The world's 932 giant oil and gas fields are considered those with 500 million barrels of ultimately recoverable oil or gas equivalent. Geoscientists believe these giants account for 40 percent of the world's petroleum reserves. They are clustered in 27 regions of the world, with the largest clusters in the Persian Gulf and Western Siberian Basin. The past three decades reflect declines in discoveries of giant fields. The present decade (2000-2010), however, reflects an upturn in discoveries and appears on track to be the third best for discovery of giant oil and gas fields in the 150 year history of modern oil and gas exploration.
This website provides a valuable set of resources on energy and climate change, designed specifically for the people who work with and for local governments. The Post Carbon Cities program helps local governments understand the challenges posed by energy and climate uncertainty, and provides resources for elected officials, planners, managers and others to develop plans and responses appropriate to their communities.
The Oil Depletion Protocol is an international agreement that will enable nations of the world to cooperatively reduce their dependence on oil. It was proposed by Dr. Colin Campbell, a prominent petroleum geologist and founder of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas (ASPO), in 1996.
By agreeing to reduce oil imports and exports by a specified amount each year, about 2.6 percent, signatory nations will help mitigate the negative consequences of an over-reliance on cheap oil and help prepare for a global decline in the world’s oil supply. The premise of the Protocol is inherently straightforward: oil importing nations would agree to reduce their imports by an agreed-upon yearly percentage, referred to as the World Oil Depletion Rate, while oil producing nations would agree to reduce their rate of production by their National Depletion Rate. This simple and sensible formula will produce, in effect, a global rationing system. If the entire world adopted the Protocol, global consumption of oil would decline by almost 3 percent per annum, thus stabilizing prices, preserving the resource base, and reducing competition for remaining supplies.
Oil megaprojects are large oil field projects to bring a significant amount of new oil production capacity to market. Tabulations of oil megaprojects are used in an attempt to forecast whether future global oil supply will be adequate to meet demand for oil, or whether the world is reaching Peak Oil. As such, oil megaproject analysis has been controversial. This approach to oil forecasting is also known as the "bottom-up" approach, in that it relies on building a detailed model of where and when new oil production capacity will come on line....
"André Angelantoni, founder, Inspiring Green Leadership, hosts the free, bi-weekly Peak Oil, Climate Change and Business Online Executive Briefing, which educates businesses and individuals on the coming oil shock and how they can prepare for it." He is interviewed by Meredith Medlin of Living Green Effortlessly. He is talking of the coming oil crunch which is an inevitable result of the peak oil phenomenon.
He separates peak oil afficianados into two groups: 'rapid peak' and 'delayed peak'. He is a self-described rapid peak person, and has a message of approximately peak oil is coming real soon, we must now begin to change how society does transportation and everything.
I think he is overly focused on what individuals do in their households. While that is important the individual use of energy resources is only a small part of the overall picture. What of the corporate use of energy resources to produce and transport goods and services? The solution needs to come from not just personal changes but also corporate changes.
An interesting idea he raises is a parallel with the five stages of death and dying. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross defined these five stages that people tend to go through in dealing with the death of another. In this case we are observing the death of a lifestyle to which we have become accustomed. And I suppose they'd say the Hummer and other SUV's is an example of the Denial stage. "What? This can't be happening, there's no limitation on oil availability, so it doesn't matter if I drive a vehicle that gets 5 gallons to the mile. There's always going to be enough oil."
He recommends taking some initiative right now, especially in self-education, learning to build things, to be a resource for your local community, etc.
He also has a business coaching businesses in adjusting to the coming peak oil situation. He runs it as a 'game', the “New Game for Humanity”. He starts the game by suggesting that the goal is to create community-sufficient communities. That is, in addition to self sufficiency, that communities also must have sufficient resources for themselves.
This is about an article that is about the way in which oil production is going evolve. Will there be a sharp peak, or a long lasting plateau?
It's largely about the peak oil phenomenon and what it says about our future. This phenomenon is an aspect of a general model that for any resource which undergoes continually increasing demand for more, there comes a time when the planet cannot provide more. The model drawn from observing the ability of oil companies to extract oil from oil fields shows that once demand reaches the point where the planet cannot provide more, that what happens is the resource begins to diminish and indeed provide less rather than more. Many oil fields around the planet have gone past this peak production point and it is debatable when the world overall will go past the worldwide peak point. And it is a concern over what happens after that point?
The article draws a distinction between "sharp peak" thinkers, and "plateau peak" thinkers. That is, will the oil production drop off sharply once the peak is reached? ("sharp peak") Or will there be a long period where the production stays the same before it begins to drop off? ("plateau")
What drives oil production is the discovery of new oil fields. The pattern is to use up the oil field, then move on to the next one and the next one and so on. Eventually we will run out of new oil fields. The current statistics shows there seems to be an adequate supply of new fields to maintain a plateau condition for several years into the future.
"In relation to the peak or plateau question, this raises two questions. For how long will the oil industry be able to add such a large amount of new production each year? And the second being, is the decline rate of 4% to 5% stable or will it increase or decrease in the future?...From historical data we know that discoveries peaked in the 1960’s and have been declining ever since. Presently we are discovering on average one barrel for every three consumed....While discoveries can influence the extension of the plateau, unconventional crude oil is not likely to have such an influence. With unconventional in this article I mean oil sands, oil shale, polar oil and heavy and extra heavy oil. Present scenario’s for these sources of unconventional oil estimate a production level between 8 to 12 million barrels per day in 2030 (Campbell, 2006; IEA, 2006). This is too little and too late...."
It seems a biodiesel advocate has been arrested for siphoning 300 gallons of grease from a Burger King in Morgan Hill, CA. Among the charges is 'Illegal transportation of inedible kitchen grease'. This is a bit curious and clearly there are a lot of biodiesel advocates who are going around collecting used fryer oil from restaurants. Though: "He certainly had been to other places in the area," said Morgan Hill police Cmdr. David Swing. "Our guess is its a bio-diesel fuel thing..."
19310. (a) It is unlawful for any person or entity to engage in the transportation of inedible kitchen grease without being registered with the department and without being in possession of a valid registration certificate issued by the department.
19310.5. It is unlawful for any person who is not a registered transporter of inedible kitchen grease to transport that product from
any place within this state to any place outside the borders of this state.
19310.7. Any person registered as a transporter of inedible kitchen grease may deliver any inedible kitchen grease to a licensed renderer or collection center for processing or recycling into usable products. As used in this section, "usable products" includes, but is not limited to, biofuels, lubricants, and animal feed, provided the uses for animal feed are permitted by the rules and regulations adopted by the United States Food and Drug Administration.
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There is a law waiting to be signed in California which would modify the requirements for the above license. In Help reduce WVO costs it is said the fee for the above license was increased from $175 to $400. This places the license beyond the reach of an individual collecting used cooking oil on their own. Waste derived biodiesel is a petition to Gov Schwarzenegger to sign the law.
Is this law being used to improve public safety? That is, perhaps there is a danger to public safety when transporting this cooking grease? Or was the law enacted to protect the entrenched industry of "waste" oil recycling.
It's a fact that a lot of vegetable oil is being produced and used in cooking all around the world. So I'm curious what happens to that oil after it's used in cooking? It is possible for the oil to be cleaned and reused, however as a former employee in fast food I know from personal experience the cost of doing so and how that process can only be done so many times. It would be possible for a processing company to make other products out of the oil. For example it's known vegetable oil contains glycerin, and it's well known you can make diesel fuel out of "waste" oil.
