The basic question here is:  Given the current rates of usage, how
much longer can we expect the world's oil supply to last?   When I get
on the freeways around Seattle, which are renowned for traffic jams, I
sometimes wonder how much longer this can go on.   Four or five lanes
of traffic in each direction, both sides bumper to bumper, stop and
go, and it doesn’t even have to be rush hour.  And, of course, Seattle
is just one of the many major cities in the world.   In the early
1970s there was an “oil crisis” and I remember that it was necessary
to wait in line to buy gasoline.   After that crisis was over, I don’t
recall anything quite like it although the price, of course,
fluctuates with supply and demand; I suppose mostly due to what OPEC
does.   But what are we really looking at?   Can we go on as we are
now for another 20 years or more?   What will be the first signs that
we are actually beginning to run out of oil?   I don’t seem to ever
see anything in the media about oil wells being pumped dry.  Maybe
this just isn’t something worth being concerned about or maybe it is. 
I’d just like to have some solid information on it.

Hello again seattle,

Another very interesting question.

It has always been my personal opinion that the "oil crisis" was a
political and economic fabrication, but I am by no means an expert in
such matters. Simply a mere consumer and observer of such things. So I
set out to see what better informed sources than myself have to say on
the subject, particularly, what reserves exist and how long they might
suffice based on predicted consumption.


http://www.iea.org/g8/world/oilsup.htm
A page entitled Oil Supply Prospects notes:

"Oil reserve estimates are inevitably uncertain and studies normally
report oil reserve estimates as ranges, rather than as point
estimates. For example the United States Geological Survey in 1993
reported a range of 2.1 to 2.8 trillion (1012) barrels for worldwide
recoverable reserves of conventional oil. Experts differ on these
figures; some take a static view, emphasizing geological and
statistical issues that lead to a low reserve estimate, and some take
a dynamic view, arguing that rapidly advancing technology will help
discover more reserves and make a wider range of already known
deposits economically recoverable. Experience in mature oil regions
indicates that production builds to a peak when approximately half of
the ultimately recoverable reserves has been produced, and then falls
away. The application of new technologies, such as horizontal drilling
and 3D seismic analysis, determines the ultimate size of recoverable
reserves. It can extend the peak and delay or slow the decline in
production. But eventually production falls, given a fixed oil
resource. This has been the experience, for example, in the United
States.

This approach has been applied on a regional basis. It indicates that
a peaking of conventional oil production could occur between years
2010 and 2020, depending on assumptions for the level of reserves. Oil
production outside OPEC Middle East would peak before OPEC Middle East
production implying a greater reliance on OPEC Middle East supply
between the two peaks. A plateau in oil production for OPEC Middle
East of 47.9 mbd has been assumed, rather than a sharp peak, following
an IEA study."

The page continues with more data and interesting charts and
concludes:

"A higher view of oil reserves would assume an ultimate stock of
recoverable conventional oil of 3 trillion barrels, compared with the
lower assumption of 2.3 trillion barrels (see Table 1). This view
postpones the production peak of conventional oil and the associated
rise in world oil price to 2020."

A page entiteld "Hubbert Peak of Oil Production " at
http://www.hubbertpeak.com/ is described as:

"Named after the late Dr. M. King Hubbert, Geophysicist, this website
provides data, analysis and recommendations regarding the upcoming
peak in the rate of global oil extraction."

There are numerous links to reports and opinions. For example, a 2001
report notes:

"Amongst the billions of words brought forth by the climate debate
over the past years, remarkably few have touched on an issue that
ticks behind it like an unexploded time-bomb. This is the probability
that world oil production will reach a peak sometime during this
decade and then start to fall, never to rise again."

A linked pdf document at
http://www.hubbertpeak.com/laherrere/opec2001.pdf seeks to predict
future supply based on past discoveries.

An article in Newsweek entitled "When Wells Run Dry" states: 

"...DEFFEYES HAS REACHED a conclusion with far-reaching consequences
for the entire industrialized world. So far-reaching that many of his
colleagues in the field of petroleum geology dismiss it. The
conclusion is this: in somewhere between two and six years from now,
worldwide oil production will peak. After that, chronic shortages will
become a way of life. The 100-year reign of King Oil will be over. And
there will be nothing that President George W. Bush or Saudi princes
or the invisible hand of the marketplace will be able to do about it.
“There’s nothing we could conceivably do now that would have much of
an effect on the oil supply for at least 10 years,” says Deffeyes. "

I found the links on this page to be fascinating and offering some
compelling arguments.

The Energy Information Administration at
http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/plugs/plworld.html agrees that supplies
are decreasing and says:

"Is the world running out of crude oil? Of course - because oil is a
finite resource that is being consumed at high and increasing rates. A
more relevant issue is when world conventional oil production will
peak. There is much disagreement on that score, due to differences
about how much oil is in the ground and many other factors that
determine oil supply. Some analysts have argued that the production
peak will occur within 5 years. The Energy Information Administration,
on the other hand, currently projects rising production through at
least 2021. Long-Term World Oil Supply: A Resource Base/Production
Path Analysis examines some of the assumptions and methodologies
behind various estimates in order to account for the wide range. "

So, we can see a pattern developing where the experts seem to agree
that shortfalls will begin between 10 and 20 years.

Another pdf from the M.King Hubbert Center for Petroleum Supply
Studies at http://hubbert.mines.edu/news/Campbell_02-3.pdf notes that
by their estimation, world supply will beging to decrease in 2010.
They feel this could even occur sooner if economic recovery were to
occur sooner than expected and that very soon, the world will have to
learn to live on less production. They offset this by noting that 
there is currently a huge amount of waste of these resources.

I have found numerous pages that all expound the same or very similar
data and reach the same conclusions.

On the other hand - 

http://sepwww.stanford.edu/sep/jon/world-oil.dir/lynch/worldoil.html
CRYING WOLF: Warnings about oil supply - says:

"...In the past two years, a number of articles have appeared warning
not only of a new oil crisis, but of the end of the oil era, as oil
production inevitably peaks and declines due to inexorable geological
forces. These include "Mideast Oil Forever?" by Joseph J. Romm and
Charles B. Curtis and "Heading Off the Permanent Oil Crisis," by James
J. MacKenzie, among others.

The profusion of articles on the subject is unfortunate, since the
casual reader (and policy-maker) might conclude that the large number
of articles have an equally large amount of research behind them. In
truth, most of these are not actually about oil, but take the
assumption that oil scarcity is imminent, especially outside the
Middle East, and nearly all rely on a few pessimistic quotes from oil
men, or recent work by one or two geologists using what is known as a
"Hubbert approach." Most notable are the recent publication of the
book The Coming Oil Crisis by Colin Campbell and the March 1998
Scientific American article "The End of Cheap Oil" by Colin J.
Campbell and Jean H. Laherrere.

The gist of their argument is that most of the world's oil has already
been found, as evidenced by the alleged lack of recent giant
discoveries; Middle East reserves have been overstated for political
reasons; actual total recoverable resources are only about 1.8
trillion barrels, not the 2.4 trillion barrels that others have
estimated; existing fields will not continue to expand in size and
production as others suggest; and most oil producing countries outside
the Middle East are said to be near, if not past, their point of peak
production, which occurs when 50% of total oil resources have been
produced. Production is predicted to drop off steeply afterwards.
Thus, they forecast that "The End of Cheap Oil" is at hand and prices
will be rising shortly. "

They continue to build an intense and well constructed argument and
conclude:

"Short-term prices will certainly fluctuate, and we will surely have
more oil crises, since they are short-term events. Unfortunately,
there is little doubt that the certain failure of the current
Cassandras will be forgotten within a few years and a new round of
alarms will be sounded. Hopefully, it will not receive the attention
that the current (and previous) ones did, and even more hopefully,
most governments and companies have already learned their lesson from
the tens of billions of dollars wasted when others cried wolf during
the 1970s."

Unfortunately, their opinion seems to be in the minority, though it is
very curious how the crisis of the 1970's was indeed, a cry of wolf.
At least for several more generations.

I'll touch last on the Alternative Energy Institue
(http://www.altenergy.org/2/nonrenewables/fossil_fuel/depletion/depletion.html)
and quote a few of their comments:

"It's coming sooner than you think. Petroleum is the lifeblood of our
civilization, but industry experts predict that the world's oil supply
will reach its maximum production and midpoint of depletion sometime
around the year 2010 (1). By then Hydrocarbon Man will have consumed
half of all the easily recoverable oil that ever existed on our
planet. That peak foreshadows the final deadline for humanity's switch
to the alternative sources of energy that must replace petroleum in
the production decline that's sure to follow (2). Even more disturbing
for oil-dependent western economies, in the near future more than half
of the planet's petroleum reserves will be owned and controlled by a
handful of countries in the politically unstable Middle East (3).

Incredibly, Baby Boomers born after World War II will have burned up
70% of America's total oil supply in just one generation	.

...Oil supply problems rarely concern U.S. residents, but when there's
a burp in the pipeline and prices spike, as in the gasoline crisis
from 1973-1979, riots and war are usually not far behind. U.S. troops
have already spilled blood on the oil-rich sands of the Iraqi desert.
In geo-political terms, the desperate fight for oil futures may have
already begun.

World oil experts fall into two camps, bulls and bears. Both agree
we've used 800 billion barrels (6). The bears think there's 1 trillion
left and that production may peak by 2010. Bulls think there's 1.8
trillion left and that the peak won't come until 2020. If ten years is
the only difference between them, it is time to prepare. Americans see
no sinister shadow on the horizon, but unless governments and industry
support alternative sources for their crucial energy needs, dark days
are coming. The only question is how soon."

The above was penned in 1998.

I hope the above has provided interesting food for thought.
Personally, I am never sure which expert to trust as motivations for
their opinion can dramatically alter the "truth" in their content. By
far, most published reports predict a downhill slide to production
beginning between 5 and 18 years from now. If they are correct, it
illuminates a diffent perspective on today's middle east current
events. On the other hand, crying wolf in the 70's stimulated higher
prices and larger profits for those in control of petroleum resources.

As Yogi Berra might say, it could be Deja Vu all over again".

Do let me know if I can clarify any of the above.

Regards,

-=clouseau=-




Search terms:

world oil supply
oil reserves

Dear Clouseau: Thank you for another excellent response.  In looking
at the links provided, I was most interested in the “OPEC seminar” by
Jean Laherrere.   Put that together with the other information and the
bottom line is:  We are getting close!   In America today, everything
is of the moment, right now, overnight.  One of the reports talks
about “The 100-year reign of King Oil.” The preponderance of the
information indicates a peak in oil production sometime before 2020
and some saying as soon as 2004!  Food for thought indeed!   Thank you
again!