Tough to pump more oil, even at $100 - Reuters

Source: Reuters

Tough to pump more oil, even at $100
Wed Jan 9, 2008 5:20am EST

By Peg Mackey and Alex Lawler - Analysis

LONDON (Reuters) - Oil at $100 a barrel should give
exporters every incentive to pump more, but their
difficulty in doing so shows the world is struggling
to sustain production.

A growing number of leading industry figures -- the
CEOs of Total (TOTF.PA: Quote, Profile, Research)
and ConocoPhillips (COP.N: Quote, Profile, Research)
among them -- now question mainstream forecasts
for supply, suggesting the era of "plateau oil" is
nearer than many in the business have admitted.

While global oil demand is projected to grow to more
than 100 million barrels per day later this century,
some argue it may not be possible to boost flows
beyond the current rate of some 86 million bpd.

Supply still falls short even after so-called
unconventional oils extracted from tar sands and
converted from natural gas are taken into account,
said Sadad al-Husseini, a former top official at
state oil giant Saudi Aramco.

-snip-

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/ousiv/idUSL0725705620080109

Peak Oil is breaking through into the MSM! This article even sounds skeptical about the placating utterances of people like Hayward (BP CEO). They'd better be careful - the sheeple could wake up and start wondering who the hell has been spinning them dream-time fairy tales about oil, and why.

This is bad. 100 dollar ought to be dropping to the 80s or even 70s after OPEC and every nation that wants some fun money dumps their product on the market.

Congrats everyone. We have passed the point of no return on this.

Bush needs to open the reserves and keep them open until the wells run dry. This thought of a "reserve" saving the day is only keeping people from supporting alternative sources.

EMC2 Fusion
Focus Fusion
Hell even ITER

We need to start getting into the fusion mindset now while we are not in an energy depression.

Full paragraph:
"Today's oil prices are high because there are limited new supplies," Husseini, who ran exploration and production at the Saudi state oil company from 1986-2002, told Reuters. "There's a history now. We're several years into level production."

And there was a story in The Guardian yesterday, where some were saying it could be as high as $200 by the end of this year. Barclays Capital predicts an average oil price of $87.40 for 2008.

Edit to add:
Whoever proves right, Husseini says there's no need for panic -- oil's decline will spur conservation and alternative fuels.

"In the long term, this crisis is probably the only way to get to a sustainable global economy," he said.

Does ANYONE believe this? If there was a shred of truth to it, wouldn't we be doing something NOW?

I spent some time thinking about this. One point of view I took was that of a major oil producing nation. If I were aware of this growing phenomena, how might I handle it?

Sure I can make a lot of money as the price climbs. But as the other nations get desperate, the odds of them attacking me to take the last of the oil grows. I risk getting destroyed.

My maximized option seemed to be to hide my declining reserves, do everything possible to keep my production up until the very last moment, when my wells run dry of useful oil and there's nothing left to fight over. The key was to keep my reserves secret, so no one would know how close the end really was.

I wonder if any oil producing nations are playing that game?

They likely are keeping the pumps on full power to help keep the US and other nations out of energy depression.

No it is not out of kindness. It is the realization that once we hit depression the oil price will drop rapidly due to the millions of people no longer able to afford their cars and SUVs.

They need to get rid of their reserve oil and build their dollar reserve to help outlast.

And I think Bush needs to do the same thing!

He needs to open the reserve fully so that there is no more thinking by Americans that we can "wait for this to pass" as I heard somebody stupidly say today.

Every bit of oil needs to be sucked up and used now so that we do not go into Energy depression. The time we get from such an effort needs to be spent on getting fusion and other alternative sources online NOW.

The Saudi Peak - a Hypothesis about the Iraq War

There's lots of supporting research and documentation in the article, but the core scenario is as follows: