Tuesday, April 06, 2010

Campbell Revises Peak Oil Price

From Jenna Orkin

Energy
The price of peak oil
Colin Campbell revises thinking on peak price: $100.
China Oil Buys from Saudi, Iran, Drop; Libya, Angola, Up
Peak Asphalt - Rice Farmer

Economy/US
Welcome to the false recovery
How to manufacture a recovery
Recovery may lose steam
Fed says "extended period" may last a long time
Actually, The Unemployment Ratio Is 41%
More Than 200,000 Lost Out On Job Benefits While Congress in Recess
52-week highs rolling over: Volatility ahead?
Housing Predictor Poll Shows Mortgage Rescue Plan to Fail
Empty office buildings make for suite deals
L.A. Controller Says City Could Run Out of Cash by May 5
FCC loses key ruling on Internet `neutrality'
Americans say time is right to buy home
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word...
"The Right Way to Mend Immigration"
Chuck Schumer and Lindsay Graham: Biometric IDs
Jane Harman: My Record Isn't Anti-Immigration

World
Greece Is Not Under Control
Tanker Rates Seen Sinking 35% as Refinery Closures Leave Surplus of Ships

Terror/Intelligence
Leaked U.S. video shows deaths of Reuters' Iraqi staffers
Dutch marines storm cargo ship seized by pirates
Discontent Grows over Moscow's Impotency [sic] in Dealing with Terror
U.S. government is stepping up recruitment of engineers who can help wage cyberwar - from Rice Farmer
Protesters seize local government HQ in Kyrgyzstan
Karzai Threatens to Join Taliban
Poppy Problems for Kandahar Offensive
The marines stationed there aren't allowed to interfere with poppy cultivation as doing so would "turn the villagers against them."
German Jihad Colonies Sprout Up in Waziristan
The Russian-language internet is increasingly subject to control by the Russian government and its allies in the private sector, according to a new report (pdf) from the DNI Open Source Center (OSC).
China cyber-spies target India, Dalai Lama

Environment/Health
Arctic Thaw Frees Overlooked Greenhouse Gasses - from Elizabeth Miller
Annie Leonard STORY OF BOTTLED WATER
Government cuts H1N1 vaccine order by two-thirds
Unused swine flu jabs cost taxpayers £150m

And...
April Fool's Article Documents Arrival of 10-Foot-Tall Aliens; Duped Mayor Dispatches Security Forces
Man Arrested at Large Hadron Collider Claims He's From the Future

11 comments:

Unknown said...

Gas pipeline in Baltic Sea Begun

The Russian gas giant Gazprom has begun to build the long gas pipeline to link Russia and Europe.

The 1220 km long connection, called Nord Stream, connecting Russia and Germany under the Baltic Sea and will go through Russian, Finnish, Swedish, Danish and German waters.

The gas flows in 2011
The official ceremony for the start of construction will be held Friday, where Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, among other things expected to attend.

About a quarter of gas consumption in Europe comes from Russia. The first gas is expected to surface in late 2011

(Link in Danish)

gamedog said...

Apparently the UK is to elect a new government soon, most of the population however missed the real government election 2 months ago, because no one thought to allow us to vote in it.

http://www.euractiv.com/en/future-eu/european-parliament-gives-green-light-barroso-ii

The UK "election" is in fact only a by-election among the 27 non-exec directors.

Still, it was nice to hear Brown's Freudian slip during his election launch...

(Verbatim) "We will renew the contract between the people and those that they are sworn to serve"
================================
Campbell thinks we're "sort of at peak demand now" But he does not think reduced demand is enough to offset the gravity of peaking supply.

I'm not really happy with this "peak demand" stuff, I've heard it mentioned a few times now in MSM, and it irks me every time I hear it.

It's like saying poverty stricken, starving, people have reached peak demand for food - utter nonsense!

toner deeski said...

My property tax bill was cut in half a year ago. I assumed that was because Pulte homes and the banks that own all the property around had cut a deal with the county. Maybe, maybe not. Now this:
Another drop projected for Alameda County property tax base
Alameda County is serviced by BART. There are more BART stops here than in any other county. Alameda County has the busiest port on the West Coast. If property values are declining in Alameda County, then home values MUST be absolutely collapsing elsewhere.

Sebastian Ernst Ronin said...

Re "We have no alternative but to go green," Campbell said.

Did Campbell miss last year's blockbuster breakthrough of Net Peak Oil? If he did (which is doubtful) then he also misses the squeezed timeline. Maybe he just hasn't taken a look out his front door lately.

I would classify the German economy as being a leader in so-called going "green." Yet during fiscal 2009 it shrank 10 percent. It doesn't matter how many wind generators, etc. go up, the replacement energy cannot displace the volume of oil. Campbell knows this. Has he fully thought through his claim?

Putting out a signal of "going green" by one of the leading PO advocates is dangerous. It lulls people into a state of false security. I hate to say this, but it looks like Campbell may have slipped into the category of "cornucopian", a category that he himself chastized at one time.

Technological determinism is a devious ideology. It can bite the best of us.

"e Brutto" said...

Mr C Campbell he the man (watching back to back The Wire).
I have read his recent statement, it makes perfect sense and only really reflects the already established orthodoxy.
Do your research before bad mouthing an established expert.
A couple of points in support:
developing countries that pay less in wages / benefits can afford a higher price than the OECD.
The US economy can not support more than 5-6% GDP on oil, your economy has shrunk since the oil price collapsed - so the dollar price you can afford has also dropped.
We are in a vice between the cost of exploiting new resources and shrinking economies.
So read this piece below and show some respect for the man "Campbell"
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=9694&page=1

Sebastian Ernst Ronin said...

e Brutto, neither gamedog nor I attacked Campbell the individual nor the pioneering work that he has contributed. We question a stance of his; a position taken. It's a fair question and fair game. There are no pro bono cakewalks. Merit is good. The analysis should be a reasonably close reflection of the condition.

Going green on a mass scale, IMO, does not qualify. Going post-green at lifeboat scale does.

Tantive said...

Part 1 of 6
The Day the Dollar Falls


It's a dutch documentary from 2005 which layed out scenario's, should the dollar fall.

"e Brutto" said...

"Campbells" detractors.
It is all there for those that can read, bless.

Weaseldog said...

Campbell seems to be saying that we are going to be forced by circumstances to go green.

Not that it's a solution. It's simply all we'll have left when the lights start going out.

The paraphrasing at the top, changes the meaning. The way he phrased it, you can get two different meanings from his words.

That may be intentional...

gamedog said...

"e Brutto" J'accuse? I mean no disrespect to Campbell, and pretty much agree with you/your sited article.

I suspect Campbell was asked by the interviewer weather we had passed "peak demand", hence Campbells "sort of.." reply. I would put money on his reply going on to reflect the quote below from your sited article, but did not make the edit (for obvious reasons)

from your sited article "...who now declare that the developed world has passed “peak oil demand”. However, that is nothing but a delusion to disguise the fact that dwindling oil supplies have ended economic growth in the developed world for the foreseeable future.)"

Lardelli is obviously more eloquent in his language, I still say "peak demand" is Bollix, i.e. a delusion, for political convenience. I'd also go further than Lardelli's "foreseeable future" I'd have a period after ".. developed world" adding "for the foreseeable future" is unconscious denial IMO, as if there might be some solution in a future we can't see yet. Bollix!

Peak Demand = Peak Economic growth, period. It's all downhill from here, fast.

Call a spade a spade and people might wake up to it, call it a fabricated manual earth moving implement and people glaze over, which of course is the whole point is it not?

I also agree with Sebastian, though I might not go so far as to say Campbell has turned all cornucopian on us, I'd say he's either clutching at straws, or scared to say were imminently doomed. I'd much rather he called a spade a spade, even if that means appearing mega-doomer.

We know we're screwed, Campbell knows we're screwed, govs know we're screwed, they're just putting lipstick on a pig with semantics. It's bollix, and it irks me no end.

Unknown said...

Dr. Colin Campbell is not, I should think, afraid that we’re doomed, in some absolute sense. He is one of the most important elements behind the
Kinsale
Energy Descent Action Plan, which last year won an award from Feasta, an Irish group founded in 1998 to promote sustainable human living on the far side of peak oil. I think Dr. Campbell has been involved with Feasta, too. Anyway, although he is old, and cannot expect to suffer much in the mid-21st century, I don’t believe he is expecting to leave behind a totally dysfunctional human race.

Nor am I.