UK

There is a huge discrepancy between the "political" values of the reserves by country as reported by the Oil and Gas Journal, World Oil, BP Statistical Review, OPEC, etc. and the "technical" values which are confidential to most countries. Yet, most production forecasts by official agencies are based on the political data. Some countries report minimum values (e.g. the USA with Proved values), others report maximum values (e.g. the FSU), and most countries report likely or median (called Proven + Probable) values which are generally close to, yet lower than, "mean", e.g. "expected", values. When technical data are used to calculate the "mean" values of field reserves, a good fit is found between annual (and cumulative) discoveries and annual (and cumulative) production, the former being close to the latter with a time translation of a certain number of years. This procedure makes it possible to forecast future production from the corresponding past discovery trend. Examples shown for conventional oil are the US Lower 48, FSU, France, UK, Middle East, deepwater and the world outside "Middle East and deepwater", and for conventional gas, North America. A long-term forecast for world production of all hydrocarbons, based on these methods, is far below all the scenarios developed for the 2000 Third Assessment report of the IPCC.

Published in: International Journal of Global Energy Issues, Volume 18, Issue 2-4, Pages 218-238
Available from: Inderscience

The oil reserves of the UK may be regarded as an asset whose rate of return will depend on future oil price movements and cost developments. The profits on depleted oil may be invested in assets above the ground. An optimal depletion policy is one which maximizes the rate of return on oil both as an asset below the ground and as an asset above the ground. On the assumptions made, it is shown that such a policy implies a rapid depletion profile.

Published in: Energy, Volume 2, Issue 3, September 1977, Pages 249-256
Available from: ScienceDirect

The UK faces long term challenges to the reliability of its energy supplies, arising from a
combination of domestic resource depletion, subsequent dependence on eroding global raw
fuel reserves, poor infrastructure investment and worsening weather. This study evaluates the
readiness of UK companies for such disruption.

The literature suggests that the approach to business continuity planning is not taking
account of these emergent risks and thus companies are unprepared. Selected UK businesses
were asked for their views on business continuity planning. This information gathering
comprised both qualitative and quantitative information obtained through questionnaire and
interviews.

It was found that whilst most companies in the study had measures in place that would provide a degree of protection, there were shortfalls in their approach to risk assessment
which meant emergent risks were not captured or mitigated against. To alleviate these vulnerabilities, it is recommended that the UK government become more proactive in communicating emergent risks and that companies review their risk assessment approach and take appropriate action to ensure that protective measures are implemented and risks are regularly reviewed.

Published in: Liverpool University, master of business administration thesis
Available from: See attachment below