Fifty years ago today, Shell petroleum geologist M. King Hubbert gave a speech in which he predicted that oil production for both Texas and the United States would peak between 1966 and 1971. He was correct: in 1971, the United States produced more oil than it ever had or ever will again.
In the decade following the U.S. peak, control of the world's oil markets shifted definitively from the west to OPEC, with highly disruptive economic and geopolitical results, even as oil prices, in real dollars, soared to nearly 20 times what they had been by the end of the decade. But the world still had abundant oil. By the early 1980s, the U.K. and Norway had begun to produce oil from the North Sea, several nuclear power plants came on line, and the U.S. and other countries began shifting to natural gas for home heating and electrical generation. Oil prices fell, and the problem was forgotten.
Hubbert linearization now predicts a peak in world oil production in this decade. By definition, a peak in world production means that there are no more producers of last resort, a conclusion borne out by the fact that no new Saudi Arabias or North Seas have been discovered in decades. In the west, few nuclear plants have been built in 20 years, and natural gas is in serious decline. Not counting hydroelectric power (which cannot be substantially expanded), all renewable energy sources together today count for less than five percent of world energy production. Biofuels may or may not even be energy positive when fossil fuel inputs are considered (natural gas fertilizers, diesel-powered farming equipment) and are not, strictly speaking, renewable as long as any artificial fertilizers are required to grow the feedstock crops. Solar and wind power produce electricity, not liquid fuel. When world oil supplies begin to decline, there will be no easy substations.
At the risk of repetition, this is what peak oil means: after world oil production peaks, there will, each year, be less and less oil produced—perhaps 2 percent a year, but possibly 8 to 10 percent. Oil is the backbone of advanced industrial societies—the key element that holds the structure together. An increasing number of highly credible experts (petroleum engineers, energy investment bankers, noted physicists) believe that the peak is now, or will come within the next 2 to 5 years. Barring a sudden, massive societal shift to alternative energy or a different lifestyle, the world is about to experience an economic and social catastrophe unlike any other in history, followed by a reversion to some kind of pre-industrial life. Given the amount of energy used to simply produce and transport food, a depression of this scale implies mass hunger and starvation.
Peak oil theorists are today dismissed for being too pessimistic, or of failing to understand the power of free markets. But given the prior accuracy of Hubbert’s predictions and the terrible costs of miscalculation, isn’t a little alarmism worth the risk?
Once again, you have written a sharp and insightful post. Nonetheless, at the risk of sounding repetitive myself, I must point out that the changes that will be made necessary by peak oil, even dramatic and traumatic changes, do not inherintly mean a return to a "pre-industrial" state. We will be shocked by the need to compensate for a loss of liquid fuel, but I don't believe we will "revert" to an earlier life or lifestyle. I think we will move on to something new, and whether that is positive or negative depends heavily on our ability to embrace reality now and prepare agressively for the future.
Further, what exactly do you mean by "a reversion to some kind of pre-industrial life?" What are you picturing? Without specifics, there is a temptation to assume you refer to some version of the middle ages. I can't imagine this is so.
Anyway, good post. And thanks for the opportunity to state my case!
Renee
Posted by: Renee Kashuba | March 13, 2006 at 09:35 AM
It is true that the term “pre-industrial” is problematic in that it takes our common historical understanding of the Industrial Revolution for granted (understanding that may be traced to 18th century thinkers like Hegel, Marx and others). I believe that one of the keys to minimizing catastrophe in the future is to carefully re-examine these ideological presuppositions, because ideology drives decision making and attitudes.
However, one of the problems in explaining peak oil is that many people don’t seem to grasp the immensity and immediacy of our crisis. “Pre-industrial” is shorthand to try to illustrate the severity of our situation.
So, to be clearer: Wikipedia defines “Industrialization” as, in part, the technological transformation associated with large scale energy production. Modern industry is not possible without abundant energy. In recent decades that production has encompassed not only consumer goods, but food production as well. Without our current energy, farming and the creation of consumer goods will necessarily become much more labor-intensive. It will be much harder to maintain infrastructure—the highway system, the electric grid, water supplies, etc. In fact, it would not take a very great energy shortfall for all of those complex systems to fail.
One of the problems with assuming energy alternatives will be available is that all current alternatives are all to some extent dependent on fossil-fuel based industry—to mine, create and ship the materials needed to build wind generators, solar cells and nuclear power plants. True, if we rapidly ramped up production of those alternatives, they might be able to provide enough energy to become self-supporting.
But what if we fail to do that? What will we be left with, if, in 30 years, oil production is a tenth of what it is now and natural gas is unavailable? Imagine homes with no heat, no electricity, and no mass-produced consumer goods; families with no cars or other means of rapid transit and no jobs; and a large proportion of the population forced to return to labor-intensive farming. Sure, some industry might continue, but for a very large number of people, life would feel pretty “pre-industrial”.
Posted by: Lakis | March 13, 2006 at 12:21 PM