What is Peak oil?
"The term Peak Oil refers to the maximum rate of the production of oil in any area under consideration, recognising that it is a finite natural resource, subject to depletion."
--Colin Campbell
Global oil production: forecasts and methodologies
Publication date:
2007-10-29
First published in:
Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design
Abstract:
A range of forecasts of global oil production made between 1956 and the present day are listed. For the majority of these the methodology used to generate the forecast is described. The paper distinguishes between three types of forecast:
- group 1—quantitative analyses which predict that global oil production will reach a resource-limited peak in the near term, and certainly before the year 2020;
- group 2—forecasts that use quantitative methods, but which see no production peak within the forecast’s time horizon (typically 2020 or 2030);
- group 3—nonquantitative analyses that rule out a resource-limited oil peak within the foreseeable future.
The paper analyses these forecast types and suggests that group 1 forecasts are the most realistic.
Published in:
Available from: Environment and Planning
