Something about Peak Oil. And some trends that will be worsening in the future
In november 2018 humanity reached Peak Oil, according to many experts * (read for example the article "Peak Oil is here. World oil production peaked in 2018" by Alice Friedemann on her blog Energy Skeptic 1.2.2022). There is, though, confusion on the subject, some experts say we haven't reached Peak Oil. Maybe the confusion lies in how we count the oil, what kinds of oil we count. Or then people put hope in a magical future rise of production. I stick with the ideas of the most published peakoilers [1]). Since then oil has been declining and it looks like it will continue that way. The academic peakoiler Gail Tverberg has stated that there is plenty of oil and coal and natural gas left, but most of it will be left in the ground in the future, because it will be too uneconomical to produce.
This means that bad economic trends in the present will worsen in the future, because oil is the lifeblood of society. That is also true with the climate trends. Bad trends will worsen.
Here is some of the most important trends which will worsen, and something we can do about it:
1. Starvation will worsen. It may reach Sweden in the end. We can alleviate this by eating all our garden apples and fruits, which we are far from doing now, harvesting all the nettles (brännäslor) there is, all the rose hips (nypon) there is, all the dandelions (maskros) there is and on the whole harvesting all the edible wild plants there is. And there is much. One can for example make tea of leafs, harvesting the nutrition of leafs in this way. One can conservate apples, by drying them on threads. One should develope one's skills in food conservation. Try to practice on some farm or by yourself. One should also compost all compostable material, for future permaculture farming and gardening.
2. The cost of electricity and transportation fuel will rise. The former can be alleviated by insulating our houses supereffectively, and heating our homes with firewood, if we have stoves. All trees in the forests should go to heating homes, and we should stop printing newspapers, journals, books and advertisement, just to save the forests, because we cannot heat our homes with firewood and print books and newspapers at the same time. We have to choose.
Another thing we can do is just saving electricity in all possible manners, using candles instead of electric light, for example.
The latter, lack of transportation fuel can be alleviated by biking more and walking more, and using more public transport.
3. Heatwaves will worsen. It can be alleviated by imbruing (väta) our clothes with water in the worst heat, sleeping and working with wet clothes, and spending the most critical hours by the sea or by brooks (bäckar), cooling ourselves with swimming in the sea or in brook-water, which is the coldest water available in nature. One can also take cold showers, as long as we have electricity. When not, we should not work as much as today, so we can stand the heat.
4. Unemployment will first rise, and only after the collapse of civilization we will all be required to do hard work. The former can be alleviated by being creative, cultivating useful hobbies and working with the garden, cultivating one's own food, and in the winter working with needlecrafts (handarbeten) and reading and writing usefull stuff, developing one's spirit. The latter, the burden of hard work, means that we will all be needed to grow our own food and do forest work by hand to get firewood. This burden can be alleviated by letting go of all useless work and all useless things, so that we only work to keep ourselves fed and warm. We could for example let go of cleanliness, not washing our clothes and ourselves so often, or not at all, so that we can have all time and power for the essential work. Modern civilized cleanliness is not essential, we can sacrifice that, without losing much life quality (one gets used to smells). What we should not sacrifice, is our bodily health, and that can be risked by too much heavy bodily work in the fields and the gardens. Be careful here. Our spine is in the risk zone.
* Here is many more articles and reports about how we now are in Peak Oil, with the newest above, literature which may explain the present high inflation and the high energy prices that we have experienced recently, with a time above 100 dollar/barrel (now Brent Crude Oil Price is 95 dollar/barrel). There is eleven peakoilers who have stood out among the others in learning and expertise, and they are Richard Heinberg, Art Berman, Gail Tverberg, Chris Martenson, Nafeez Ahmed, Ron Patterson, Simon Michaux, Alice Friedemann, Ugo Bardi, Steve St. Angelo and Kurt Cobb. I try to find articles and youtubevideos by them:
PARADIGM SHIFT: END OF THE OIL AGE (posted by Art Berman on his blog/homepage 15.8.2022)
From the article: "World oil production is unlikely to regain November 2018 peak of 102 mmb/d."
PEAK GOLD & PEAK OIL ARE HERE: Means Big Prices Moves Coming (posted on SrsRocco Report by Steve St.Angelo 29.7.2022)
We're past Peak Oil (youtubevideo by Chris Martenson 12.7.2022)
In this article, Heinberg among other things states that conventional oil production started a production plateau 2005 and is now declining.
How much oil remains for the world to produce? Comparing assessment methods, and separating fact from fiction (article in Current Research in Environmental Sustainability Volume 4, 2022, by Jean Laherrère, Charles A.S.Hall and Roger Bentley)
From the article: "The signs of energy crisis are everywhere. In Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, airlines recently threatened to cancel virtually all flights in response to surging kerosene prices. US retail gasoline prices just hit a new record. And Europe is preparing for the likelihood of severe natural gas shortages next winter.
Saudi energy minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, speaking at the World Utilities Congress in Abu Dhabi in early May, said, “The world needs to wake up. The world is running out of energy capacity at all levels. It is a reality.” "
Decline in World Conventional Oil Output and Peak Oil (posted on the blog Peak Oil Barrel by Dennis Coyne, 25.4.2022)
This article puts the peak of conventional oil to 2016.
The world has a major crude oil problem; expect conflict ahead (posted on the blog Our Finite World, by Gail Tverberg, 21.4.2022)
Almost all production growth in world oil production since 2005 comes from US oil production. Gail Tverberg writes in this article about US oil production the following: "Thus, while growth in US crude oil production greatly supported world growth in crude oil production in the 2009 to 2018 period, it is impossible to see this pattern continuing."
Peak Oil! OPEC+ and US Shale Oil Production is on the Decline! (youtubevideo by Kingdom Exploration 15.4.2022)
From the video: "Shale oil and gas peaked in 2019."
Prognosis and Conclusions: Oil from a Critical Raw Material Perspective (posted on Greenpeoplesmedia 22.1.2022 by Simon Michaux)
Has oil peaked? (Posted at Post Carbon Institute by Richard Heinberg on October 9, 2020)
The End of the Oil Age Is Upon Us (Posted bNafeez Ahmed on August 26, 2020 on Vice)
Shale oil and gas fraud: A sign of a peak in oil supplies? (posted on the blog Resource Insights by Kurt Cobb, 20.6.2020)
From the article: " The U.S. oil boom was the principal source of increased world production for most of the last 15 years. Without that boom and the boom in the Canadian tar sands, world oil production would have grown little or even declined. Now that U.S. shale oil production is receding—from an estimated 8.3 million barrels per day (mbpd) in November 2019 to 6.9 mbpd as of February 2021—it is unlikely that U.S. producers could pull off a similar feat again."
The decline of oil has begun (Greenpeace, by Rex Weyler 23.3.2020)
Art Berman: Houston, We Have A Problem (posted at Peak Prosperity 30.11.2019)
Tight Oil and The Willing Suspension of Disbelief (Art Berman, 22.11.2019)
Gail Tverberg: Have We Already Passed World Peak Oil and World Peak Coal? (posted on the blog Our Finite World, by Gail Tverberg, 22.2.2019)
OPEC January Production Data (posted by Ron Patterson on his blog Peak Oil Barrel 13.2.2020)
Peak Oil… and Blindness (posted on the blog Mind the Post, 9.2.2020)
Peak Shale Will Send Oil Prices Sky High (posted on Peak Oil news and message boards, by Nick Cunningham 7.2.2020)
Government Agency Warns Global Oil Industry Is on the Brink of a Meltdown (posted on Vice by Nafeez Ahmed 4.2.2020)
From the article: "According to Dr. Hagens, this new analysis confirms that “‘peak oil’ is now really about ‘peak credit.’ If we can somehow continue to keep growing our financial claims to allow us access to future energy today, we’ll continue to be able to extract the next most costly tranche of hydrocarbons.”
But as debt levels are becoming dangerously unstable, this can only continue for so long; and only pushes the problem forward, making future oil decline rates steeper."
"The Finland Report" (A report on Peak Oil by the Geological Survey of Finland, by Simon Michaux (2019)
Nafeez Ahmed: Venezuela’s collapse is a window into how the Oil Age will unravel (posted on the Energy Skeptic blog 17.7.2019)
Peak oil, 20 years later: Failed prediction or useful insight?, (article by Ugo Bardi in Energy Research & Social Science, february 2019)
Brace for the next oil, food and financial crash. 80% of the world’s oil has peaked, and the resulting oil crunch will slowly flatten the economy (posted at INSURGENCE intelligence, 6.1.2017 by Nafeez Ahmed)
From the article: "...just to keep production flat against increasing decline rates, the world will need to add four Saudi Arabia’s worth of production by 2040. North American production, despite remaining the most promising in terms of potential, will simply not be able to fill this gap."
“If we assumed a decline rate of 5%pa [per year] on global post-peak supply of 74mbd — which is by no means aggressive in our view — it would imply a fall in post-peak supply of c.38mbd by 2030 and c.52mbd out to 2040. In other words, the world would need to find over four times the size of Saudi Arabia just to keep supply flat, before demand growth is taken into account.”
"Much trumpeted improvements in drilling rates and efficiency will not make things better, because they will only accelerate production in the short term while, therefore, more rapidly depleting existing reserves. In this case, the report concludes:
“… the decline-delaying techniques are only masking what could be significantly higher decline rates in the future.” "
"But even so, the paper finds that the world is experiencing:
“… declining average EROIs [Energy Return on Investment] for all fossil fuels; with the EROI of oil having likely halved in the short course of the first 15 years of the 21st century.” "
Former BP geologist: peak oil is here and it will 'break economies' (in The Guardian 23.12.2013 by Nafeez Ahmed)
[1] We have at least reached Peak Diesel, according to Alice Friedemann, which is what really counts.
