As Fracking Rises, Peak Oil Theory Slowly Dies

Forbes ^ | 7/16/2013 | David Blackmon

[thackney]

On July 3, the administrators of The Oil Drum, a blog/discussion forum site dedicated to and frequented by those who advocate for “Peak Oil” theory, announced the site would close at the end of July, marking an end to an eight-year existence. During that period of time, “Peak Oil” theory has basically gone the way of the California Condor, from widespread existence and acceptance in the oil and gas environment to near extinction as its environment has dramatically shifted thanks to the discovery of and ability to access massive oil shale reservoirs not just in the United States, but all over the world.

Eight years ago, some of the leading thinkers in and around the oil and gas industry, like the late Matt Simmons, were proponents of this theory, which advocates the belief that worldwide oil production has reached or has very nearly reached its peak overall production, and the world faces a long period of decline of the resource. Today, given the new abundance of shale oil, almost no real industry thought leaders are Peak Oil proponents, and the theory is now mainly advocated by self-promoting opportunists looking to gain free media attention by being contrarians to prevailing belief, and environmental activists who cobble together misleading data and fright scenarios to justify costly policies that throw billions of public dollars at renewable energy schemes.

At his Carpe Diem blog on Tuesday morning, Dr. Mark J. Perry posted a great chart illustrating the levels of interest from 2005 through today in the topics of “peak oil” vs. “fracking” using the Google GOOG -0.55% Trends tool. Anyone wondering why the administrators of The Oil Drum are unable to sustain a critical mass of interest in discussions and news around Peak Oil theory need only view this chart to get the picture.

[Justa]

Well, hydrocarbons have been detected in comets and asteroids as well as in the atmospheres of other planets and moons. I think it’s quite reasonable to assume hydrocarbons are abiotic.

Hydrocarbons are one of the building blocks for life imo. Particularly after seeing the algae and fish blooms which followed the Deepwater Horizon “tradgedy”.

[Strategerist]

Well, I was referring to “Peak Oil” in the context of “Peak Oil” right now.

There’s been this weird FR infatuation with abiogenic oil, driven by:

1) The strange belief that mainstream scientists think oil ACTUALLY comes from dinosaurs (which they have never believed or argued)

2) Lack of understanding that oil actually comes from fossil plankton from lakes and shallow oceans

3) A bunch of idiotic articles from Jerome Corsi on Wing Nut Daily a few years back

4) Basic geological ignorance

5) A lack of understanding that real petroleum geologists don’t take abiogenic oil theories seriously, and all the oil they find, including shale oil that they find and frack, has been discovered on the assumption that oil is NOT abiogenic, but fossil.

What had happened is that people saw abiogenic oil as an argument against “Peak oil” in the 2010-2020 period, not understanding that you could BOTH oppose the idea that we are about to hit “peak oil” in the 2010-2020 time period, and also believe that petroleum is a fossil fuel, and that there were huge fossile reserves accessible with new technology.

[faucetman]

“Peak Oil also ignored the fact that, although oil is lighter than the surrounding liquids, and rises, it is found up to five miles down. That’s well below any fossils ever laid down. This strongly implies that oil is produced, not be fossils, but by something else. The hot biosphere has been proposed as an ecology living deep in the Earth’s crusts. If that’s so, then the supply of oil will last as long as the Earth does.”

YES! Just like ALL life is a result of Photosynthesis. Until, OOPS, we discovered an abundance of life on the ocean floor where there is no light.

Like all “scientific theories”, they’re true until they aren’t anymore.

[PeterPrinciple]

Because it isn’t true. Heat and Pressure break down heavy crude oil molecules into smaller, simpler molecules like Natural Gas, octane, etc.

We do it every day in our refineries. The physics doesn’t reverse because it is underground.

---

There is this thing called organic chemistry, which is not as simple as you present. Carbon has a natural affinity for itself to produce longer chains with itself and other elements. That is why we are a carbon based life form.

Your refinery example is a distilling process, separating the different length of chains, very little changing of bonds, if any.

Thanks for the question, maybe that organic chem has value yet.

[theBuckwheat]

“Peak Oil” is fraudulent silliness born of ignorance. The issue is not the quantity of oil left to extract, but the price of the finished fuel products that people want to purchase.

We do not burn crude oil in our cars, trucks and airplanes. We burn very carefully refined fuel products made of molecules that are assembled, atom by atom, by a process that breaks down the molecules from some raw, hydrocarbon rich, feedstock.

Crude oil is the primary feedstock for the only reason that, for the time being, it is the least costly source of those atoms. But when crude oil was in short supply during World War II, the Germans used coal as the source of molecules. Based on today’s prices, it becomes less expensive to convert coal to diesel fuel when crude oil costs more than $80/bbl. But we can use other sources of hydrocarbons. A company in Carthage, Missouri was selling a form of diesel fuel that was made by rendering the waste products of slaughtering turkeys. It went bankrupt not because the process didn’t work, but because the resulting product was more expensive than customers wanted to pay. The company had previously run successful tests to convert municipal solid waste and sewage sludge into diesel fuel. They computed that there was enough sewage sludge in the US to supply around half of national diesel fuel needs if properly converted.

The end issue is cost. Presently, fuels made by refining crude oil cost less than fuels made by refining coal, sewage sludge, or turkey carcasses. But the instant those later sources are less expensive, the market will start to use them. We don’t fret about ‘peak whale’ because when over hunting caused the price of whale oil to rise, other sources of oil for lamps was found from coal and crude oil. Then electricity came into use for lighting of homes and streets. Today, even the use of Coleman lamps (that burn a form of gasoline) for illuminating camp sites is giving way to lights that use efficient LEDs and batteries. We can no longer buy whale oil, and who would light their home with it anyway? Neither would they use an open gas flame, as was done for decades.

An exciting frontier of research is to use genetically engineered algaes to produce usable fuel molecules. A recent article stated that at the present time, the break even costs were in the ballpark of $200/bbl. If it is really less, then all the better. The carbon atoms for algae-produced fuels would come from the CO2-rich gasses from coal-fired power plants.

The plain truth is that we are awash in hydrocarbons that can be converted to usable fuel products. The only issue is cost, that is if government will not intrude and distort economic decisions like it presently does with corn-based ethanol.

“Peak Oil” is propaganda that is used in an attempt to stampede policymakers and the public into choices that cannot be productive in the long run, and certainly ones will raise costs and destroy liberty in the process.

[rlmorel]

Actually, Thomas Sowell does a very cogent job of explaining this as he always does.

When the cost of finding oil gets above a level where the people looking for it cannot cost effectively find and extract it, the supply of oil will drop, and the cost of oil to the consumer goes up.

When the cost of oil goes up, it can become profitable again for the people to look for it again, and they will do so. Supplies of oil will then increase, and supply will increase, and prices will drop.

And on it goes. A self sustaining engine driven by capitalist motives and forces that keeps the providers in business and the consumers with a reliable supply.

And dipstick liberals want to manually mange that process because they are SO MUCH DAMNED SMARTER THAN EVERYONE AND EVERYTHING ELSE AND CAN DO IT FAR, FAR BETTER.

Screw them.

[rlmorel]

Right. See my post below...I like your explanation.

[Okieshooter]

As taught in every Economics 101 class.

[thackney]

Simple hydrocarbons, yes.

When there is a lack of oxygen, methane is going to be lowest energy state for carbon and hydrogen. Depending on ratios of atoms, ethane and few larger molecules will exist as well.

Let me know when you find a substantiated claim for the Paraffins, Naphthenes, Aromatics and Asphaltics that make up the majority of crude oil composition.

[thackney]

There is this thing called organic chemistry, which is not as simple as you present. Carbon has a natural affinity for itself to produce longer chains with itself and other elements. That is why we are a carbon based life form.

Yes, those are the biotic sources. I was responding to a claim of abotic.

[rlmorel]

LOL...I don’t think they teach that anymore. They couldn’t possibly...probably not for the last 30 years.

It is all Keynesian Economics now, probably. How else to explain the preponderance of these people at all levels of government and apparently, industry?????

[Rad_J]

I like to tell liberals that peak oil was a lie started by big oil so that they could charge a lot more for the oil and make billions more in profits.

[Okieshooter]

My professor in 1960 was a Keynesian fan, but at least he taught supply and demand. He used to make me crazy with his tax and redistribute BS. I recall I made a C in his class.:-)

[PeterPrinciple]

Yes, those are the biotic sources. I was responding to a claim of abotic. -------------------------- and you do not think these longer chains form in non biological situations? I repeat the natural affinity of carbon for carbon. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/95006/carbon-group-element/80951/Catenation "Only the carbon–hydrogen, carbon–fluorine, and carbon–oxygen single bonds (C−H, C−F, and C−O) are stronger than the carbon–carbon single bond (C−C), and each of these is weaker than the carbon–carbon multiple bonds (C=C or C≡C)." And a response to your refinery argument? To prempt you, yes you can break carbon bonds but it takes more than heat and pressure. It takes addition of steam, (see above) or other agent or catalyst. You can refine shorter chains into longer chains by removing hydrogen, (much more complex than that) I am not an expert in organic chem but there are some basics to understand. You have painted your self in a corner and would rather be "right" than learn something. I have been there often myself, and have found it is best to admit where I am and let the paint dry.

[thackney]

To prempt you, yes you can break carbon bonds but it takes more than heat and pressure. It takes addition of steam, (see above) or other agent or catalyst.

False. I've done multiple refinery design projects as an engineer. We do not inject steam. Some thermal crackers introduce nothing besides heat and pressure. Many modern crackers use catalysts to lower the energy requirement but not all. Cokers are good example of a thermal cracker that are still designed and built today that only use heat and pressure to crack the heavier molecules.

[cpdiii]

There is not any commercial oil production outside of sedimentary basins.

Oddly enough we have some production from Volcanic rocks. This production comes from sills (volcanic intrusions into surrounding rock. Some of these sills intruded into sedimentary rock that are oil bearing. The oil then migrated into the porous sill and is produced from the volcanic rock. Thus the origin of the oil is sedimentary but the production zone is volcanic.

[thackney]

https://www.fwc.com/GlobalEC/pdf/VisbreakingProcess.pdf

Visbreaking is a non-catalytic thermal process that converts atmospheric or vacuum residues via thermal cracking to gas, naphtha, distillates, and visbroken residue.

Let me know if you want other examples or more detail.

[spokeshave]

My college students are usually sucked into the "scarcity" theories

Then tell them about the Green River deposits... According to the US Geological Survey in Feb this year the deposits weigh in at 3 Trillion Barrels of oil....with 1 Trillion Barrels recoverable with today's technology.,...

and for the Peak Oil fanatics...1 Trillion Barrels of oil is about equal to the entire world's known reserves of oil.

[Okieshooter]

“Green River deposits”

Now you are talking about some REALLY expensive oil. It is not really oil but kerogen that must be converted into oil.

[Okieshooter]

It appears that Peak Oil is not really about oil at all, but about economics.

http://peakoilpetroleumandpreciousmetals.yuku.com/topic/21205/Peak-Oil#.UebIysu9KSM