more concentrated than the 500,000 oil wells in the US>
Wind and solar produce electricity: what’s more concentrated?
Seriously, this whole “density” thing is unrealistic. The only thing that matters is cost, and the costs of renewables are affordable.
Fossil fuels are considerably cheaper than renewables.
Why keep saying that, when it’s not so?
When the economy collapse there will be no money to fund renewable projects.
Actually, this kind of investment increases in hard times.
Nah. The idea that wind and solar projects should deal 100% with their own variance is a red herring. That’s not demanded of any other source of generation.
It’s far cheaper for the grid to provide that service.
why ac power?
Because most appliances use low voltage AC. Do you think it’s practical to ship 5 kV DC into people’s homes?
Whenever I propose that solar and wind power fanatics put their money on the line they invent a run around. But 50 mw reliable power is very suitable for smallish islands. Jamaica is fairly large and uses about 600 to 700 mega Watts. For Jamaica I need about 800 mw so they can start driving Teslas.
they invent a run around.
Nothing new about the way the grid works. Every power source backs up every other power source.
That’s why nuclear works well in the US, and can’t be used in Ireland: the grid is big enough in the US, and not in Ireland.
Wind and solar, on the other hand, come in much smaller units, so they work nicely on small islands.
Heck, Guantanamo Bay base is using windpower. It’s saving them a lot of money on diesel bills.
I admit, my knowledge in the AC/DC issue is thin. I guess I was asking something more fundamental than well that’s what we have now, so that’s what we should use.
That being said, I am sure I am not the only one who is thinking that maybe DC is at least an option when thinking about smaller systems / microgrids / buildings, etc.
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/427504/edisons-revenge-the-rise-of-dc-power/
FWIW department…
Renewable Electricity
Futures Study – NREL
lots of stuff here. 4 big pdfs
http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy12osti/52409-1.pdf
“That being said, I am sure I am not the only one who is thinking that maybe DC is at least an option when thinking about smaller systems / microgrids / buildings, etc.”
1. DC Can’t be easily stepped up/down (voltage). DC needs switching hardware which has reliability issues compared to transformers.
2. DC has arcing issues. Once a arc occurs with DC, not extinguished until the power is shutoff. AC is generally self extinguishing, since the voltage drops to zero every 120 times per second (for US 60 hz Grid). DC isn’t recommend except for low voltage inputs ( < 50VDC). Higher DC voltage have increased risks. Low voltage distribution has high losses (even in household wiring). Decreasing the voltage by 10 fold increases the power losses by 100 fold Ploss = I^2R. Older homes would need wiring retrofitting to replace the wiring with much heavier gauge wiring.
3. The majority of consumer electronics and appliances require AC power for input. Most would require retrofit or replacement. Currently there are very few DC consumer appliances (Refrigs, Washing machines, Kitchen appliances, etc), and the selection of models is very limited, compared to AC appliances.
FWIW: I looked into using just DC for an offgrid home. The issue is the cost of running extra heavy gauge wire ($$$) to compensate for the low voltage, and the lack of DC appliances (and their higher costs). In a long term grid down/economic collapse, it would far easier to acquire replacement AC appliances, than DC appliances, since virtually every abandoned home will have AC appliances and there will be virtually no abandoned working DC appliances. Most of the DC appliances are 12V/24V DC which means they are usually limited to small devices (no full sized DC Refrigs/Freezers/Washing Machines) and are not very power efficient because of large current input required.
well, see TechGuy, you are thinking about it.
http://www.news.pitt.edu/news/pitt-project-aims-turn-world-dc-power
http://www.mnn.com/green-tech/research-innovations/stories/the-home-of-tomorrow-will-run-on-direct-current
http://www.emergealliance.org/
In about two and a half weeks (June 26), the EIA’s next “Electric Power Monthly” should be out with the data for April. I will be updating my graph for Solabr PV and Thermal Monthly Energy Output with the April data but, the figure for March is already greater than the peak in June last year (1934 vs 1689 GWh).
This year the output should peak in June or July and it will be interesting to see what the peak production will be. Solar is approaching 1% of US electricity production (GWh) and may well produce more than 1% of the electricity used in 2015 with that doubling to 2% by the end of 2017. That would suggest less than six more doublings from 2017 to reach 100%!
I am not suggesting that any such thing will happen but, just pointing out how current growth trends suggest a disruption may be in the offing. If I were in the business of generating electricity using fossil fuels or nuclear, I would be busy planning my strategies to deal with the threat from new renewables. Otherwise I would be planning my exit strategy, from the electricity business that is.
Just in case there’s anybody out there who’s still wondering why I continue to post about electricity production from renewables on a Peak Oil site, take a look at the following stories:
Oil, Politics Pave Path Toward Default in Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico Gets $3.5 Billion Plan to Fix Teetering Utility
From the EIA
” Puerto Rico has few conventional energy resources, and shipped in petroleum products are the dominant energy source for the island. In 2013, 55% of Puerto Rico’s electricity came from petroleum, 28% from natural gas, 16% from coal, and 1% from renewable energy.”
Other articles I have read suggest that Puerto Rico faces similar challenges to where I live, among them, high levels of electricity theft and large numbers of delinquent customers. For all intents and purposes, I could have been posting from Puerto Rico but, I think Puerto Rico may have more electricity related indebtedness than Jamaica! The high price of oil since 2005 or thereabouts seems to have done a real number on them. For islands all over the world with zero fossil fuel resources, I see improvements in the affordability of renewable energy technology as a very positive development.
I will also add that EVs are far more practical for islands and the smaller they are the less EV range limitations are an issue. What’s the point of an EV with 200 miles (320km) of range when the island is 15 miles from end to end or even less? Cuba, Hispaniola, Jamaica, Puerto Rico are the only islands in the Caribbean on which, you could drive for over a hundred miles in a straight line without ending up in the ocean and for Trinidad, the longest distance you could drive in a straight line, is a little over 60 miles.
Rest assured that quite a lot of the regulars here look forward to your comments.
The various islands are ready made natural laboratories that are as good as deliberately designed experiments in helping us learn how the peak oil question is going to play out.
Hopefully the people of Jamaica will get their political act together and get control of their electrical grid by whatever means is necessary- maybe even nationalizing it if nothing else works.
It seems obvious to me that your little country has no real choice other than to bite the bullet and somehow pay the upfront cost of going renewable as soon as possible to the extent possible.
It is only a matter of luck that my own country has a larger window of opportunity to manage a successful transition.
What happens in the island nations is probably for better or worse going to be repeated within a decade or two , maybe much sooner, in many larger countries.
History doesn’t precisely repeat but it does rhyme.
Hey Mac, thanks for the assurance!
Speaking of natural laboratories, Wimbi posted some links in a comment he made on the previous lead post that, introduced me to pyrolysis, something I had not looked at before.
Last year during a particularly bad spate of bush fires, an idiot was negligent in starting a fire that damaged a portion of the land at my late father’s homestead. I have been felling the trees that did not survive the fire as well as some low value trees that did survive, as I am re-planting with high value lumber trees. My farm hand and his brother decided that they would use the felled trees to produce charcoal which I thought was a good idea. However, I have observed that their choice of using an earth mound kiln to produce the charcoal seems fraught with issues, produces a lot of smoke and seems a bit inefficient.
Wimbi’s link lead me to the discovery of this 55 gallon drum charcoal retort that, seems pretty easy to build and operate as well as being significantly more efficient, smoke free and movable, once the feedstock has been exhausted. I’ve told the guys to stop until I can get one of these things built.
One might say that burning biomass is unsustainable but, around here excessive amounts are often considered a problem. People light bush fires to clear land and the waste from clearing road and highway verges, vacant lots and agricultural plots as well as yard cuttings from trimming hedges and lawns, is considered a solid waste problem. I have often thought, why not gather all this biomass that might otherwise just go up in smoke and use it to produce electricity or charcoal for fuel or bio-char for soil enrichment? Some of this stuff grows really fast, to point of being a plague. I would love to be able to turn the Guinea Grass on my property into bio-char!
Gov. David Ige, D-Hawaii, signed a bill into law that mandates state utilities to procure 100% of their electricity from renewable energy sources, making Hawaii the first U.S. state to require such a mandate.
H.B.623, “Relating To Renewable Standards,” increases Hawaii’s renewable portfolio standard to 30% by 2020; 70% by 2040; and 100% by 2045.
http://www.solarindustrymag.com/e107_plugins/content/content.php?content.15363
This ought to trigger a boom in geothermal power. They are going to need 20 to 25 2000 hp rigs drilling non stop forever.
I know growth of solar has been much higher than 8%/y. Still in real numbers on a global scale we are talking about peanuts. When solar will (soon) represent substantial quantities, these double digit growth numbers will be over. In the model I let solar (+wind and geo) grow at 8% for 35 years. That means a ~twentifold increase! That is huge! We will run out of rooftops! There will be no more wind available to blow through our hairs! 🙂
You know: I am just guessing – starting from the knowledge I have. It is what is is.
Hi Verwimp,
I think your graphic is very interesting. My point was that in 1900 (the oil industry was about 40 years old in the US at the time) oil output grew at double digit rates until 1948, so such growth in a relatively new technology lasted for many years (oil growth was about 31%/year from 1900 to 1910 and over 10% in 1948.)
My understanding of the oil industry is that it is somewhat more complex than digging holes in the ground at random. Even if that is not the case, there has been some technological progress since 1900, no? Possibly we can match 1900 to 2005 growth rates with the technology of 2015 to 2100? The model seems too optimistic so I have modified it to 80% of oil industry growth rates below for something that looks reasonable, I have no illusions that this will be easy, there will no doubt be obstacles, many unforeseen. It does not look to be impossible, though you may not agree, do you have an alternative proposition?
Note that with efficiency improvements and a reduction of the Total fertility ratio worldwide and slower economic growth we may well be able to cut energy use below 300 Exajoules, but there are physical limits to efficiency improvements.
The modern wind industry is roughly 41 years old (took off with first oil crisis in 1974, a similar age to the US oil industry in 1900), though I used 1995 as the starting point for Wind at 1900 oil industry growth levels (modern wind industry only 23 years old). For the solar industry, growth took off around 1995 with output growth for the last decade at about 44%, and from 2005 to 2013 growth was 47% per year, so the 1900 oil industry growth was actually slower than present day growth in solar output.
If we assume wind and solar only grow at 80% of the 1900 to 2005 oil industry growth rate (wind starting at 80% of oil industry growth rate in 1996 and solar in 2008) then we get a more realistic scenario with wind and solar output at 340 Exajoules in 2100.
You know, given the cost of the mega batteries you’ll need I think I’m going to start sketching a geothermal renewable business line. We can use second hand rigs from North Dakota to get started. Let me see if I can invent some kind of “future technology improvement” I can peddle to get some r&d cash and future subsidies.
So, got any calculations on the batteries??
Fernando,
I single out wind and solar because they are growing rapidly, I am all for geothermal, tidal, wave, hydro, and pumped hydro storage, whatever works for the lowest cost (when all externalities are included in those costs). For nuclear, I would want the nuclear industry to cover all liability (repeal the Price Andersen Act in the US) and all cleanup and disposal of nuclear waste so that we see the true cost of nuclear power. If it is cheaper and the people who live near the reactors are comfortable with such reactors, we could go for nuclear, as long as it is not in my backyard (I would feel the same about a coal fired power plant).
A widely dispersed set of these technologies tied together with an HVDC grid and a capacity overbuild of a factor of 2, would require very little back up by a combination of vehicle to grid, fuel cells and batteries. Excess wind and solar can be used to produce hydrogen to fuel the fuel cells for backup, hydro, pumped hydro and geothermal can also be used to fill some of the gaps and a limited amount of natural gas can be used on rare occasions until the system can be optimized to run without natural gas spinning reserve.
There is also thermal storage and peak power pricing that can be used to shave the peaks in demand and fill the valleys.
In eighty-five years natural depletions and the growing global warming crises will have provided any needed impetus for change. Not a very aggressive or politically abrasive goal.
To look that far into the future gives no urgency to act today. Solid goals for near term of five year increments with annual checks need to be set to spur early action. The sooner action occurs the easier it is to implement further action and the less likely the effort will stagnate.
Thanks for the effort Verwimp. I hope you can update this on an annual basis, and maybe consider for example 2-3 scenarios.
Enno, thanks! Annual updates on world energy consumption are provided by BP. (Tomorrow is the release of the 2014 data!!!)
The reason why I made the post above was the G7 statement. The cool thing is: The G7 als a group of nations experiences a decline in energy consumption since 2007. They are post peak-consumption. And they are aware of it. And now they ask the rest of the world to limit their growth too, in the interest of the climate. That’s just politics. But it’s interesting.
The G7 als a group of nations experiences a decline in energy consumption since 2007. They are post peak-consumption. And they are aware of it.
Of course they’re aware of it. It’s what they want. It’s what they planned. It’s a good thing.
Fossil fuels (and other energy sources) have no inherent value. Their only value is what they can do for us. If we can get around, and deliver freight, with less energy, that’s a very good thing.
Hi Verwimp,
If we assume wind and solar grow at the oil growth rate from 1900 to 2000, with wind starting in 1996 at the 1900 oil rate of growth and solar starting in 2008 at the 1900 oil rate of growth (wind was at a similar growth rate, solar was actually growing faster), we would have the following electric output in Exajoules from wind and solar from 2020 to 2100. These are unrealistic, but the idea is to illustrate that similar rates of growth as oil experienced when it was a new technology would easily allow double the fossil fuel peak energy output, when we only need half that amount.
Fossil fuels peak at about 500 Exajoules, that amount can be reached in 2055, but 300 Exajoules would be enough (because of fewer thermal losses in engines and power plants, and the use of heat pumps for space and water heating) and could be attained by 2048.
Dennis! Why you do this to me? 😀
I know, I know. But solar PV is not oil. You don’t just make a hole in the ground to get Solar, like they used to do to get that first oil. I believe solar PV is a result of fossil fuels, not a substitute. Time will tell. I hope there is a really great future for solar PV and wind.
Hi Verwimp,
I replied to you in the wrong place. Your work is excellent, thanks.
See my reply at link below:
http://peakoilbarrel.com/the-eias-drilling-productivity-report/comment-page-1/#comment-520757
I believe solar PV is a result of fossil fuels, not a substitute.
Every energy source is built (at the start) using the energy source that came before.
Oil was originally transported with horses.
Coal was moved from the mines using wood.
A New Peak in Conventional Crude Oil Production
http://www.euanmearns.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/C-Cdec141.png
If shale’s decline will mirror it’s increase (in full percentages on a monthly (!!) base), future doesn’t look pretty good.
Can someone please inform the masses to stay calm and cool?
Rising prices will send people stampeding back into shale, which will provide something of a moderating factor on the way down. Erratic extraction of reserves makes Hubbert peak graphing inapplicable. Iraq is the best example of this.
Problem is that the US continuing to grow production is toast.
One would think that since the boom and bust cycle is harmful to society in general, that people would get tired of it and move to more stable endeavors. Real progress (and I do not mean infinite growth or increases in GDP) is difficult to make in unstable situations.
EIA says the above shale plays oil production peaked in April.
Didn’t I just read the EIA reported a large spike in May?
The spike in May had to do with revisions? Or are other oil plays, such as SCOOP really taking off?
Can someone explain this? I feel like I have been following this closely. I guess not, or the intelligence/memory is failing me.
Shallow, it is very easy to explain. Those guys who said we had a huge spike in May are a different group of guys from those that said we peaked in April. They work all the way over on the other side of the room. Different cubicles and everything.
Ron, I am sure I have posted this before, and you may already know this, but for the benefit of others, given what I find is a ridiculous system by the EIA of recording oil production data, here is what happens each month regarding our, and I assume every other oil producers’ oil in the United States:
1. Throughout the month, our oil is picked up by tanker trucks. At one time several of our leases were metered and went straight into the pipeline. Unfortunately, the pipeline company did not want to maintain the line and shut it down.
2. Each time a truck hauls a load of our oil, we are provided with a run ticket, which contains information such as top gauge, bottom gauge, % bs&w, oil gravity, date and time gauged and hauled, etc.
3. Around the 10th of the following month, the crude purchaser forwards us run statements, which show pretty much the same information as the run tickets, but also show the price per barrel. We match the run tickets with the run statements. If we find an error, we call the crude purchaser. I can remember 2 errors in 18 years, and they were minor and corrected immediately.
4. Around the 20th of the following month, we are paid for oil sold the previous month.
I presume 99.9% of all proceeds from oil sold in May, 2015 will be paid to the owners thereof between the 18th and 25th of June, 2015.
I again ask, why can’t the EIA require all US crude purchasers report their gross US crude purchases to the EIA? The information would be sent electronically.
Why would this be a bad thing to do? What problems am I not considering?
I do not think oil in storage would be an issue. Even if Exxon decides to store every drop of oil it produces in a year, I am sure it first sells same to a subsidiary pipeline, which pays the royalty and other working interest owners.
As I have said before, crude purchasers have to be meticulous record keepers and have advanced technology for record keeping purposes. They handle millions or billions of dollars paid to hundreds of thousands or maybe over a million different persons or entities each month.
We have leases where minerals were severed from the surface over 100 years ago. Some now have well over 100 royalty interest owners. This is common in many places all over the USA.
Think about the division of interest for SACROC, the Wasson Unit and the Yates Unit. If crude purchasers can keep these records accurate, seems sending a simple report of monthly gross purchases to EIA electronically would be a piece of cake.
We would know crude oil sold for May by June 20.
I invite criticism of my idea. Surely I am missing something here.
Also, they could report gravity information. That way Jeffrey J. Brown would be proven conclusively correct re his oil gravity assertions.
Shallow, you have explained basically the process in which oil is sold and how the income from that oil is disbursed. That happens every month, to the complete satisfaction of 28,000,000 Texans, in Texas anyway. Leases, counties, districts, regions; every barrel is accounted for. The problem (for some folks) is on the state level and how all that data is gathered up over time and presented to the public.
As I have said here, however,
http://peakoilbarrel.com/world-oil-output-last-3-years/comment-page-1/#comment-520543,
folks are not going to change how we do things down here in Texas very easily. Your idea is reasonable and a good one, but there must be an accounting relationship between producer and buyer to balance the oil check book.
Our process down here works fine. It causes some people angst, I understand. To me its much to do about not very much and my only complaint with all this hubbub is the misinformation being stated by some that creates doubt and mistrust in how barrels of oil are actually accounted for in Texas.
Mike
Hi Mike,
I apologize. My use of the “e” word was not intended to cause mistrust and I will try to refrain from using it in the future, occasionally it is actually mentioned by the RRC, as in the link below.
http://www.rrc.state.tx.us/all-news/052715b/
I am sure that all barrels produced are accounted for as accurately as is humanly possible in Texas and everywhere else in the US.
You probably don’t care what the statewide output is in Texas, but I do because it is more than a third of US output. Do you have access to better data for Statewide Texas output than what is reported in the PDQ?
Any uptick in Eagle Ford activity in April and May? I have read that there were more completions in April and May than in the first quarter. About 150 oil well completions per month in first quarter and 210 completions per month in April and May.
Edit: I just read your comment linked to above.
Mike you seem like a very smart man. If you really believe that the total output of oil is known exactly in Texas, I will just go with it.
In my world, no measurement is exact, every measurement is an estimate. Clearly you think of estimate in the sense of a guess, and most people seem to agree with your use of the word. These are just different meanings of the same word and for the most part I will avoid using that word as many find it offensive.
Texas has been at the oil game a lot longer than North Dakota, at some point Texas will improve its data systems, but i won’t hold my breath. Two years is a long time to wait to get all the data reported, but if it works for Texas, it’s all good, we will use statistics to guess at output in the meantime.
No need to apologize to me, Dennis. I understand its frustrating to you and a handful of others; I simply want to make sure that the rest of America does not think we are flying by the seat of our blue jeans down here. Texas operators must file timely, and accurately, and no regulatory agency or individual working in that agency has the ability to trade oil futures with data the rest of the world does not have. That’s dumb. You did not say that, I know. Production reporting is complex in Texas, with a workable system of checks and balances (absolutely imperative by Texas mineral law standards), but it serves the precise purpose for which it was intended when it was devised over 90 years ago. Things won’t change in Texas too much, no sir.
I just drove thru the guts of the EF today, Dennis; there is absolutely NO uptick occurring, I assure you. I saw only 3 drilling rigs running in the Karnes trough, near Cheapside (now called Richside by many), in the heart of EOG country and numerous CT heads on cranes indicating to me that EOG is frac’ing away, on multiwall pads, at that. I never bought into that drill and hold stuff and I sure don’t see it. If completions increased in April and May that was shale folks getting caught up on wells they drilled EOY 2014, under dedicated 2014 budgets. The drilling to completion lag time is decreasing with less stress on frac spreads; 2-3 months now, IMO. H&P has a new yard east of San Antonio that has 75 rigs stacked in it. There were 3 rigs sitting on 30 trucks waiting at the front entrance for the valet to show them where to park. I don’t see how they could squeeze a wheelbarrow in that yard anymore.
I have good friends, with 40 years of experience out of work. If we drop off in another swale with oil prices, it is even going to get worse, IMO.
Mike
Hi Mike,
I am releaved that you are still talking to me.
Thanks for the info. So maybe the fracking activity has picked up a little since March, but the drilling has not. I imagine if oil gets above $80/b for a month or so maybe the rigs will become active again.
Hopefully Kopits oil price forecast is correct ($85/b by end of 3rd quarter).
Is there anywhere that has more up to date statewide Texas output data than the RRC’s PDQ?
It may be that I just don’t know how the RRC’s online system works or maybe the info is in the State’s tax database (but that info may not be available to the public).
I am convinced that somebody follows this very closely (to the penny) in Texas, probably on a monthly (or maybe weekly) basis.
What seems strange is that it takes 2 years for all the data to flow to the PDQ, it may make sense to you. For example I understand for tax and royalty purposes everything has to balance like a checkbook.
For reporting purposes in the PDQ there is no such requirement, the data provided by producers could be posted in the PDQ with the proviso that all data is preliminary until 24 months have past and any discrepancies (and I believe you have said these are very few) can simply be taken care of by revising the data.
The only thing I would mess with is the way data is reported in the PDQ, I am pretty sure that nobody’s taxes or royalties are based on the PDQ (or a whole lot of Texans would be mad that their royalty payments were late).
Dennis, my assessment of activity in the Eagle Ford is based on physical observation, actual vested interest (and first hand knowledge) in the near term plans of several shale operators and heresay. New EF wells in S. Texas have slowed to a crawl. On a day to day basis I am too busy dealing with 149 of my own problem children to worry about what those shale knuckleheads will do tomorrow when and if oil prices improve. All the pundits and bloggers are essentially discounting price volatility in their desire to guess about the future of shale oil; LTO economics require high, stable oil prices for the business model to succeed and it didn’t, IMO. It won’t.
Texas oil producers do not report production to the EIA, nor IHS, nor DI, nor to NCAA; only to the TRRC. There is no other place to get the data.
I have tried to correct the misstatements made about Texas reporting practices. I don’t think “estimate” is a four letter word. I allocate individual well production under commingling permits and common tank batteries using a number of different methods; it is indeed estimating, but it’s accurate estimating. In the end, however, oil produced, and removed (sold) from under a mineral owner’s land must balance to the barrel. Stealing oil (by not reporting production accurately) will still get you strung up in Texas. Royalty and taxes are paid accurately on a lease by lease basis, each month, not off the PDQ, correct, but by individual reports, lease by lease, pooled unit by pooled unit. The PDQ exists for the benefit of people like yourself who think they need the exact data, immediately.
Admittedly, I don’t fully understand that.
In my opinion 80% of the oil producing countries in the world do not report their daily production accurately, intentionally, by very large amounts. Most remaining recoverable reserves throughout the world are grossly overstated by wide margins. For the peak oil community to get its panties in a bunch about Texas not making its production data accurately available to the public for several months down the road…well, I don’t much get it.
Mike
Mike: Do you do your own royalty accounting or does the crude oil purchaser do that for you?
The crude oil purchaser does that part for us, thankfully.
Mike,
A cold beer on a hot summer day, what a refreshing dose of realism. Thanks for that man.
Doug
Mike, many of us get the data prepackaged and massaged from IHS in a single contract. It includes well logs, maps, production and all sorts of goodies. That outfit makes a living taking state and private data and reselling it.
I think my idea is more efficient than what EIA is currently doing.
EIA apparently has many analysts who use various formulas to estimate production.
My idea would seem to require a very small team that would just need to be able to set up a simple online reporting system for crude purchases, gravity of crude purchased, monthly, and then total/compile the data.
My suggestion would not require any state to change anything they do. It would only require crude purchasers to electronically mail a simple report of total crude purchased for the month, and a breakdown of the crude by gravity, maybe in increments of 5 degrees, or whatever is deemed best.
It is too simple. Therefore, I assume, it will not happen.
Maybe too many government employee forecasters and private forecasting firms rely on the current system in order to make a living.
Hi Shallow sands,
I guess my point is that the oil companies already provide this information to their state agencies and would probably prefer not to have any extra paperwork.
As far as the different reports out of the EIA, none are great, but the monthy data from the Monthly energy review(MER) is much more reliable than the Drilling Productivity report, which is a model which needs some serious work. Given that the data the EIA gets from the states is incomplete, the MER is as good as it gets for US data, if we subtract Texas EIA guesses and substitute the much better guess by Dean, that is about as good as it gets for US C+C output data.
I like your idea even better, but like you said it is unlikely to happen.
Dennis. I agree that no business likes extra paperwork/record keeping. However, what I propose is a minimal amount of extra work concerning information I am sure the crude purchasers have already compiled. The form, which would be electronically submitted, would be one page. Crude oil purchased for the month would be broken down by state and by gravity. That is it. I think that could be fit on one page, or at least one page per state.
My comment above about forecasts is an exaggeration. However, I thought forecasts concern predicting future events, not what happened months ago.
It really is not a big deal to us. We don’t trade oil, just sell oill for the monthly average posted price plus a volume bonus. I just think EIA production data could be made more accurate and timely.
Agreed, we should put you in charge 🙂
Lol Dennis. No way. I am highly qualified at complaining though. I think I have demonstrated that well here! Lol!
Updated EIA chart showing estimated US C+C Production by gravity. The EIA is now showing virtually no increase in US 40 API and lower crude oil production from 2011 to 2014, with a minimal increase in 40 API and lower projected production in future years, in their Reference Case.
It would certainly be better data then we get now. It would be sales volumes as opposed to production volumes. For purposes of watching big trends, it would be close enough to the same thing. Perhaps it is because I have been mired in the minutiae of this very stuff for nearly 20 years, but it seems to me that it would probably harder to get it together than it seems at first glance. It depends on what level of detail you are after I suppose. The more useful, the harder it would be. That has been my experience anyway.
Hi Shallow sands,
I think this is a states rights issue. Recording this information is up to the states.
North Dakota probably does something like you suggest (but that it is a guess).
Other states seem to do that for their taxes and royalties etc, but the information does not seem to get to the part of the government agency that compiles and reports the output data publicly in a timely manner. There are states where it takes about 24 months for all of this output data to make it to the public database. The reasons for this delay are unclear, it is just a low priority I guess.
So the EIA is left to guess at output. The Drilling productivity report is a forecast and it has never been very good. The output from Jan to April in that forecast for the Bakken and Eagle Ford is too high. We have the real numbers through March for the Bakken from the NDIC (about 1130 kb/d) and in Feb the Eagle Ford was about 1400 kb/d (my last estimate based on RRC data and Dean’s estimate from April). The DPR does not take account of the frack log and bases its estimates on rigs and assumed completions per rig. So when the rig count goes down output goes down with a two month lag, the existence of thousands of wells waiting on completion is ignored and is a major flaw in the EIA’s model.
I think this is a states rights issue.
Dennis, I am sorry but I could not help but laugh when I saw that sentence. Do you really think this is a Tenth Amendment issue?
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Hi Ron,
I am not a legal scholar. Generally the federal government lets the states decide how they should tax minerals. As some have pointed out a lot of this has to do with mineral rights and taxation.
The EIA has to be funded by congress, if the legislature wants the EIA to do a better job collecting data, they will put enough money in the EIA budget to accomplish the task. This choice has not been made, for what ever reason, mostly because many members of congress would prefer to reduce the scope of the Federal government as much as possible.
The suggestions of Shallow Sands could easily be done by the state agencies responsible for collecting oil data and the EIA could just collect the data from the various states. It is just not a high priority item as some people have pointed out.
So we are left with guesses.
I bet OPEC, the Chinese, and other outfits have this data, and the NSA and CIA grab it. This is used by fake CIA fronts to play in the market and get extra cash to pay for secret operations and the illegal alien welcome center in Area 41.
This is used by fake CIA fronts to play in the market and get extra cash to pay for secret operations and the illegal alien welcome center in Area 41.
Does this welcome center look anything like the extraterrestrial alien welcome center in Area 51? 😉
The welcome center is at McCarran for the weekly flights north, which is not all that comfortable.
I think $85 oil by end of year is pretty likely. Bakken new well production would just about equal out to legacy declines at that price, but it certainly won’t grow under $100. For production to actually continue to increase and go above it’s March peak, you’d need prices that the global economy couldn’t sustain for long.
Shale oil growth has matched the increase in global demand for half a decade now, but that’s over now. The ~1 to ~1.5 million more barrels per day that the world gobbles up per year will start to have an effect on prices.
Steven Kopits is predicting $85 oil by the end of the third quarter. Here’s the link to the recent interview with Steven on CNBC:
http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000384466
It depends on the Chinese, I suppose. They must have a huge stock of cheap oil bought over the last few months. Being the largest crude buyer does give them an interesting monopsonish flavor. What’s the Saudi net cash flow at 80? Do they live from what they make at that price? Would it be possible for the Saudis and Chinese to fine tune the market? Just asking.
So, the EIA says the US shale plays will decline at 1.63% per month in June 2015.
Solar PV is good for the southern U.S.,
but for the northern areas and Canada, it seems Wind power is the best option.
Recent installations on vancouver island have shown an 8.1% return on investment, which means they are economic without subsidies.
Wind generation has massive issues with bird strikes & kills in northern US since that is in the migratory pathway. On the talk radio there is frequent mention of how the dead birds really pile up if not cleared away by people or predators in the heavy wind farm areas.
cats and windows kill several orders of magnitude more birds than wind farms
A Summary and Comparison of Bird Mortality from
Anthropogenic Causes with an Emphasis on Collisions
http://www.fs.fed.us/psw/publications/documents/psw_gtr191/Asilomar/pdfs/1029-1042.pdf
Wind turbines are responsible for 0.01% of bird fatalities from man made causes. The more important causes are buildings(58%), power lines(14%), cats (11%), and pesticides (7%). All other causes were less than 1%.
From table 2 in the document linked by ezridermike on p. 1036 of the document.
Killing 1,000 birds per day like a wind farm will? Don’t know about that. Chilling video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CEersoJLtRw showing how our genius government is literally giving these wind farmers license to kill endangered and supposedly protected birds all in the name of keeping the greenies happy (and voting Democrat, no doubt).
If we don’t have energy….birds don’t stand a chance anyway.
We will be putting them on tacos and nachos when ELM peak oil bites.
We need thorium/nuclear and liquid fuels to have a chance.
I don’t think even that will work.
Ultimately, it is an exponential curve of population growth that is the problem. We have to stop the exponential doublings.
There is no escape from that, unfortunately.
”There is no escape from that, unfortunately.”
BB4 ,I used to believe the same thing but I am no longer SURE there is no escape.
Some possibilities come to mind.
One, Business As Usual, world wide, lasts longer than we expect – with women world wide getting some education sooner than we expect.A number of countries that I used to believe were doomed to famine and worse might turn the population corner simply because of rising general prosperity.
Two, priests of various stripes in some cases may and probably will come out in favor of family planning. This has happened before with dramatic results but I can’t remember the details well enough to post them.
Three, some super rich folks are donating megabucks to good causes. Somebody may figure out a way to make birth control free and unobtrusive. Suppose a woman could swallow a single pill that prevents her from getting pregnant for a year or longer?Or suppose a poor man is offered something priceless to HIM – such as a small pv system with batteries, some power tools, radio, and so forth in exchange for having a vasectomy?
Four, somebody impatient with more ethically acceptable approaches may decide to modify a common virus so that it sterilizes anybody who gets infected by it. Given that it would spread by itself but curing it would involve treating the victims- many or most of them in places where no treatment is available- this sort of approach could work wonders.
All this sort of thing used to be the province of wishful thinking or science fiction but things are changing so fast technologically that social change can and sometimes does come unexpectedly in an eye blink.
Consider the amazing drop in the birth rate in Brazil for instance. So far as I can tell the single most important factor in this coming about was the arrival of cheap television sets. Once the women there saw actresses on tv living a modern life without lots of kids they got the idea IMMEDIATELY. Note that Brazil is at least nominally a Catholic country.
Another thought that apparently has not yet blossomed in the eyes of the public is that as population falls-which it MUST eventually- wealth is going to be there for the inheritance of it rather than the purchase thereof. A new social paradigm could arise.
Just yesterday I was lamenting the fact that I don’t have a couple of hale and hearty sons to work their asses off for their old daddy on their days off for affection and in hopes of inheriting the farm.
People at one time did in PART raise large families to assure themselves of help and hopefully support in their old age. (Personally I have always believed half or more of the kids were the result of just having a little fun back in days when birth control was expensive, unreliable, and hard to come by due to law and religious custom.)
With modern medicine and the welfare state etc people no longer need lots of kids. People may come to FULLY understand that having one or two kids means having a HIGHER standard of living over the course of their lifetimes- PLUS having ASSETS to leave as inheritances which will ensure the prosperity of that same one or two kids.
Nevertheless you are probably right.
My own guess is that the Four Horsemen are going to solve the population problem in a lot more places than people solve it for themselves.
From Calhoun’s population studies on rats:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_B._Calhoun
“After day 600, the social breakdown continued and the population declined toward extinction. During this period females ceased to reproduce. Their male counterparts withdrew completely, never engaging in courtship or fighting. They ate, drank, slept, and groomed themselves – all solitary pursuits. Sleek, healthy coats and an absence of scars characterized these males. They were dubbed “the beautiful ones.” Breeding never resumed and behavior patterns were permanently changed.
The conclusions drawn from this experiment were that when all available space is taken and all social roles filled, competition and the stresses experienced by the individuals will result in a total breakdown in complex social behaviors, ultimately resulting in the demise of the population.”
Do you find yourself spending more and more time alone at the computer, the TV and other isolating endeavors and less and less time procreating, raising and protecting young or otherwise being involved with females and children? It’s OK, you are now beautiful, at least according to John B. Calhoun’s labeling.
But unfortunately we’ve never been able to get of rats.
We won’t – or people either. A closed laboratory is not the same thing as large open spaces. In the real world , as opposed to a closed lab space, rats and people move and fight to the death and keep on making hanky panky.If a given suitable territory by chance becomes totally depopulated, wandering newcomers soon find it and repopulate it.
But the implications of this research are troublesome in the extreme. I think it should be repeated on a larger scale with more modern equipment. There might be a significant new insights gained.
The lack of predators seems to be a key to the results. I don’t know if ants or other scavengers were present and present in sufficient numbers to clean up the rat carcasses. Such factors would change the results, probably dramatically.
I remember hearing about it in various classes I took over the years. The professors generally referred to this phenomenon as part and parcel of the ”General Adaptation Syndrome.” You seldom hear it mentioned these days.
“we’ve never been able to get of rats.”
Rat knew that.
I ate simbiliki a long time ago. It’s a large African rat. Tastes ok with rice and mushroom soup.
showing how our genius government is literally giving these wind farmers license to kill endangered and supposedly protected birds all in the name of keeping the greenies happy (and voting Democrat, no doubt).
Yeah, maybe so! But your comment reeks of ignorant ideology! Why don’t you concern yourself with skyscrapers that symbolize the fossil fuel based BAU paradigm, infinite economic growth and right wing corporate monopolies? How about migrating waterfowl that are killed by waste ponds around the Tar Sands up in Canada or because of deforestation and and habitat loss in hundreds of places all around the world?!
http://www.bcnbirds.org/window.html
Window Collisions
Bright Lights, Big Cities: Lights & Windows are Deadly Hazards for Birds
At least 100,000,000 birds are killed and even more are injured every year across North America by collisions with windows. Ornithologists have been studying this phenomenon for decades and their findings are very conclusive: birds simply do not recognize glass as a barrier. During daytime, birds often fly head-on into windows, confused by the reflection of trees or sky. This is a common occurrence even in the suburbs at homes and glassy office campuses. Of the birds that suffer head trauma, over half die.
Additionally, scientists have observed that at night the bright lights of buildings seem to confuse birds, especially during cloudy, foggy or rainy weather. Large masses of birds have been photographed during the night at one of Chicago’s skyscrapers, the birds continually circling and battering the building lights. By dawn the birds are either dead or seriously injured. These birds were migrants on their twice-yearly, night-time migration. During some weather conditions and at certain “killer” buildings, the death toll can be in the hundreds per day.
Emphasis mine, BTW, NOTE: those hundreds of birds killed per day, that’s not caused by an entire wind farm, that’s just one fucking building on one street corner in one city.
The USA is placing these windmills in wild, natural ecosystems, causing an untold amount of ecological damage. In one desert ecosystem in California, the first Earth-death occurred while skinning the ecosystem with roads for access to install the wind turbines in the first place.
The turbine installers then killed a huge population of desert tortoises, a listed, protected, native species of biological diversity with the heavy, planet-skinning equipment. One of the reasons, this strand in the web of all life is headed toward extinction is, when they disturb the soil in an ecosystem, like skinning the plants and trees away to make room for the bird, eagle and bat killing windmills, more death to the strands in the web of all life — they plant weeds in the disturbed soil.
These weeds are not in the food chains with any biological diversity; bio means life. The endangered tortoise/biological diversity is starving today because the weeds aren’t in his ecological food chain.
A sliced and diced ecosystem falls under fragile island ecology, scientifically, “fragmentation”. A fragmented ecosystem is a heavily damaged ecosystem. It changes the roles of predators and prey species. Birds like to build their nests in the interior of ecosystems while fragmentation forces them to build their nests and nestlings at the exterior of the system. Predators have easier access to prey species at the exterior, just like windmills killing birds, the predators gain the advantage.
The reason they’re skinning and destroying these rural out of the way ecosystems/Earth is because people will no longer live with these noisy, gigantic monsters that take away serenity, beauty and peace and health due to all the noise and oscillations. Yes, the USA is killing Earth, the strands in the web of all life and the future to, maybe, somehow, help climate! Sickening.
Can we sign you up for the various environmental protection groups?
There are all sorts of projects we might want to kill to protect the environment.
I am concerned that those who protest wind turbines in the name of the environment wouldn’t also protest roads, housing developments, waste water disposal, and other projects because of their negative environmental impact.
But if there is true environmental concern for all of these projects I welcome the discussions. Let’s organize a massive campaign across the US to support environmental protection.
We’ll add people like yourself to show that the EPA does have widespread support.
The EPA? They’re skinning, deforesting, denaturing and scouring Earth’s ecosystems to make room for a green energy while they lap up the big green payola for themselves! Wind energy requires vast acreages of Earth’s wild, natural ecosystems for an inefficient, unproven energy source that slaughters millions of birds.
Where are they placing these butchers of Earth and mankind’s strands in the web of all life? On the surface of Earth’s most endangered ecosystems, land-based, terrestrial ecosystems, or untrammeled wilderness. Scientifically, we’re killing Earth and every reason mankind breathes for the perception of helping the climate, which according to the government’s own data hasn’t even warmed in 17+ years!
Ironically, ecosystems are the agent that absorbs those “greenhouse gases” for Earth, and when they skin away the plant and tree biological diversity to make room for these giant biological diversity killers, they release these sequestered climate warming gases back into the atmosphere to heat up the climate again like before the last ice age!
Mankind’s “land-use changes”, like skinning and denuding ecosystems, also heat up and dry out the climate. “The greener the land cover, the cooler the surface temperature.”
“Trees, in particular old growth trees [trees that Earth planted], are vitally important for life as we know it. Trees are effectively the greatest carbon warehouses to have ever evolved on Earth. For every one ton of wood created, 1.5 tons of carbon dioxide is absorbed and one ton of oxygen is released.” — A Scientist
Mankind’s “land-use changes”, like skinning and denuding ecosystems, also heat up and dry out the climate. “The greener the land cover, the cooler the surface temperature.”
I hope you’re pushing hard for rain forests, both preventing further destruction and restoring that has been lost.
Oh, and suburbs have been a huge part of land change. Will you support more open space and fewer housing developments? We’d love to have you join that movement. The more people supporting that, the better.
The environmental movement can use your support. Preserve nature!!
Patty Patty , forgive me for being blunt but the width and depth of your ignorance is astounding given that you have bothered to post a comment.
You believe coal fired power is in the best interest of the planet and everything that lives on it, don’t you?
Coal mining has a nasty habit of tearing up the land to get at the coal.
Of course, Patty is against coal, right?
The reason they’re skinning and destroying these rural out of the way ecosystems/Earth is because people will no longer live with these noisy, gigantic monsters that take away serenity, beauty and peace and health due to all the noise and oscillations. Yes, the USA is killing Earth, the strands in the web of all life and the future to, maybe, somehow, help climate! Sickening.
Let me guess you are either a really good POE or one of those paid professional trolls sponsored by some very wealthy vested interest group.
Otherwise I expect you to be up in arms about every single glass tower in every major metropolitan area all over the globe. I can’t wait to hear your proposal to tear down just about every single skyscraper on the planet. 100,000,000 birds a year are killed by glass windows and buildings in the US alone, how come you aren’t out there protesting that, eh?!
So which is it Patty?
Here you go Patty. We know you’ll support stopping the construction of buildings.
Bird Window Collisions: It’s estimated that more than 100 million birds (both large and small species) die in the United States each year as a result of collisions with windows. Research has determined that birds can hit windows of all sizes at any height (from a one-story house to high-rise building), at anytime, day or night.
Were any of ’em sage-grouse species?
Just askin’.
Oh no, the conservative Repubs are trying to turn the environmentalists against the environmentalists. Of course , the greenie environmentalists are educated, can think fairly clearly and came to the logical conclusion that not having wind power would be far more devastating to a whole range of species than having it.
Sorry Matt, no one can take you seriously when you couch your comment in terms used on rabid right wing radio shows.
I don’t see those activists out there protecting the many millions of birds purposefully poisoned each year. Or are we only interested in special birds, not birds or life in general?
The facts on Avitrol® bird poison
Avitrol®, promoted as a “flock frightening agent” or “repellent,” is a nervous system toxicant. It readily kills birds, and is dangerous to mammals and other animals.
It causes birds who eat it to suffer convulsions, fly erratically, sometimes striking structures, vocalize repeatedly, and eventually die.
The most common target birds are pigeons, house sparrows, and starlings.
From 2002 to 2006, 151-175 pounds of 4-aminopyridine were sold in the U.S. each year—enough to kill more than 200 million birds each year.
Isn’t it great that we now know people who are opposed to wind power are concerned about birds. We’ll recruit them. We’ll quote them.
Bird power.
They forgot the bats. Oh, that’s right there are not many left because the pesticides and herbicides are killing them. I guess bats are not pretty enough to be on posters.
It’s an interesting tactic because anyone who wants to stop wind power because of birds is waving a flag to all the bird-loving, habitat-protecting groups to join their cause.
Now those bird protection groups can say that those who oppose wind power for the sake of birds can be considered environmentalists and should be counted as yet another potential source of money and environmental support. Let’s get those folks to sign petitions to stop bird habitat destruction.
I think having so many people interested in bird protection is just a great thing.
I noticed that the push to stop wind power because of sonic illness faded away.
I knew one guy who was really pro coal and he kept telling everyone that the wind towers were not only ugly but the sound would wreck their health. He did appreciate the beauty of a surface mine and loved taking photos of drag line equipment.
Each to his own, but sounded weird to me.
Hmmmm! See my comment upthread where I write ” If I were in the business of generating electricity using fossil fuels or nuclear, I would be busy planning my strategies to deal with the threat from new renewables.”
All this opposition to renewables on environmental grounds makes one wonder! It has always struck me as wierd, for example, that people have protested that solar farms will destroy the habitat of endangered desert tortoises. This raises a couple of questions. 1) How did they end up on the endangered list in the first place? 2) Would these tortoises be further stressed by these new, largely passive structures in their environment?
I would think the tortoises might be quite happy to have the extra shade!
If I were in the nuclear power business I would sell a power plant accessory to fry birds with a blast of high pressure steam as they try to fly by the plant. That should be good enough to get wind and solar level subsidies for the darned things.
There are subsidies for all energy industries and they have varied over time.
A big subsidy for nuclear is reduced liability through Price Anersen Act in 1957 and the government eventually dealing with the problem of nuclear waste.
Well if talk radio says it’s true, you better believe it.
When flying toward a vertical turbine, most of what is in front of you (the bird) is empty space, so it looks safe.
When flying toward a horizontally-oriented turbine, the obstruction in front of you fills 100% of the outline, so you (the bird) veer off.
People think horiztontals are ugly; maybe they just don’t look Dutch enough or high-tech enough. But they solve the bird problem, if that’s what you’re worried about.
If protecting bird populations has become a big priority, I hope there is now a focus on preserving wetlands, creating open spaces, and making sure we don’t develop on their habitats.
There is SO much we can do to protect bird populations. Are you in for that? Can we sign you up for the support? Want to join the Nature Conservancy and the National Audubon Society?
what about the vertical axis windmills.
They should be safe for birds.
I got to the discussion late. This comment should
follow: this
thread and is addressed to Dennis, Ron, and others.
I think with respect to oil production reporting we should distinguish
between measurements and estimates. A
measurement is made with some sort of measuring equipment and the
value of the measurement is then reported. An estimate is made from
either incomplete or faulty measurements. Both measurements and
estimates can be inaccurate, but for different reasons.
A measurement can be inaccurate because
The measuring equipment is defective.
The person measuring is incompetent.
The person reporting the measurement is dishonest and lies about
the measurement.
An estimate is always based on assumptions and can be inaccurate if these
assumptions are not valid.
With these definitions, I think we can agree that the Texas RRC
reports measurments and the EIA reports estimates. The EIA breaks all
the rules in reporting estimates. Dean does an excellent job in
reporting his estimate of Texas oil production based on the incomplete
measurements of the Texas RRC. He explains how the estimates are
obtained and he includes a confidence interval. All estimates should
be accompanied by a confidence interval to give the reader an idea of
how reliable these estimates are. Jean Laherrère has frequently
lamented that the accuracy of oil production reporting is poor and
that the agencies reporting this production do a very poor job in
conveying the accuracy of their numbers by reporting 6 significant
figures when in fact only the first two figures are significant.
Hi Schinzy,
I have a different understanding of estimate than you and the rest of the World.
Some estimates are better than others. As an example, I used to play golf and would estimate distance by pacing off the distance from a 150 yard marker to know which club to choose. A better estimate would be found with a tape measure. Both of these are “measurements”, but like all measurements there are limits to their accuracy and so they are “estimates” of the true length.
For the scientist a measurement is always an estimate, it really is that simple.
Some estimates are very accurate (say when using a micrometer for measuring length), some are not very accurate, like pacing off a distance to estimate length. Both are estimates.
We can claim for legal and tax purposes that we know our measurements are exact, that does not make it so.
The way I view measurement and estimation is summed up at the link below:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Measurement#Information_theory
Note that in this view, unlike the positivist representational theory, all measurements are uncertain, so instead of assigning one value, a range of values is assigned to a measurement. This also implies that there is not a clear or neat distinction between estimation and measurement.
We are in agreement. I neglected to add “the limits of the measuring device” when I listed reasons for measures being inaccurate. There is however a distinction between estimates using inferential statistics (and thus usually assumptions) and estimates involving measures. Perhaps if we agreed that the word “measure” implicitly means “estimate” and referred to production numbers put out by the Texas RRC as “reported measured data” then people (at least you and I) would understand that this is an estimate of production while the estimate furnished by the EIA uses inferential statistics to come up with a number. In both cases there is an issue with accuracy which is not addressed by those reporting the numbers.
Hi Schinzy,
We are pretty much in agreement. I think you have a more positivist take on this than I do, but that is splitting hairs. I think there are always some assumptions, but in some cases there are more assumptions which tends to reduce our confidence in the resulting estimate.
As an example, a typical assumption when measuring with a tape measure is that the tape measure is accurate.
So it is pretty hard to get away from assumptions all together, we can try to minimize them, but eliminating them all together is difficult in practice.
I have decided to just use data for a measurement and guess for what you might call “an estimate using inferential statistics” (which I might think of as assumptions beyond the assumption that my measuring device is accurate).
Production volumes are nearly always some kind of estimate. If you think about what what a monthly production volume is; it is the volume produced from midnight on the first day of the month to midnight on the last day of the month. Outside of some very high value properties there is no reasonable way to measure this. The cost of the infrastructure and maintenance is too high to implement universally. There are complex Production Accounting systems that allocate volumes back to a wellbore completion using well tests, well downtime, flow meters, run tickets, and tank strappings to name a few of the inputs required. I’ve spent a lot of years working on getting field data into these systems and then getting the allocated data out. They are fairly accurate, but they are estimates. In the industry they are referred to as Actuals if they are monthly volumes and Estimates if they are calculated on a daily basis. Having to go back to re-allocate and resubmit a monthly allocation because someone in the field forgot to enter downtime is not all that uncommon. If you are looking at a monthly volume for a well completion, it is almost surely a volume that been through some kind of allocation process.
Thanks Slim.
For many people “estimate” is a four letter word 🙂
In the future I am going to stick with “data” for measurements and “guess” for the “e” word so I won’t waste anybody’s time on the meaning of a word.
In my estimation, I’m guessing that you could be right.
As in guesstimate or perhaps guesstimation?
My guess is that anything with “*stimat*” in it will cause undue confusion, I will try to use data and guess, though old habits are hard to break. 😉
Ezydermike
As per the charts in your study, the turbines at the Altamont pass in Cali kill three eagles, hawks or falcons every other day. This coincides with a reported project to modify the turbines in an effort to mitigate the slaughter.
I am a bird lover myself and do what I can out of pocket considering my very limited resources to maintain and improve bird habitat. Given that preserving bird habitat is more a matter of do no harm than active intervention my personal efforts are meaningful.
We have to be realistic and come to conclusions about such things as bird kills at wind farms and solar farms while keeping the BIG PICTURE in mind.
IF we manage to hang on , meaning not suffer a hard crash, while maintaining something of the environmental protection regulations already in place, THEN the survival of all the species of birds commonly killed at wind farms is pretty much assured.
If we do crash, as somebody upthread mentioned we will eat every bird that comes within shotgun range. Mist nets and other traps will get the ones too small to shoot and the ones left when we run short of ammo.
Only an ecologically ignorant or willfully blind person could possibly believe that wind farms over the long haul are going to result in a NET LOSS of birds as a general case. Each and every wind farm built means that many fewer acres of bird habitat destroyed elsewhere mining coal and cutting down forests for the purpose of burning the trees.
There is already a fast growing wood fuel export industry in the southeastern USA. As the fossil fuel supply dries up in coming decades we will be burning more and MORE and MORE wood in power plants- unless we get the power from wind and solar farms and other renewables.
We will be farming more and more fields not only hedgerow to hedgerow- the hedges will be taken out and the fields consolidated into larger biofuel farms of one sort or another. There are already millions and millions of acres of monoculture tree farms in my part of the country.
Loggers used to haul out the logs. Nowadays they take every scrap of wood down to small twigs, leaves, needles and all. Such landscapes are not exactly what most bird lovers have in mind visiting in their fossil fuel burning cars.
Having said all this I do believe in doing whatever can reasonably be done to reduce bird losses at wind farms – short of shutting them down and not building them.
There are enough good sites that we CAN afford to pass up some sites that are located on major migratory flyways. I am in favor of that.
There is a also a good possibility that somebody will eventually figure out a way to keep the birds away from the turbines. Research in this are area should be well funded.
Folks who want to build wind farms should sweeten the pot a bit by paying for the long term protection of some critical bird habitat to partially appease the folks who are religious about their birds.
Few issues are so often bungled as the day to day management of preserving land and wild life habitat.
For instance the highway department here recently spent over a million bucks supposedly saving a small patch of wetland at a new interchange. This land for now LOOKS sort of like a wetland which is about all I can say for it.
That same million bucks would have bought a good sized farm with a SUBSTANTIAL wetland on it and preserved it into perpetuity as state owned PARKLAND only a few minutes drive away.
That mostly wooded farm has since been logged and converted almost entirely into cow pasture and hay land. The bang for the buck would have been at least fifty times higher if the money had been spent buying that farm.
I love birds as well, they’re delicious 🙂
ConocoPhillips withdraws from shale gas exploration in Poland
http://www.pennenergy.com/articles/pennenergy/2015/06/conocophillips-withdraws-from-shale-exploration-in-poland.html?cmpid=EnlDailyPetroJune92015&eid=291006698&bid=1091495
Shale gas by country
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shale_gas_by_country
And of course, we all remember the massive reduction in the EIA’s estimate of possible recoverable reserves in the Monterey Shale Play. I believe that one company drilled and completed about 21 wells in the Monterey Play without reporting a single barrel of production. I’m guessing that the production rates were so low that they didn’t want to formally report any wells as being productive.
Poland had around 1/4 of the estimated TRR shale gas in Europe, too. Amazing how quickly these things get written down.
how things are quickly written down is quite natural 🙂 but how things are written “up” is fascinating 🙂
And that’s the end of Poland’s 15 minutes as the poster child for future Euro oil/gas.
Though we should remember this. It’s there. It’s not there economically. A time will come when economical won’t matter.
We all understand that money can be printed or keypunched into existence by central banks and other banks TO SOME EXTENT for the purpose of maintaining our unsustainable business as usual economy FOR A WHILE.
But there are hard limits to how long and how much money can be printed and thrown at the oil and gas industries. Right now I have to run but I intend to come back to this question later.
Maybe we can collectively gain some understanding of what these limits are.
Economical will matter. Of course, economical for a company trying to operate at a profit is different than a government or a society. But at some point, it will matter.
The point is that it is all over before that ever happens. The world economy will shatter before individual countries go on economic war-footing and are willing to accept 2 barrels of oil for every 1 barrel, or the energy sector eats up all of the capital in the country.
”Shatter” is a word that to me implies something breaking into countless highly variable pieces . Cheap dinner plates shatter into hundreds and even thousands of small sharp pieces.
The world economy is more apt to get badly BENT like an aluminum campers dinner plate- which implies it is at least possible to continue using it with or without some repair.
The world didn’t come to an end when WWII consumed virtually all the capital available in the countries involved in the war.
I do agree that things will get to be pretty tough before more than a very few governments will adopt policies sufficiently tough and robust to have a decent shot at successful a transition.
Germany is the only country right now that impresses me as having the drive and foresight to pull it off proactively .
Fossil fuels are not going to just disappear overnight except maybe in the case of hot war between major powers.
Five or ten years from now Germany may have enough home grown essentially ”free” energy to outcompete ANY country trying to live on imported energy and exported finished goods such as automobiles and other machinery.
What I mean by ” free” is that the capital expenditures will have already been made – no foreign exchange needed to import gas and coal etc. That SAME capital could just as easily have been frittered away on F250 four by four six thousand pound pickup trucks used to fetch beer and groceries.
IMO a good many countries will eventually come to grips with the fossil fuel depletion problem before it destroys their economies beyond any hope of repair.
The people of the UK for instance certainly have a serious problem with getting wind farms permitted. But one of these days the country is going to come up REALLY short of stored gas during a hard winter.They just barely dodged this bullet three or four years ago.
All that needs happen is a few million houses freeze up and a few thousand people die or enter emergency shelters due to a lack of heat while the country stands by helpless to do anything about it.
The UK political calculus will change overnight in favor of building more wind farms and doing something SERIOUS about energy conservation .
I do not by any means think that BAU as we know it today can be preserved long term but if the cards fall right there need be no short to medium term hard crash in most western countries. We can adapt to lower energy lifestyles and living standards- which is good because we have only two choices- adapt or perish.
Any country that fails to give adaptation the old school try WILL suffer a shattered economy. I am afraid most currently poor overpopulated countries don’t really have much hope of a successful transition in any case.
Don’t get caught in Egypt.
Watcher,
The idea central banks can print whatever is needed forever or for an indefinite amount of time is false. Each and every dollar created by key stroke is a debt that has to be serviced. This system requires two things to keep it going. 1 an ever increasing amount of debt and 2 an ever increasing amount of energy. Otherwise it collapses. I think you already know that.
The fiat monetary system we have days are numbered. Government can try to decree all it wants. Currency paper or digits will no longer get accepted as form of payment between countries. If you want oil you’ll either have to trade something like food or you’ll just have to go take it.
We are not quite at this point yet but this is where we are headed.
Each and every dollar created by key stroke is a debt that has to be serviced.
Who says you have to pay interest?
Seriously – short term US treasury debt has been at zero, and European banks are charging their customers to accept deposits!
The Baker Hughes International Rig Count came out a few days ago. I have totaled the changes below, one month and one year change.
Baker Hughes does not include, in the International Rig Count, North America, (U.S. or Canada) or any states of the Former Soviet Union.
Ron. Thanks for the post. Is there anyone who could hazard a guess as to how much of a production hit results from stacking those rigs?
We would need the rig count for development wells (oil and gas) without exploration wells, broken down by country.
In a conventional working oil field – one that is already in production – how long does it take on average to drill a new well and get it tied into the pipeline or storage tanks etc and start producing it?
I suppose there is a substantial difference between deep water and dry land time frames when it comes to drilling and hooking up a well.
Mac, it depends. The optimum path depends on a ton of factors. Let me give you two boundaries for onshore:
Case 1. Well is 18000 feet, expected to produce 18000 bopd plus 20 million cubic feet. The decision to install a 3 mile, 8 inch diameter, 5000 psi working pressure flow line is made after the well is logged. Such a well could take 180 days to drill and complete, and 6 months to hook up.
Case 2. A 10,000 foot well drilled from a multiwell pad, drilling rig does the drilling, skids over, and a work over rig moves in to complete. The flowline is pre installed, as is the electric and control system. Such a well could take 20 days to drill, 7 days to complete, and 3 days to hook up and put on production.
Offshore it can go pretty fast if it’s platform drilling, the well bay can be set up to hook up wells in 72 hours (the drilling rig sits on a top deck completely apart from the well deck).
Fernando
That is an excellent synopsis that can be so instructive to so many readers on this site – and, indeed, to pretty much anyone. (Great question as well OFM).
A few ‘tweaks’ to your numbers, if I may be so brash.
The 10,000 foot – if it is bout 5k deep/5k lateral – is regularly done in the Marcellus and Niobrara. Drill time under one week.
Deeper formations such as Bakken and Eagle Ford (20,000′ measured total depth is frequent) is now drilled in under two weeks.
Although the post production expenses have been noted by shallowsands and others, charts such as Rune Likvern’s cumulative expense/revenue chart can be both accurate and wildly misleading.
The buying/leasing/building of things such as mineral rights, sand mines, access roads, railroad terminals (for CBR), pads, storage facilities, gathering lines is to name but a few of the components involved these past 7/8 years in the production of the EF and Bakken. To say nothing about the research and trials of a wide array of innovative techniques and processes.
Much of that is done and reflected in the industry’s financial outlays. Future production will far more likely mimic Fernando’s #2 example up above.
I would also add that in many instances, much of the time is actually spent waiting. Although “fraclog” has become a term to describe a company voluntarily delaying the completion of a shale well, until the recent down turn, it seems there were delays of up to 6 months due to the frac crews being unable to keep pace with the drilling crews.
I was thinking of a simple s curve directional drilled through a nasty shale, requiring very tight directional control. However, 30 days from rig move to first production is very fast, don’t you think?
Fernando
I think they are doing that now on pads that already have one existing, producing well.
There is still significant activity in drilling additional wells on pads with existing producers in pairs and triplets for evaluative reasons as well as not needing to install humongous storage tanks for the somewhat transient flush early production if a half dozen or more were simultaneously drilled/completed/brought online.
That is starting to change, however, in ND as producers had started to ramp up infrastructure buildout for much higher output just prior to the price collapse.
The specific answer to your question should be available by comparing spud dates with test (output) dates. I’ll do some checking.
Hi Shallow sands,
It is a 14% drop in rigs. If we assume output is a simple linear function of rigs, we would expect a 14% drop in output, I don’t think it is that simple, certainly not for the LTO plays where a substantial frac log has built and the rigs can be brought back online when the frac log gets thin and oil prices increase. So realistically I would expect World output to drop by no more than 2%, then oil prices will increase and output will be back to 2014 levels (12 month average for 2014).
Another NYT article on Greece, focused on underfunded pensions and on pensioners:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/09/world/europe/greece-pensions-debt-negotiations-alexis-tsipras.html?hpw&rref=business&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well&_r=0
Of course, one could change the specific names in the preceding excerpt, and basically have an accurate story about US underfunded and over-promised Social Security and pension systems (especially for local and state government workers).
Ridiculous. The United States is nothing like Greece. I’m sorry.
The only similarity would be the widespread tax evasion of the moneyed elite. Nothing else is similar.
Our so-called social security “problem” can be fixed by raising taxes and tailoring social security payments to assets. There’s no reason why a 65 year old with millions of dollars of assets should be receiving a social security check.
Contrary to popular belief, there is plenty of room to raise taxes in this country to pay for a whole assortment of things.
Wasn’t that already done January 2013 with the millionaire’s tax increase that the Democrats got through (and the GOP voted for)?
Households making more than $1 million beginning Jan 2013 saw an increase in taxes of on average $170K. That’s increase. Not liability.
And how come Anonymous is allowed to post. I thought the software didn’t allow that. Surely more than 1 person by now has tried to create an account called Anonymous.
It’s always nice to have visitors from Fantasy Island.
In any case, an excerpt from the article:
Does this remind anyone of another Social Security system?
To borrow Warren Buffet’s phrase about finding out who is skinny dipping when the tide goes out, I wonder if the tide has just receded faster for Greece than for the US, in terms of over promised and under-funded Social Security/Medicare and pension plans, especially in regard to vastly underfunded state and local government pension plans.
I doesn’t seem to me as if a > 100 trillion dollar unfunded liability problem should be dismissed so easily. But, if it can be “fixed” with minor taxation adjustments than you’d think they would get on with it?
The 100 trillion unfunded liability boogie monster is the net present value of future Medicare, Medicaid and social security payments.
Those are political promises and can be changed. It might cause rioting in the streets from grandma and grandpa. But it can vanish like a cow fart in the wind.
It basically means if u are counting on Medicare in the future u r fucked.
The undiscussed problem is that the costs of the medical system in America are compounding at 9 percent per annum and will financially destroy the country if the medical system isn’t changed.
This is karl denninger’s idea. I recommend reading if u want to see the true financial monster that is coming at the usa. And there are a lot to choose from!
The only way to fix it, is to rip monopolistic pricing practices out of the system. Then we would get the same prices as Japan which is an 80%. reduction. That means 20%. of us gdp would drop by 80%.
This will collapse the medical industry and the economy. The alternative is an exponential ticking time bomb that bankrupts the entire country.
Read denninger on this topic if u are interested. Beware he thinks peak oil and global warming are nonsense. He is selectively scientific when it supports his cognitive biases.
When he uses the scientific mindset he is a financial genius imo.
http://Www.market-ticker.org
Indeed, I expect your analysis is spot on. Incidentally, I’ve personally had positive experiences with the medical system in Japan: Extraordinarily competent medical staff and reasonable costs. At the same time, I know several Canadians who are now afraid to travel in the US for fear of being inadvertently entrapped in your medical system; there are many examples of this happening. I only travel in the States with several layers of medical insurance – just in case.
Greece has no central bank.
Period. If they did, taxation would not be the solution.
True that.
The proposed cuts, demanded by the Troika, were something like . . . from memory . . .
an employee at the Director level with 37 years of govt service gets presently a pension of 1300 Euros/month. The Troika wants that cut to 925.
tra la
And one more time, with feeling, this is cuts demanded in order to loan Greece some more money, adding to the 320 billion Euros of debt they carry, with the new loan allocated 95% to service debt already borrowed (and held by the Troika) — all while the ECB is presently doing 1 trillion Euros of QE to end September of next year.
Greece says, what sense does this make? Why not expunge it? It can never be repaid anyway. And you’re creating 1 trillion out of thin air at the same time you want to starve these pensioners.
Anyone who thinks it is about the Troika actually getting its money back is silly.
It’s political. It’s about control. No need to occupy a country when you can dictate its policies. Debt has ceased to be a tool for future investment. It’s a tool used to punish countries that go against the prevailing neoliberal ideology.
“Greece says, what sense does this make?”
Because Greeks know very well that is not about debt or Yannis small pension. It is about transferring Greek public assets into private hands. What they are after is assets that make rentier income even in depression. They want Mykonos, water utility, gas utilities, even Parthenon is financelized. Everything that is in papers/media as a debate is just pure bullshit for the masses for daily consumption. It is so simple, look Greece is now 3rd world country in general but check the prices of electricity, water that are at absurd high levels. or good luck finding decent hotel room on Santorini in the summer for less than $400-$500 a night! A Night!!! I am sure you can sleep in Waldorf Astoria on 5th for less. So creditors are after these hard assets where you can extract a profit even in depression.
Germany starts two World Wars, causing trillions of dollars worth of damages, and they have the overwhelmingly majority of their indemnities forgiven.
With the EU, Germany (and to a lesser extent France) have established its long sought after Continental League. What it could achieve with force of arms it did with persistent diplomacy and promises of future growth and prosperity for all.
Now it is squeezing Greece to make a political point: Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Italy – don’t even think about challenging austerity; don’t even think about electing a left wing party.
The end goal? Keep Greece indebted but in the EU. Force it to sell off public assets and open up the country for corporate plunder. The top 1% of Greeks will prosper, but the rest of the country will be left out to dry. Greece will be forced to sell its cultural heritage to the highest bidder. German and French bankers will, with the help of some willing Greek puppets, own the country.
No corporate plunder in Greece at this point. I am in my 70’s, and to my knowledge I have never bought a single item of any kind that had “made in Greece” on it. They just want tourists to come and look at the ruins of what their ancestors built over 2000 years ago, and feed/shelter them while they are there. Of course, if they ever do welcome corporate plunder, their economy will undoubtedly get better. Korea, Vietnam, China, India, Australia, Switzerland, Germany, Italy, France, England, Sweden, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, South Africa, – well – you get the point.
@clueless,
It does not really matter with what you make money as long you make money. I am sure you have noticed that oil producers are little bit struggling, to put it mildly, in making money in the most important commodity in the world. Oil should be no brainer? Yes?
Clueless, Greece used to sell a lot of agricultural products. Russia was a large buyer, but the EU decided to play the neocon game, and Russia cut them off.
The way we see it, the commies want to use hard earned money from others to subsidize their ideas. I don’t think that’s going to happen.
” the commies want to use hard earned money from others to subsidize their ideas. ”
You mean “commies” (like EU) because they are the who want to use Greek money from agriculture/tourism to subsidize their ideas (geopolitical games). Greeks are actually subsidizing EU, that is correct way of putting it.
I meant the Greek commies. The other guys are called neocons. I hate those guys too.
I know what you meant. 🙂 I was just doing switcharo with labels (“commie, necon). But if you look without labels you would actually agree with me that due to EU provoked counter sanction agri ban from Russia and tourist visa ban travel for Russians in tourism (compare Russia’s 5 mil tourist visits to visa-free Turkey to just 300k to Greece) you would see that Greeks are actually subsidizing in big way the foreign policy of EU.
“The end goal? Keep Greece indebted but in the EU. The top 1% of Greeks will prosper, but the rest of the country will be left out to dry.”
This is not end goal. This is reality now and have been in the past. So this is nothing shuttering new.
“Greece will be forced to sell its cultural heritage to the highest bidder. German and French bankers will, with the help of some willing Greek puppets, own the country.”
Well that is one of the possibilities. But we don’t know yet the end of the game. It is in the last inning but it is not end of the game. Cavalry still has time to come to the hill.
“Now it is squeezing Greece to make a political point: Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Italy – don’t even think about challenging austerity; don’t even think about electing a left wing party.”
It is very simple. Parties in the power in these countries are not challenging because they are part of the problem. They drink martinis and eat pate with the same creditors in the spare time. And populace, well they still get some crumbs thrown at them so it is not as “bad” as for Greek general population and there is that thing that humans have – hope.
But if you really want to know the feelings of populace just have a cab ride in Madrid or Dublin and have a chat with taxi driver. After that you don’t need anymore NY Times to tell you their bullshit .
The last taxi driver I talked to was discussing the nice weather and mentioned his brother had opened a fish restaurant. The economy is supposed to grow 3 % this year, house prices are up, u employment down. What they they need here is more labor reform, less pampering and better education. We will have to see if the combination of the improving economy and the mess they are making in Venezuela and Greece gives the extreme left a chance to self destroy.
If they vote commie around here this country is toast. Many foreigners will take off, and there won’t be much investment as capital flight gets going.
CAPP (a Canadian petroleum industry trade group) released a report today detailing the massive Canadian CAPEX cuts resulting from the 2014-15 oil price crash.
Bottom line, forecast for 2030 Canadian oil production cut by over one million barrels per day, from 6.4 million bopd to 5.3 million bopd. Current Canadian production is 3.7 million bopd.
They expect 4 million from oil sands, which is what we were expecting prior to the price crash if WTI prices averaged $110 (when CAPP expected 5 million). CAPP have been consistently optimistic in their long term oil sands forecasts, because their methodology is a producer questionnaire – i.e. they ask their members what they think they will be producing in 5 years, tot it up, then extend the trend line. CERI are even worse for optimism bias.
They expect oil sands to increase from 2.3 mbd in 2014 to 4.2 mbd in 2030.
Still, the new forecast is 0.9 mbd lower than in last year’s report
so if 3.7 of total current production we deduct 2.3 of Gucci expensive Tar (that nobody can afford) you are left with just 1.4 of so called conventional. And there is also some shale thrown into that 1.4 figure. And how much Canada consumes internally? House of cards.
That tar can be upgraded into a really nice sulfur free syncrude. Canada can have a long term plan to export a premium 34 degree API sulfur free syncrude at about 1 million bopd in 12 years or so. Exporting all syncrude doesn’t make sense, but they can move this high quality syncrude to the Japanese and other oriental types. I suppose in 12 years all Californians will be riding bicycles and tiny electric bikes.
Fernando
If you read of the refusal today of the Santa Barbara folks denying Exxon emergency road transport for their production from their offshore rig, the Cali folk may be trikin’ it sooner rather than later.
30,000 bbls per day?
don’t turn in your F-150 just yet.
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-oil-trucks-rejected-20150609-story.html
Fern,
But at what price that premium staff can be made? Show me the money 🙂 Are you saying that Canada should do so called “structural reforms” reserved for Greeks (for now) so we can all work for $500 a month so Canada can export that staff to the Japanese?
Fern, everything is leveraged up, the whole financial system is leveraged up in order to get this little increase of Tar. There is no room for up any more. For the same amount of the money that you can buy container style crap-shack house in Fort Mac, ground zero for Tar sands production, you could buy a vila in Marbella!!! ( and a small speed boat as cherry on the top). We have blown financial system to get that extra Tar. And zombies are nodding up and down with head every night on TeeVee “Yes it is worth it, Fort Mac the armpit of the world with average high in the winter is -10C is where the value is” 🙂
Ves, the upgrading cost depends on several factors, of which the capital cost is the main function. The nature of the final product and gas prices are also important.
If we review the Canadian projects we can see some use upgraders, others do not. The decision to build the upgrader is made by comparing the price of the diluted material versus the price for X quality syncrude.
The diluted heavy oil requires a light diluent (48 degree API nafta is one of the best). So the economic analysis has to include the diluent cost.
But the diluted oil has to find a market, and the bid price is limited to the availability of refineries with the ability to handle what we call a “dumbbell” crude (lots of asphalt and lots of light components with the missing middle fractions).
As you can see, this is a very dynamic and complex system. But in general we can see that as production increases the refineries will bid lower prices (simply because there’s a limit to what they can process).
At a certain point in time the Canadian industry really needs to get its act together and coordinate efforts to build upgraders in sequence, to keep a level load on suppliers and the local labour force. I think the provincial governments botched their role and allowed a truly disorganized rush to build too fast. It’s done in complete anarchy, and must have cost over $30 billion in extra costs (I’m probably low).
If they were to let me run the show I would set up a planning agency with heavy industry participation (at least half of the members), transparent meetings and open source meeting minutes and white papers, and tell them to develop an optimum plan for most of those involved.
And this would include a serious effort to reduce emissions (this is feasible, but it’s advanced technology and it costs money).
Oil gains after API data show 6.7 mln barrel crude supply drop
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/oil-gains-after-api-data-show-67-mln-barrel-crude-supply-drop-2015-06-09?link=MW_home_latest_news
Also, this one: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/us-crude-oil-monthly-output-was-highest-in-more-than-40-years-2015-06-09
Interesting article in foreign affairs magazine
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2012-04-20/mafia-states
Check the discussion about Venezuela and its involvement in the drug trade
Fernando is a lot smarter and better informed than some of us in this forum are willing to admit.
” But unlike normal states, mafia states do not just occasionally rely on criminal groups to advance particular foreign policy goals. In a mafia state, high government officials actually become integral players in, if not the leaders of, criminal enterprises, and the defense and promotion of those enterprises’ businesses become official priorities. In mafia states such as Bulgaria, Guinea-Bissau, Montenegro, Myanmar (also called Burma), Ukraine, and Venezuela, the national interest and the interests of organized crime are now inextricably intertwined.”
I don’t know of anybody credible who thinks Foreign Affairs is a subsidiary property of the right wing media mafia.
Incidentally there is something that Fernando knows about communism that has not been mentioned here to the best of my knowledge which does significantly distinguish its practitioners from other low life politicians and power grabbers.
This is that there is a sort of religious or evangelical element involved. A despot of the ordinary stripe is not very much motivated to spread his philosophy as a matter of idealism. But communism has this motivation in common with outfits such as ISIS.
Fortunately communism itself is hopefully on the way out- assuming it morphs into something different in China. The Cuban variety is going to implode within the next few years and the Venezuelan hybrid is not going to last very long either, unless the US is so foolish as to allow the Chinese to steal an empire march in our backyard and keep the current Venezuelan regime in power.
Things are almost for dead sure going to get VERY interesting in Venezuela before too much longer.
Venezuelan bureaucrats = CCP officials = American corporate managers = Saudi Royal Family
Choose your variety, but it is all the same shit: a minority who controls the organs of government and industry in order to enrich itself and maintain power.
That is why the Venezuelans are not going to let another lockout happen, even if they have to make marginal deals with China.
That coup attempt on Hugo is still in the mind of the population.
A violent, corrupt situation, but they weren’t going to get it right the first time.
They are going to resist being a Client State of the US, like most of their South American comrades (with the exception of Columbia).
I don’t see that Venezuela is necessarily in the position of HAVING to be a ”client state” at all.
If the country IS in such a position , the USA would probably be no worse than China long term. Maybe better. The USA is remarkably free and democratic with a well established political culture involving the rule of law ( flawed with many cracks but FAR superior to China in recent times ).
This sort of thing counts in the long run. If a country wants to develop into a free safe and peaceful place it is PROBABLY better off to ally itself- if compelled to do so – with a country with a reasonably free press, reasonably free elections, reasonably independent courts, etc.
Nothing I have said about this issue should be construed as my thinking Uncle Sam has no blood on his hands from times gone by.People and countries change. When I was a kid black kids went to separate schools etc. Nowadays there are lots of black school principals, lawyers, and cops.
One of them wrote me a ticket just a few days ago. He was VERY nice and professional about my broken taillight and it never even occurred to me to wonder if he would have overlooked it if I had been black myself. The local cops are writing tickets right and left these days for minor things. I think maybe the chief of police and the county board have a quiet little understanding involving budget troubles and new cop cars.
With the exception of North Koreans I never hear of any body trying sneak into China.
Taken all the way around it is VERY easy to see why the Venezuelan people don’t have much affection for the USA.China is a new face and easier to accept as a friend due to our past Yankee sins.
The Venezuelan people couldn’t care less about Hugo Chavez and his ideas. Maduro stays in power because he has a really sophisticated repression machine designed by the Cubans.
Mac, the real communist menace works as follows:
1. Take over peddling socialism and communism. Use populism, lie, exploit social resentment. Feed hatred.
2. Destroy democratic check and balances, change the constitution. Centralize power. Eliminate judicial independence. Set the parliament as an appendage of the supreme leadership.
3. Build a repressive apparatus, with secret police, brown shirts, and a purged military. Arrest opposition leaders or drive them into exile.
4. Nationalize industry and agriculture to some extent. Control independent unions.
5. Begin a period of lawlessness and anarchy. Violate laws as needed.
6. Ruin the economy.
7. Increase repression as people start getting upset. Arrest more opposition leaders. Censure the media.
8. When things get really bad allow some internal reforms so people can have small businesses and invite foreign multinationals to invest.
9. Evolve into a fascist state where capitalism is practiced by a red elite and their foreign partners. Maintain the dictatorship.
This is what makes communists such a terrible threat. Eventually they fail and turn into incredibly repressive fascists. I think they are neo nazis wearing red shirts. It goes full circle.
EIA’s Short-Term Energy Outlook, June 2015:
The numbers for U.S. crude + condensate production were revised upwards, as we already know. But the EIA now expects a slightly deeper decline from May 2015 into second half of 2015 and early next year.
The average output in 2016 is now expected to decline by 0,1 mbd vs. a 0,2 mbd increase projected in May report.
“Total U.S. crude oil production averaged an estimated 9.6 million b/d in May, but it is expected to generally decline from June 2015 through early 2016 before growth resumes. Projected U.S. crude oil production averages 9.4 million b/d in 2015 and 9.3 million b/d in 2016. The forecast is 0.2 million b/d and 0.1 million b/d higher for 2015 and 2016, respectively, than in last month’s STEO, primarily because of revisions to actual production data from the first quarter of 2015. “
US C+C production, mbd
Source:EIA’s Short-Term Energy Outlook, June 2015
Lower 48 States (excl GOM)
Lower 48 States (excl GOM) – table
This is how the EIA explains resilient oil production despite declining rig count:
“Production has increased as producers work through the backlog of uncompleted wells
(completing more wells than they are drilling) and achieve potentially better completions with
higher initial production rates.”
North Dakota’s DMR has already reported a decline in fraclog in March. It is likely that, with WTI nearing $60 and little confidence that oil prices will increase further in near term, companies prefer to complete more wells, as they desperately need cash
Rune Likvern’s recent post on his blog was excellent on this very point. He compared Continental, Whiting and EOG. The first two have to produce to pay their mortgages, and have worse acreage, particularly Continental. EOG, with a lower indebtedness and the best acreage around, can afford to hold off.
If I were those two companies I would put myself up for sale and call it quits.
What does, “revisions to actual production data” mean?
I wish I could revise our actual production higher.
See my comment up thread. Actual volumes are almost always some kind of calculated value that are often based on a number of inputs. Revisions are quite common.
AlexS and Slim. Sorry I was being flip there. Just surprised we could have 200K-300K bopd revisions.
I still do not understand in the context of EIA production data how that occurs.
shallow sand,
as discussed above, the increased production numbers for 2014 and 1Q15 mainly reflect revisions in Texas’ C+C output.
I also think that companies started to complete drilled but uncompleted wells, reducing the “fraclog”. That should support production in the near term, even with slightly declining or flat rig count.
So when there is reference to “actual revisions” that in layman’s terms means “monthly revisions”? And I presume the reason for the monthly revisions is that several new wells went into production that had previously been unaccounted for in prior EIA estimates, and once the sales from those were reported, EIA was required to substantially increase production estimates?
Maybe the EIA is already compiling all of the sales data, as I suggested above, and is using it to revise estimates they have made for past months and also to forecast future months?
I may be wrong, but what I think Slim is referring to above is allocating production amongst wells when more than one well’s oil production is running into a common tank battery? That would be why taking into account individual well downtime would be important?
I think maybe because our operation is on the simple side, I am not understanding why the process of reporting US oil production is as difficult as it seems to be.
For one, we do not allocate on a well by well basis, but on a lease by lease basis. Therefore, all we do is gauge each tank at the same time daily. The gauge is “entered into the computer” and the measurement in feet and inches is converted to barrels, based upon the size (diameter) of each tank, which were all strapped when the crude purchaser first bought oil from the lease. When a tank is sold, further adjustments are made to take into account any bs & w issues.
I appreciate all of the information provided on this topic, and I am sorry for the sarcasm, which is not intended for those who are posting here, but just more towards the general notion that US production is so difficult to measure. One month’s revisions boosting many months by 200K-300K barrels per day tends to cause conspiracy theorists to take notice.
Texas monthly oil production data revisions as % of total U.S. revisions:
Nov. 14 : 62%
Dec.14: 81%
Jan.15: 97%
Feb.15: 93%
So the key problem with these revisions is that producers in Texas are not required to report their production numbers quickly to the RRC and/or the RRC is not required to process these numbers and report quickly to the EIA.
As I understand from Mike’s comments, there is simply too much oil, to much wells and too much operators in Texas, so that more or less exact data on state-wide production can be obtained only with a one-year delay
AlexS. That is where I think looking at sales volumes would be helpful.
For example, I assume if a shale producer completes a well this month (June) in the EFS and oil starts flowing into the stock tanks, oil will be sold to and hauled out by a crude oil purchaser in June. The operator will receive run tickets at the time each load is truck hauled, and in early July will receive a run statement, showing the total volume purchased for the month, as well as the price paid by the crude oil purchaser and the gravity of each load hauled.
I assume the above happens regardless of any delays on the part of the operator, the Texas RRC, or anyone else for that matter.
I do realize interest owners in the well/lease may not be paid in July (in the above example) if title is not competed and division orders have not been issued by the crude oil purchaser. However, the crude purchaser will still send the run statement to the operator.
Every crude oil purchaser in the United States knows how much oil they have purchased each month from every lease they purchase it from. All of this has to be computerized. I cannot believe any crude oil purchaser in the United States would keep track any other way than through software specifically designed for crude oil purchasers.
In fact, our software has this ability, even though we do use it. We do not purchase the crude oil from our leases and do not have to do the division of interest accounting, the crude purchasers we sell to do that, thankfully.
I do not know how many stock tanks are typically being set at shale wells, nor do I know what size tanks are common. I would hope that operators are not setting too many, given that in a year or so they will not need more than two or three.
I suppose there could be large discrepancies between production and sales volumes. However, I think first point of sales would be most important. Can’t see how the barrels that may be lost due to a leaking tank or lightning strike would be relevant. Seem that what goes into the pipeline is what really matters, unless some large producers are storing large amounts of oil on the lease. Wouldn’t think this would be happening, but I admit I am not there to know.
Hi Shallow sands,
The EIA does not know how much oil is produced in Texas for the most recent 6 months reported, they have some method that they use for making a “guess” about output levels. When they find credible information (maybe from IHS, but that is a guess) that suggests that earlier guesses were not very good, the guess gets revised. Texas does have way more leases to keep track of than anywhere else so we should probably give them a break.
I don’t know why the EIA can’t sample the largest 50 oil producers in Texas each month with a simple question, “how many barrels of crude plus condensate did you produce last month?”, we could add, “what was the average API gravity of that output?” It would take a competent person less than an hour to compile the data. It would take about 24 months until the EIA got a handle on how the sample data corresponds with the actual output data from the RRC, but going forward it could estimate that the sampled companies account for 80% of total output and simply divide the sample by 0.8 to guess at total output.
Perhaps the EIA already does this and the data revisions occur when they realize that the ratio of sample to total output has changed from 80% (in my example above) to 85% (or 75%).
As Mike has suggested, we should not worry about it, nothing is going to change.
Hi AlexS,
If I look back at old data that I downloaded from the RRC’s PDQ in June 2014 and Feb 2014 and look back 12 months prior to the most recent data point in those downloads (April 2014 and Dec 2013) and compare to current data for those dates in the PDQ (which I assume is correct) the data is low by 2 to 4%, I believe we need to go back at least 18 months to have nearly complete data (less than 1% error.) The data seems to be improving, the data downloaded in June 2014 is much more accurate than the Feb 2014 data.
For data downloaded in Dec 2014 (Oct 2014 is last data point) 18 months prior (April 2013) the error is only 0.6% and 12 months prior (Oct 2013) the error is 1.75%. Note that the data is always low for the most recent 18 months as this is an incomplete data issue.
Hi Dennis,
TRCC 18-months old data may be improving, but the EIA’s guesstimates for the most recent months are getting worse.
I think the EIA is using some coefficients to recalculate the TRCC uncomplete data into estimates for Texas. But in the recent months these coefficients proved wrong, so the EIA has changed its methodology
Hi Alex,
Yes, the EIA believes it was underestimating in the 4th quarter of 2014 and adjusted its coefficients. I believe that now the EIA is overestimating (by 100 kb/d or more in March 2015) for Texas C+C output, they will revise this downward in the future.
Part of the problem may be that Texas has gone to all digital reporting and this may have messed the EIA up. The RRC data should start to come in more quickly and the EIA’s coefficients will need to be reduced to account for this.
It is difficult to predict how quickly the data improvement (speed that the data reaches the PDQ) will occur, so in the meantime the EIA estimates will not be very good. Even Dean’s methodology may be messed up by this change, but it seems to be the best analysis we have for Texas C+C output.
Some of their employees and minor stockholders may go to bed hungry but the rich seldom have to tighten their belts even in the face of bankruptcy.
A specialty steel supplier bites the dust due to the oil downturn.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/nathanvardi/2015/06/09/billionaire-len-blavatniks-boomerang-tube-files-for-bankruptcy-due-to-oil-slide/
GTM Research, SEIA report: The US installed 1.3 GW of PV in Q1, 2015; residential installations up 11%
“On June 9th, 2015, GTM Research and the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) released the Q1, 2015 U.S. Solar Market Insight report, which finds that the U.S. solar market had a strong first quarter in 2015 with 1,306 MW of solar photovoltaic (PV) installations across the country.
This marks the sixth consecutive quarter in which the U.S. added more than 1 GW of PV installations. [snip]
But the residential market saw no such decline and instead grew 11% over Q4, 2014 to have its largest quarter ever. Collectively, more than 51% of all new electric generating capacity in the U.S. came from solar in Q1, 2015.
7.9 GW of PV installations expected for the whole year 2015
GTM Research and SEIA forecast that PV installations will reach 7.9 GW in 2015, up 27% over 2014. Growth will occur in all segments, but will be most rapid in the residential market.
767 MWac of new CSP capacity connected to the grid
2014 was the largest year ever for concentrating solar power (CSP), with 767 MWac brought on-line. The next notable CSP project slated for completion is SolarReserve’s 110 MWac Crescent Dunes, which entered the commissioning phase in 2014 and is expected to become fully operational before the end of 2015. “
Interesting article from Reuters:
Disappearing Bakken oil discount adds to output slowdown signs
Jun 10, 2015
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/10/us-oil-bakken-supply-analysis-idUSKBN0OQ09O20150610
Oil traders scrambling to secure crude in the U.S. Midwest have pushed North Dakota’s Bakken to a near premium for the first time in two years, a rally stoked by record refinery runs and an unprecedented slump in Canadian imports.
Yet some traders say the surprising strength emerging from opaque physical crude markets in the heartland of the fracking boom also points to a more important, lasting factor: declining production of Bakken crude, a long-anticipated but as yet unproven twist in the shale revolution.
The buying frenzy pushed Bakken delivered at Clearbrook, Minnesota WTC-BAK, to trade just 35 cents a barrel below the West Texas Intermediate benchmark last week, dealers say, the narrowest discount since July 2013. On Tuesday, it widened slightly to a 75-cent discount. Four months ago, it traded at a $7.50 discount.
“The rapid spread contraction may be indicative of a faster-than-anticipated production decline, presenting upside risk to our price forecast” in the second half, Barclays analysts wrote in a report.
………………………………………………
Oil drilling rigs are down 58 percent this year in North Dakota, setting the stage for a reversal after years of breakneck production growth. The timing and scale of that descent have been unclear due to lagging official data.
North Dakota’s Department of Mineral Resources will release figures for April production on Friday. The No. 2 oil-producing state posted a surprising jump in oil output in March.
The Energy Information Administration estimates that Bakken output was little changed from a record high 1.3 million bpd in March, but expects it to fall by 70,000 bpd over the following three months
Others still see growth through May. PointLogic, which uses real-time natural gas flow data to forecast oil production, estimates output rose by 31,000 bpd in April versus March and kept rising through May before turning lower recently, according to data made available to Reuters.
Last week, North Dakota’s crude-by-rail loadings averaged 437,000 bpd at monitored terminals, the lowest level since mid-March, industry provider Genscape said. Meanwhile, Enbridge’s (ENB.TO) North Dakota pipeline system has run close to capacity, signifying that production has fallen.
I don’t know anything about “point data”, it would be interesting to see if they have a method to predict gas line connection delays as well as a well’s tendency to have increasing gas to oil ratio?
I know this will sound a bit techie, but we used to monitor other producer’s total flow rates by looking at common pipeline pressure gauges and modeling the flow. We used that trick to lease acreage when they were connecting tight holes. In one case another company hit a really good deep well, they connected it to a pipeline and we saw the pressure at our gas plant discharge, so my boss sent word to the land department, and they leased the acreage in the area in a hurry. I turned out great.
Note that WTI was redefined to look more like Bakken blends.
Link please.
We don’t often hear much about day to day life of the people working in the oil industry in the so called third world.
Here is a short excerpt from Fernando’s latest blog post. I found it to be VERY enjoyable. He has a sense of humor that may come across as arrogance to some folks though.
This is the local culture as described to him by his job site boss at a job in the Kenyan desert.
“The main tribe is Rendille. They are the good guys. The other guys are the Borana, Turkana, and Somalis. The Turkana are fine if you don´t mess with their cattle. The Rendille think the Borana can be killed because there are very few of them. But the Somalis have to be avoided, they are armed with AK47, and like to raid everybody else to steal their cattle. Don´t stare at women´s tits, and never take their photographs. It´s ok to wave at them, if they come close you have to shake hands. Don´t go too far from the camp without armed guards just in case you run into Somalis. It´s better to let the locals fight and stay out of it” (he said the last part because a few months before one of our guys had run into what he thought were hostile Somalis and emptied a full clip on them, this caused a lot of paperwork and strict orders not to shoot at the natives even if they were shooting at you). ”
I have read a lot of professionally written accounts of travel to exotic locales that were less entertaining and informative..
FYR: Perhaps Wall Street is beginning to recognize Peak-Oil.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-beginning-of-the-end-for-the-oil-age-2015-06-10
The beginning of the end for the oil age
“Over the past six years, U.S. oil production has risen in every year. Even this year, with cutbacks in capital spending, it looks like production will continue to tick upward to be very near or even slightly above the record set in 1970. Next year might be a different story.”
“Companies like a former favorite of mine, Whiting PetroleumWLL, +1.75% might not come out of this intact after the oil-price collapse and aggressive purchase of Kodiak Oil & Gas — a company whose stability I warned about back in late 2013. It would not be surprising to see Whiting purchased for only a slight premium to their currently beaten down price due to their debts. Oasis PetroleumOAS, +0.23% and Continental ResourcesCLR, +2.04% both companies I recommended buying in 2012 before big runs upward, might not fetch significant premiums either. Both companies are suffering from high debt, and Continental’s Harold Hamm made a terrible mistake lifting the company’s oil price hedges last September.”
“With the collapse in the price of oil and oil stocks, many investors today are looking toward oil stocks for great value opportunities. Most of them are likely to fall into value traps in the short-term. In the long-term, the opportunities might not be as clear cut as in the past. The age of oil has now begun to end, and that means at least more volatility, so be aware and beware, the world is changing in a massive way. “
wait, what?
“Meanwhile, BP says that total proved reserves of fossil fuels were unchanged last year at a time when an increasing number of environmentalists and others were arguing they must be left in the ground to stop runaway climate change.
The company, which recently promised to be more open about its climate change strategies, added that proved world oil and gas reserves were now double the level they were in 1980.
“The big picture remains one of abundant reserves with new sources of energy being discovered more quickly than they are consumed. Total proved reserves of oil and gas in 2014 were more than double their level in 1980, when our data began,” said Dale. ”
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/jun/10/energy-industry-has-reached-watershed-on-fossil-fuels-says-bp
Let’s offer this up.
Climate change should be dismissed and ignored here.
If oil scarcity is going to assert itself for widespread death, then far more will take place towards eliminating emissions than would have taken place through any imaginable legislation and thus the matter is not worthy of focus.
If oil scarcity is not an issue and voluminous production can be expected as far as the eye can see, then there is no peak oil, no need for this blog, and you can talk about climate change somewhere else. Further, if you’re a believer in supply and demand, voluminous production would equate to lower price, which means no one is going to be interested in alternative fuels and any politician who demands such a lifestyle upheaval will be removed. So it’s additionally pointless.
Hi Watcher,
I everyone agreed about everything. The blog would also be pointless.
wasn’t meant as a climate change post, but more of reserves post and shouldn’t that be “Let me offer this up” not “Let’s offer this up”?
World proved oil reserves (billion barrels)
Source: BP Statistical Review of World Energy 2015
BP carries how much for Venezuela extra heavy, 230 billion?
Here’s my very rough estimate. Don’t tell anybody you got it from me
http://21stcenturysocialcritic.blogspot.com.es/p/venezuelas-oil-reserves.html
Venezuela total: 298.3
of which Orinoco belt: 220.5
Venezuela’s reserves are inflated. They never change. The fact is that many of those reserves were overbooked in the early 1980’s. The extra heavy oil figures require very high prices, but as time goes by and they keep mismanaging the reservoirs the reserves one would estimate keep dropping beyond what’s being produced.
BP included Orinoco belt in its reserve estimate in mid-2000s, reflecting rising oil prices, which supposedly made extra-heavy oil economically viable.
Their estimate for other Venezuelan reserves remains in the range between 77 and 80 bn barrels since 2000
In the 1980s, most OPEC members sharply increased their proven reserve numbers, as OPEC production quota were distributed in proportion with reserves
Venezuela proved oil reserves, billion barrels
Source: BP
well if your going to live to be 250yrs old the you might see the the oil dry up but they pulling more the 2 million barrels a day out of ND by 2020 and I know bcuz my brother in law works in the bakken fields
Van
Thanks for posting.
Any on the ground perspective from folks such as your brother in law is always appreciated.
Tell him to put as much money as possible in IRA and 401k, invest a portion of the post tax income in corporate bonds and learn to do cathodic corrosion protection system maintenance. And I wouldn’t buy property in ND near the oil fields. He may be better off buying in Rapid City.
Hi Van,
The North Dakota Bakken/Three Forks will top out at roughly 1300 to 1500 kb/d, add another 100 kb/d for the other formations in North Dakota and C+C output in North Dakota will be 1500+/- 100 kb/d in 2017 +/- 1 year if oil gets back to $100/b or more by mid 2016 and remains above $90/b through 2018.