Figure 2: World petroleum consumption from 1960 and projected to 2025
Source: Robert L. Hirsch, SAIC, Roger Bezdek, MISI, Robert Wendling, MISI (2005) Peaking of world oil production: impacts, mitigation, & risk management, US Department of Energy, National Energy Technology Laboratory
Viable mitigation options exist on both the supply and demand sides, but to have substantial impact, they must be initiated more than a decade in advance of peaking.” A range of estimates puts it between 2003 and 2020. Colin Campbell, one of the most experienced oil industry analysts, a former vice-president of Fina and chief geologist of Amoco, puts the point in 2006 but adds that, “The real issue is not the actual date of peak production but what happens during the decline of production. I think we are in for an extended period of restricted economic activity. I do not think that we will adjust very smoothly.”31 In a 2004 report, Strategic Significance of America’s Oil Shale Resource, the otherwise obscure Office of Naval Petroleum and Oil Shale Reserves connected to the US Department of Energy put some startling facts on record for the government of the world’s largest energy user. It points out that no major new oil field discoveries have been made in decades and that, “World oil reserves are being depleted three times as fast as they are being discovered.” As existing fields are used up, reserves are not being replaced. The oil company Shell’s embarrassment over exaggerating its oil reserves merely underlined the fact that, in light of this trend, “Oil reserves of individual oil companies must therefore continue to shrink.” The report also points out that, “The world may be facing shortfalls much sooner than expected”, as none of the predictions of oil peak are beyond 2020. The fact that “a practical supply limit will be reached and future supply to meet conventional oil demand will not be available” is set to hasten the onset of inevitable competition among consumers (and nations) for ever-scarcer oil resources.32 The method of predicting oil peak was devised in the 1950s by M King Hubbert, a Shell geologist, who correctly predicted that the point of peak US domestic oil production would be about 40 years after discoveries peaked around 1930. In Britain, North Sea oil discoveries peaked in 1973 and production peaked in 1999. According to Chris Skrebowski, editor of Petroleum Review, “Governments are always excessively optimistic. The problem is that the peak, which I think is 2008, is tomorrow in planning terms.”33
Mirage and oasis
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