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ABSTRACTS
2nd International Workshop on Oil Depletion
Paris, France, May 26-27 2003
Organised by the Association for the Study of Peak Oil
and Gas
The workshop was held at the
Institut Francais du Pétrole
, Rueil Malmaison, Paris.
If information and other material from
this proceeding is used the following reference shoul be given:
Proceedings of the 2nd International Workshop on Oil Depletion, Paris,
France, May 26-27 2003,
Edited by K. Aleklett, C. Campbell and J. Meyer, www.peakoil.net/iwood2003
.
The U. S. Reaction to World Oil and
Gas Depletion
Matthew Simmons
The reason the topic of Depletion is so controversial and so misunderstood
is that too many skeptics think depletion (or the phenomenon that oil and
gas production from any field, or any basin, ultimately peaks and after some
time staying flat, then begins to decline) is wrong is that most assume depletion
means "oil has run dry."
The reality of the topic is that depletion (i.e. "when daily production
of energy flattens and begins to decline) is a topic wrapped in secrets.
No oil or gas company ever published a table or chart showing how much their
production base at the start of any period ended up declining, had no new
production come on stream.
Oilfield technology then compounded naïve skeptics to the thesis that
oil and gas were non-renewable energy sources. For a decade, myths like
"we have eliminated the dry hole," or "oil and gas prices are now following
Moore's Law and will steadily fall,” became conventional wisdom but like always,
conventional wisdom was wrong.
"Peaking” of any oil or gas basin, so far, has been an event that only gets
acknowledged about a decade after the fact. All serious basin-wide declines
have always caught the principals of the same basins by the most surprise.
Do we even have the right terminology to frame this critical issue?
If the world is close to peaking in oil supply, could the same event also
be happening to Natural Gas? If Natural Gas ever became supply constrained,
would that end any vision for hydrogen?
What is the role of energy price in this complex arena? If oil prices
were extremely high, would this suddenly bring on many new supplies?
Or has price now become a literal "one-way street" where high prices seem
to have little impact on extra drilling or surge of new supply, while low
prices quickly bring any drilling to a halt?
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