Posted on 06/05/2008 11:11:38 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Junk your SUV and buy an electric scooter. Recent claims by various OPEC leaders that the world has plenty of oil left are bunk, alleges Sadad Al-Husseini, a former top executive at Saudi Aramco, Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil company.
Oil-producing countries are inflating the size of their oil reserves by as much as 300 billion barrels by padding supposedly proven reserves with “probable” reserves and tar and oil sands, according to Husseini.
Such hypothetical reserves are “not delineated, not accessible and not available for production,” Husseini said at a recent energy conference in London.
Oil production has now reached its peak and will begin dropping in 15 years or less, earlier than most other experts predict.
In an article for Petroleum Intelligence Weekly, Husseini took issue with the publication’s survey on oil reserves, criticizing common methods for estimating oil reserves.
Oil companies mix proven finds with probable reserves that may have only a 50 percent chance of getting out of the ground, he wrote. They also count “unconventional hydrocarbons, inaccessible oil accumulations and unconfirmed recoveries, none of which fit the current definitions of proven or probable reserves.”
Take the 140 billion barrels of Canadian bitumen that’s regularly reported as proven oil reserves. In reality, Husseini alleged, only a small fraction of that will be converted to useful fuels.
Siberian hydrocarbons, reported as reserves, call for massive investments to extract and refine, and cannot be considered reserves.
Counting probable reserves and tar and oil sands is controversial, admitted Petroleum Intelligence Weekly. The problem is that definitions vary.
Plus, oil companies and governments are often secretive, claiming information about their oil is a security issue.
Oil producers, according to Husseini, are also overly optimistic about new extraction techniques. They presume they’ll work well everywhere, instead of analyzing their usefulness field by field.
Adding to the confusion, the U.S. Geological Survey and others have mixed up reserves with resources, combining proven and probable fields with speculative, undiscovered hydrocarbons.
That, he said, has prompted speculation that global oil reserves may be over twice current estimates.
While Husseini is an oil-production pessimist, others are coming around to his view.
Prompted by uncertainty about world oil supplies, the International Energy Agency is studying depletion rates at about 400 oil fields in its first-ever study of world oil supply.
"The prices are very high, and demand did not respond in the last few years as much as one would have expected," said IEA Chief Economist Fatih Birol. "The growth in terms of production was not great. We did not see enough investment."
The study, due out in November, will predict supplies through 2030. The fear is that demand will outstrip supply, sending prices through the roof.
Oil companies and governments have been cooperative with the IEA, but analysts were skeptical that the agency would get a complete picture from often-secretive oil producing nations.
The Paris-based IEA is seen as the world's most reliable independent source of oil information, and its new forecasts are likely to further upset markets.
© 2008 Newsmax. All rights reserved.
Why would they want us to think they have more oil than they do? You’d think it’d be the reverse.
It’s not *us* they’re trying to fool, primarily.
Imagine what would happen to the Saudi royals if the word gets out that they’re running out of oil in SA.
In addition, a *secondary* reason they want people to think they have more oil than they do is to maintain power over other nations AND to keep people from switching to alternative energy supplies.
PING.
Well, whatever our U.S. reserves are we shouldn’t bring them on line until the Islamofascist cash-cow is bone dry and pushing up daisies.
Oh, and note to BP: GTHOOMC, ‘cause WE didn’t vote for your King.
Seems that if one describes the supply as limited, demand for existing production would be worth more.
It is, after all, a cartel, an organization chartered to control price/profit.
“In addition, a *secondary* reason they want people to think they have more oil than they do is to maintain power over other nations AND to keep people from switching to alternative energy supplies.”
Your secondary reason is the primary reason why McCain’s plan to start a crash Nuclear power development program is a sound one.
I disagree with the man on many issues, but he’s dead-on in this case.
If it were up to me, the only resource under Saudi control would be sand.
Not us, but each other.
OPEC production quotas are based upon reserves. The more they claim to have, the more they are allowed to produce.
So you dont go building nuclear power plants and the like, I would think. Thats the reason the OPEC shieks resisted underselling in the past. Complacency ensures a reliable customer base.
Nobody knows what will be produced until it is produced and nobody knows the rate of production until it is being produced. Everybody is free to guess, even former oil execs. Especially former oil execs.
Being with Saudi Aramco he should know all about overstating reserves. Matt Simmons is convinced Aramco has dramatically been overstating reserves snce the 70’s when they claimed the ability to produce up 25 mill bpd. Everyone now knows that was bunk and 10 mill bpd appears to be about the practical max. No good reserve data out of Saudi since the early 80’s.
If the western oil companies are overstating, Aramco is 10 times worse.
If you think about it, the Saudis and their ilk are actually big fans of the anti-oil types that we have here in the U.S. -- the ones who don't want us to drill ANWR or Gulf Coast, convert shale oil, make liquid fuel from clean coal, etc.
As long as these enviro-weenies have a stranglehold over the mental midgets in Congress and the MSM, we'll never increase our domestic oil supply. And, thus, we'll continue to have to rely on foreign oil at whatever prices those foreigners want to charge us. Our green idiots are making the Saudis laugh all the way to their banks.
See what you did by posting this article? Crude oil 126.64 +4.34
Panic!
A couple years ago he thought it would rise from the then 84.6 MMBPD to 95 MMBPD in 2015. Has the discovery of more oil like that of Brazil and the increase in oil price made him lower his estimate?
NYMEX crude 127.26 +4.96
RBOB gasoline 3.31 +11 cents
This is very quick
If we think Saudi oil is about to run out, then we would/should be starting NOW to develop other sources of supply, plus building more nuke plants. They want us to think we can depend on them for supplies well into the future
How many times does he have to be wrong before he become irrelevant?
According to al-Huseini the technical floor - the basic cost of producing oil excluding factors such as geopolitical risk and hedge fund speculation - is currently about $70 per barrel, meaning the minimum oil price could hit $106 in 2010 and $130 by 2012. Actual crude prices, including financial market factors, could be be as much as $125 by as early as 2010.
Oil has peaked, prices to soar - Sadad al-Huseini
Posted on Monday, October 29th, 2007
http://www.davidstrahan.com/blog/?p=67
I’m an eeevil bastard. :-)
A scare tactic to drive up the price of oil no doubt. Unfortunately these new “fears” will drive the price up to $150.00
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