What Would Happen If the World Ran Out of Crude Oil?

[specinho + 440]

On 4/9/2019 at 2:50 AM, Abe Gold said:

I think that's what Russia is waiting for, severe oil shortages. With the huge expanse of land that is Russia there has to be lots more oil they haven't pumped or found. A road to $ trillions is simply patience. Minerals as well.

But if we run out the electric car gets more popular, sooner. And oil from algae gets more cost effective.

Regarding oil from algae......... pardon me......... not sure if this info is true but.........

If we have captured the key points correctly .....

1. it's microalgae that is being tested...... by "micro" we generally mean very small don't we? Hence.......... to extract 1 ml of algae oil we might need 1000 liters of algae culture or more no?

2. On a long cycle.......... we decided to let them sink and burried deep under so that they can form fossil fuel over millions of years later......... uuhhh.......... dear commies........... this algae oil................ uuhhh...........

 

22 hours ago, Bobby P said:

Journalists in general are not very smart, they never studied science or engineering. So, they have no technical knowledge. They are only good at spreading fake news. 

reminds me of some "latest research" published saying 10 samples were being used; one proven to be slightly responsive. Hence the result is statistically significant with p > 0.001 etc.

 

 

Edited April 10, 2019 by specinho

[D Coyne + 305]

19 hours ago, ceo_energemsier said:

The extractions and recovery costs and prior to that the costs of exploration and discovery will also lower on a larger scale as well............. technology is not static........ everyday new technologies are under R&D and using existing, new and emerging technologies and applying them to all aspects of the hydrocarbons finding and production cycle will lower the costs. Some years ago, no one would have thought of

recovering and producing oil and gas from a very thin payzone 15-10ft or narrower, now it is happening, same thing with the tight oil and gas,  each cycle there is an improvement and cost reduction. It takes time, but the technologies are in the pipeline and the application of existing technologies from other branches also help create a suite of technologies that help.

 

Ah the magic of technology.  Some believe this is limitless, but there are those pesky laws of physics.

Many of the technical miracles in tight oil and shale gas are simply the result of very high oil and natural gas prices allowing these methods to become widespread.  In the Permian basin the average well completed in 2017 has a breakeven oil price of about $60/bo at the wellhead.  Such a well barely pays for itself over its productive life if a 10% annual discount rate is assumed in a discounted cash flow analysis.

The oil industry is quite old and technological breakthroughs in this industry are likely to be very limited.  Most of the cheap oil has been found and a high percentage of that cheap oi has been produced.   The oil that is left will be more costly to produce and substitutes will likely be found.  The same principles apply to natural gas and coal, all fossil fuels will peak in output and then decline. Oil 2025, coal 2030, natural gas 2035 will roughly be the peaks in output for the main fossil fuel energy resources.

Next step prices rise and demand falls while people move to substitutes, such as rail, light rail, EVs, hybrids for oil substitutes, and wind, solar, hydro, geothermal, and nuclear to replace coal and natural gas.  Clearly these are guesses, but basically at some point fossil fuel use will peak and then decline, peak roughly 2030+/-5, rate of decline in output about 2 to 4% per year (in units of energy such as BTU or Joules).

[ceo_energemsier + 1,818]

48 minutes ago, D Coyne said:

Ah the magic of technology.  Some believe this is limitless, but there are those pesky laws of physics.

Many of the technical miracles in tight oil and shale gas are simply the result of very high oil and natural gas prices allowing these methods to become widespread.  In the Permian basin the average well completed in 2017 has a breakeven oil price of about $60/bo at the wellhead.  Such a well barely pays for itself over its productive life if a 10% annual discount rate is assumed in a discounted cash flow analysis.

The oil industry is quite old and technological breakthroughs in this industry are likely to be very limited.  Most of the cheap oil has been found and a high percentage of that cheap oi has been produced.   The oil that is left will be more costly to produce and substitutes will likely be found.  The same principles apply to natural gas and coal, all fossil fuels will peak in output and then decline. Oil 2025, coal 2030, natural gas 2035 will roughly be the peaks in output for the main fossil fuel energy resources.

Next step prices rise and demand falls while people move to substitutes, such as rail, light rail, EVs, hybrids for oil substitutes, and wind, solar, hydro, geothermal, and nuclear to replace coal and natural gas.  Clearly these are guesses, but basically at some point fossil fuel use will peak and then decline, peak roughly 2030+/-5, rate of decline in output about 2 to 4% per year (in units of energy such as BTU or Joules).

Ah, technology!!!! you seem to favor and believe in technology for everything but oil...... EVs, hybrids for oil subs, wind , solar, geo etc, but dont think the technology for exploration and production of oil and gas will have breakthroughs?

I am an equity investor in natural resources (oil, gas, metals , minerals, non food crop based biofuels etc), health, medical and biomedical tech, pharma and tech as well as a direct investor i oil gas operations , companies , WI , royalties and ovverides etc. We have been producing in the Eagle Ford since 2005 and are still growing and producing more oil and gas, NGLs, condensate with very low decline rates. Each well drill and complete stands to the test of time in terms of its longevity, productivity and sustainability.

FYI, breakeven prices have scaled down from the 60s down into the 40s for for many shale operations. What some people keep on parroting about 60s and 50's was true a few years ago, today it is not. Example , the breakevens in the Eagle Ford are down into the 30s and 40s.

It is also the same case in the Permian in many locations.

Yes everything in the oil and gas industry is based on technology and there is no limit on it as there is also no limit in technology for other industrial sectors as well.  There are many factors involved in making an oil and gas prospect profitable and sustainable and technologies whether existing, evolving, emerging or combination of all those and existing techs and coupling techs from various other sectors are all beneficial and result in success. We are not walking around marking drill sites dowsing with a stick.

[GOD + 1]

You will find people living a healthier life...riding bicycles.

[Jan van Eck + 7,558]

20 hours ago, ceo_energemsier said:

......................... majority of the population doesnt even have clean , safe drinking water, not enough nutrition, no proper safe sanitation ....

It is far worse than that. The majority of the population of India does not even have an outhouse to poop in.  Indeed, the majority do not even have an open pit, never mind the outhouse enclosure.  That's right: 500 million Indians, pooping on the ground outdoors, out by the railroad tracks. Welcome to modern India, a land swamped in poop. 

Edited April 11, 2019 by Jan van Eck
inserted word "pit"

[Elon Musk + 15]

On 4/8/2019 at 11:32 AM, Tom Kirkman said:

Don't mind me, I'm just gently poking the "Keep Oil & Gas In The Ground" hater crowd for some amusement this morning.

AOC and ilk please do feel free to over-react in a Chicken Little apocalypic frenzy of hyperbolic panic, I could use the laugh.

Global Oil & Gas is simply not going away any time soon, regardless of what the Mainstream Media and the Oil & Gas hater mob screechingly insist to the contrary.

e.g. ZOMG WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE! 
HYDROCARBONS WILL KILL THE PLANET IN 12 YEARS! !  
ELEVENTY ! ! ! !

Anyway, back to reality, the global demand trend for Oil & Gas continues to steadily grow year after year after year.

Decades from now, Oil & Gas are very likely to remain a primary source of global energy and global raw materials for chemicals.

Jump up and down and yell and froth at the mouth if you feel so inclined (I tend to find it amusing) but that over-reaction simply does not change the fact that the world - for the forseeable future - primarily runs on HYDROCARBONS. 

Just my opinion; as always, you are free to disagree.

 

What Would Happen If the World Ran Out of Crude Oil?

Crude oil is the lifeblood of modern economies and nations, but what would happen if this vital fuel source were to ever be exhausted?

Needless to say, it would be a pretty serious event. But is it a realistic scenario for the future? 

Let's find out.  ...

AOC takes Uber’s instead of the subway (even when literally a few minutes walk from subway stations) and takes planes instead of trains. The left are true hypocrites. Open borders until someone’s asks them to take an immigrant into their houses. Here’s a clip in Canada showing their hypocrisy: https://youtu.be/Py1NZT5_NlA

[Bobby P + 88]

1 hour ago, Jan van Eck said:

It is far worse than that. The majority of the population of India does not even have an outhouse to poop in.  Indeed, the majority do not even have an open, never mind the outhouse enclosure.  That's right: 500 million Indians, pooping on the ground outdoors, out by the railroad tracks. Welcome to modern India, a land swamped in poop. 

Agreed, I know first hand. India in not even close to adopting the EV vehicles, they don't even have stable electricity. Where "power cuts" are considered normal for up to 2-4 hours a day. And yes they have very poor sanitation facilities with people taking a dump on the streets, it's not even people. I see animals such as cows, buffalo, goats, pigs, etc. running around on the roads and taking a dump. I would love to see these animals take a dump on a Tesla in India (if there is one). 

[Bill Simpson + 7]

We don't need to run out, for big problems to occur. Soon after the supply can no longer meet the demand, at a cost we can afford, the economy will be forced to shrink because it takes energy to move goods and people to their jobs. It takes oil to grow most food too, but play like that doesn't even matter.

A shrinking economy is called a recession. If less and less oil is on the market, that shrinking will continue because less & less transport services will be available, unless you plan to carry everything on your back. With global debt now at about $245 TRILLION, it won't take that many bankruptcies to wipe out the entire banking system. If you doubt it, reflect on the 2008 subprime housing loan crisis. A shrinking economy from fuel in short supply everywhere will make a few million defaulted housing loans seem trivial in comparison. 

A banking meltdown will take all economic activity with it because not much happens without payments being made through banks. Even the electric grid might go down. That would starve 80% of the population within 2 months. As would no fuel from the refineries shutting down. Remember the schools closing from Hurricane Katrina shutting a few Gulf Coast refineries?

So no, you don't have to run out of oil to starve. You only need a global decline in total oil production to get the ball rolling. So you don't have as long as you think before a catastrophe hits. Maybe only 15 years.

[Jan van Eck + 7,558]

2 minutes ago, Bill Simpson said:

We don't need to run out, for big problems to occur. Soon after the supply can no longer meet the demand, at a cost we can afford, the economy will be forced to shrink because it takes energy to move goods and people to their jobs. It takes oil to grow most food too, but play like that doesn't even matter.

A shrinking economy is called a recession. If less and less oil is on the market, that shrinking will continue because less & less transport services will be available, unless you plan to carry everything on your back.

Not quite, Bill. Remember that liquid fuels (diesel, kero, gasoline) can be made from coal.  That is an old technology.  Recall that the German Wehrmacht attempted a Blitzkrieg across the Ukraine in order to seize the oilfields of the Caucasus.  That failed.  Nonetheless, the entire German war machine was fuelled by synthetic gasoline from coal, and Germany (and conquered areas) has limitless coal.  So if pumped oil gets scarce, then coal it will be.  You can also make gasoline out of garbage, and industrial waste, and household trash including plastic grocery bags, lots of options there once you go to catalytic reactions inside cooking vats. 

 

8 minutes ago, Bill Simpson said:

Even the electric grid might go down. That would starve 80% of the population within 2 months.

Meanwhile, you can expect that new nuke generators will be on-line, providing for a nuke power experience.  I see that as inevitable, and coming fast.  Stick around and watch how the Iranians will do it.  they will be front-runners.  Cheers. 

[ceo_energemsier + 1,818]

16 minutes ago, Jan van Eck said:

Not quite, Bill. Remember that liquid fuels (diesel, kero, gasoline) can be made from coal.  That is an old technology.  Recall that the German Wehrmacht attempted a Blitzkrieg across the Ukraine in order to seize the oilfields of the Caucasus.  That failed.  Nonetheless, the entire German war machine was fuelled by synthetic gasoline from coal, and Germany (and conquered areas) has limitless coal.  So if pumped oil gets scarce, then coal it will be.  You can also make gasoline out of garbage, and industrial waste, and household trash including plastic grocery bags, lots of options there once you go to catalytic reactions inside cooking vats. 

 

Meanwhile, you can expect that new nuke generators will be on-line, providing for a nuke power experience.  I see that as inevitable, and coming fast.  Stick around and watch how the Iranians will do it.  they will be front-runners.  Cheers. 

The US and the world have a lot of coal resources ( various grades of coal) and yes the old tech and new tech can definitely be used to convert coal to liquids fuel, which will not only be cleaner but more efficient.

However, certain groups of people rather have the coal remain buried in the ground and just spew methane into the atmosphere unchecked , yet they want cows to stop passing gas!!!

Maybe the can develop the technology to capture the methane emitted from the horses mouth errrm rather the cows asses LOL

I have worked on and invested in technologies that can upgrade coal from  a lump of coal into a much cleaner , leaner and energy packed product which has all the heavy metals removed and recovered for other industrial uses, majority of the moisture is recovered as is the sulphur and other undesirable components. We had had over 100 , 100 m/t per day pilot plants operated and successfully tested. We are in the process now to move to 10,000 M/T per day processing, upgrading production plants having successfully tested several 1,000 M/T per day pilot plants. The entire plant is on a closed circuit loop capturing recovering and reusing as much of the energy, heat and water etc used at the beginning with no air emissions. Working very closely with several struggling coal companies and power plants to see how we can form meaningful and sustainable joint ventures.

Coal to liquids (CTL) is another aspect where using the right combination of technologies and process/chemical engineering the liquid fuels that are the end product are extremely clean in terms of emissions. CTL is also a great platform for obtaining petrochem feedstocks.

I think it is an Austrian or  German Oil company that is recycling plastic and successfully reclaiming crude oil.

 

 

[ceo_energemsier + 1,818]

4 hours ago, GOD said:

You will find people living a healthier life...riding bicycles.

People are living healthier lives just walking

But then it wreaks havoc on the joints etc over time and bicycles are made of metal and plastic, causing environmental degradation and forcing people into poverty while the rich CEO's reap all the profits and forcing climate change based mass migrations 😴 LOL

[ceo_energemsier + 1,818]

41 minutes ago, Bill Simpson said:

We don't need to run out, for big problems to occur. Soon after the supply can no longer meet the demand, at a cost we can afford, the economy will be forced to shrink because it takes energy to move goods and people to their jobs. It takes oil to grow most food too, but play like that doesn't even matter.

A shrinking economy is called a recession. If less and less oil is on the market, that shrinking will continue because less & less transport services will be available, unless you plan to carry everything on your back. With global debt now at about $245 TRILLION, it won't take that many bankruptcies to wipe out the entire banking system. If you doubt it, reflect on the 2008 subprime housing loan crisis. A shrinking economy from fuel in short supply everywhere will make a few million defaulted housing loans seem trivial in comparison. 

A banking meltdown will take all economic activity with it because not much happens without payments being made through banks. Even the electric grid might go down. That would starve 80% of the population within 2 months. As would no fuel from the refineries shutting down. Remember the schools closing from Hurricane Katrina shutting a few Gulf Coast refineries?

So no, you don't have to run out of oil to starve. You only need a global decline in total oil production to get the ball rolling. So you don't have as long as you think before a catastrophe hits. Maybe only 15 years.

We have seen this happen through the ages within recent history , each and everytime there is a catastrophic conflict  in oil producing regions , there is a shortfall in the supply followed by a downturn in the economies of the world. Imagine what it would do if the stable and required sustainable volume of oil supply is forcibly shut down or lowered by frothing @ the mouth politicians

[ceo_energemsier + 1,818]

5 hours ago, Jan van Eck said:

It is far worse than that. The majority of the population of India does not even have an outhouse to poop in.  Indeed, the majority do not even have an open pit, never mind the outhouse enclosure.  That's right: 500 million Indians, pooping on the ground outdoors, out by the railroad tracks. Welcome to modern India, a land swamped in poop. 

I was trying to refrain from being too descriptive and ruin the first time experience of new visitors to the land of aromas , that maybe on this forum and come across the post LOL

Every mile you drive through the country, city etc , you get a whiff of a different flavor!!! You literally see the schitt floating on the sides of the streets and yes people and animals urinate and defecate right on the streets. Yes dogs, cows, goats, sheep, water buffaloes, camels, oxen, elephants (wow what a load that is, imagine being in traffic and you hear this loud thump and you see there is a heap of steaming elephant processed meal on your hood) I have seen people literally relaxing on the side of the highway and relieving themselves. You will see groups of people one after the other lined up along the highway doing the same .

Food borne and water borne diseases are rampant. Air pollution is so bad that if you are outside for even an hour and you have a white shirt on its covered with soot and dust and dirt.

Edited April 11, 2019 by ceo_energemsier
correction

[buckskinner + 19]

Why do people want to use oil?  There has got to be a reason.  Oil must have some kind of use for there to be demand.  If nobody wanted oil, the supply would not be there.  Wouldn't be necessary. 

All ruled by supply and demand fueled by desire.  Would you rather work behind two draft horses all day long or be in an air-conditioned tractor to do your field work?  The choice is there.  What will happen is the demand for workhorses will be low, demand for farm tractors will grow. 

Supply and demand rules.    

If there were high demand for wagon wheels, there would be a supply of wagon wheels by the millions.  There is demand for automobiles, plenty of demand, means there is a supply of cars, a plethora of supply.

I saw a video of traffic on a roadway in Russia.  There was a horse-drawn car on the road.  The front end of the car had been chopped, no engine compartment, no fenders or front wheels, no steering wheel, there was the firewall and some hardware to hitch the horse to what was left of the car.  More than one way to get you there.

If the world uses, consumes, 100,000,000 barrels of oil each day, it means there is a lot of it and there is plenty of demand for all of it; until the day it is gone, that is how it is going to be.  One cold hard fact of the matter.  That one little spray of fuel derived from crude oil into a piston explodes with enough force to move tons of anything all over the world.  Jet fuel sipped by Rolls Royce jet engines can fly you thousands of miles with ease.  The jet flies by wire, the job is far easier that way.  If the jet fuel is not there, you won't be taking off.  Good old aviation jet fuel is what you will need.

You can order a large internal combustion engine from Fairbanks Morse.  They know how to build an engine.

https://www.fairbanksmorse.com/diesel-products

Plenty of people have figured out what to do to solve problems and make it just a better world.  A waterwheel can provide the drive you want to get stuff done.  Ropes, pulleys, cables, mechanical conversion to power a drive can be derived from water or coal.  Humans do work at solving problems.  Internal combustion works and oil is the key to the combustion part.

You want a rocket?  No problem.  Rocket science, the knowledge, can make a rocket work, when blastoff goes as planned, the rocket gets you there fast. 

Tell me crude oil is bad for you, go ahead.  I won't mind.  

There are probably 200 billion tons of coal within 200 miles all around me, so I have no worries if I can find a source of heat, fuel for the fire.

Coal right on top of the ground, coal seams that are exposed from erosion, tons of it, walk over to it and collect it.  Take it home and have enough to heat your house all winter.  There is coal until the cows come home, tons of it, millions of tons of it.  It is not a problem to find coal and mine for it, you just have to do it.  With coal, all you will have to have is a furnace or a boiler, don't even need electricity.  You'll need a chimney, though.

Better to have a power plant that generates electricity, you can use electricity to heat your home, far more convenient.

How much oil was consumed 200 years ago?  Not much.  Coal and water provided the energy.  Industrialization takes place with fossil fuels making it all possible.  An outhouse with twelve stalls situated behind an apartment building is not what you desire for a bathroom.  Running water and sanitary conditions are preferable.

There is just too much knowhow in existence for it all to go to hell in a handbasket in a hurry.  The infrastructure won't allow it.

Computations abound in this world, continuous motion robot oil rigs drill for oil these days.  You'll need a powerful computer, you'll want a powerful computer.

You'll need five acres of good green grass to feed a workhorse, then the tack, then you'll need equipment, implements, ground to plant, seed, a garden, chickens, goats, pigs, ducks, by the time it is all over, you'll be dead tired and you'll have to do it all over again the next day. 

Then the hay season rolls around, then the harvest, then the winter sets in, by the time it is all over again, it is time to do it all over again. 

You'll be living a life of quiet desperation.

The solution: Go buy a tractor and a combine, a line of implements and haul your grain to the grain house, they'll ship it for you.  Might as well use crude oil in place of horses.  Propane can work, but won't provide the powerful punch diesel fuel offers.  A propane-fueled tractor will run 24 hours and run a pump all day long to drain land.  Don't need anybody there to monitor water being pumped to a drainage ditch, the tractor does it all with no supervision. 

Peanut oil will be a substitute for diesel fuel if the oil goes away, there are solutions to problems.  You'll be able to have your tractor and combine, it is just that nobody else will have any gas for their car.  You'll have to go electric with a power plant fueled by coal or nuclear or water.  In the final analysis, fossil fuels power civilization.  Civilization collapses if there is no oil.

A horse-powered civilization with horses will be a whole new world.  Just doesn't have to be that way anymore, too much knowledge is available, factories do exist and do manufacture machines that work more than a horse ever could.

Machines do the work to grow food.  You don't have to slave away to grow your eggplant, you can go to town, find a job, buy a house and a car.  All kinds of choices in this world.  Fossil fuels have made your life the Life of Riley.  It could be worse.

By the looks of it, oil will be available tomorrow too.

The Chinese were using natural gas in 2000 BCE.  Used bamboo to move it around, the Chinese haven't used all of the natural gas yet.  There were 300,000,000 Chinese living in China back then.

Mr. Peabody's WABAC machine is the best source out there.

Edited April 12, 2019 by buckskinner

[BenFranklin'sSpectacles + 762]

12 hours ago, Jan van Eck said:

Not quite, Bill. Remember that liquid fuels (diesel, kero, gasoline) can be made from coal.  That is an old technology.  Recall that the German Wehrmacht attempted a Blitzkrieg across the Ukraine in order to seize the oilfields of the Caucasus.  That failed.  Nonetheless, the entire German war machine was fuelled by synthetic gasoline from coal, and Germany (and conquered areas) has limitless coal.  So if pumped oil gets scarce, then coal it will be.  You can also make gasoline out of garbage, and industrial waste, and household trash including plastic grocery bags, lots of options there once you go to catalytic reactions inside cooking vats. 

 

Meanwhile, you can expect that new nuke generators will be on-line, providing for a nuke power experience.  I see that as inevitable, and coming fast.  Stick around and watch how the Iranians will do it.  they will be front-runners.  Cheers. 

I'm surprised no one mentioned this sooner: anything with carbon in it can be turned into synthetic gas which can be turned into any hydrocarbon one desires.  If we run out of liquid hydrocarbons, prices will rise until it's economical to manufacture liquid fuels from any source of carbon, electricity, and heat. 

Carbon is effectively unlimited due to conservation of mass.  It's not leaving the planet.  In the absolute worst case, we use plants or machines to extract CO2 from the environment. 

Energy is effectively unlimited.  If we somehow run out of nuclear fuel, we can always put solar farms in space.  That'll buy us some millions of years until the sun explodes.  By the time either of those events occur, state of the art technology will be unrecognizable to us, so there's no point projecting that far.  Thus, we should limit our analysis to the transition from liquid carbon fuels to non-liquid carbon fuels. 

Even limited to proven technology, we can manufacture enough liquid fuel.  The question is, "At what price?"  I'd guess the upper bound is $100/bbl given that legacy coal-to-oil plants produced at that price.  The new, scaled-down plants are promising $50/bbl, but that's unproven.  A more interesting question might be, "If <carbon feedstock>-to-oil scaled up to meet world demand, what would it cost?"  I suspect we'd find significant savings.  E.g.:
1)  Running a fleet of chemical plants would require an incredible quantity of 24/7 heat & electricity - the perfect case for coal & nuclear power plants.  Could a surge in base load electricity demand shift us back to the cheaper coal & nuclear, thus reducing the wholesale price of electricity? 
2)  Instead of South Africa building one-offs to scrape by, we'd see the world scrambling to optimize chemical processes, serialize plant design, and streamline construction.  How far down does that learning curve go? 
3)  How much would these facilities cost if we amortized R&D across 1000 of them instead of across 2? 
4)  How much would we save on transportation if we produced oil near demand instead of shipping it across the world?

There might be a price spike through the transition away from pumped liquids, but in the long run, I suspect the ostensible price of oil would be no higher than it is today.  If we also include the cost of wars, policing the sea lanes, diplomacy, OPEC's machinations, and other nonsense, I suspect the total cost of oil would decrease. 

I think the price will remain low.  Where do you think it will fall? 

[Oil_Engineer + 86]

On 4/9/2019 at 1:56 PM, ceo_energemsier said:

If the world ran out of oil, it would be a good thing (sarcasm), the climate change will end and the earth will survive , only downside is the population of people wont LOL !!!

Humans existed before the petroleum revolution, we will continue to exist after it is gone, just in much smaller numbers, just like before.

[ronwagn + 6,290]

On 4/9/2019 at 4:24 PM, Justin Hicks said:

I believe we'll reach a point where the extraction costs far outweigh the recovery( pretty much like it is now only on a little bigger scale)

Then natural gas and renewables will take over, maybe something else, like thorium plants, will help. 

[ronwagn + 6,290]

On 4/8/2019 at 12:16 PM, D Coyne said:

Tom,

At some point oil and natural gas output will peak and prices will likely rise, then people find alternatives and as more of the alternatives are produced, economies of scale cause the price of alternatives to fall, eventually this will lead to a lack of demand for oil and natural gas and they will decline steeply in output as they lose their scale advantage and much of the resource will be stranded as nobody will be able to produce it at a profit.  The entire argument rests on economics alone.

Even those who refuse to accept mainstream scientific understanding of geophysics can be assured that mainstream neoclassical economics suggests this may be the case.  Much of the petrochemical industry exists because of the cheap inputs that exist due to by products from the petroleum industry, those inputs will also become expensive as petroleum output declines and substitutes may be found.  Air and water transport will continue to need petroleum, as well as farm equipment so it is likely there will be some demand for oil and natural gas for quite some time, but high prices might lead to substitution in these areas as well.  It will take decades before most land transport uses of oil are eliminated, for most air and water transport perhaps 50 years or more, much depends on price relative to alternatives, impossible to model.

You need to understand that natural gas and biogas will be abundant long after oil is largely depleted. That is a very good thing because it is a very clean fuel source, It would take revolutionary discoveries to find economical replacements for fossil fuels. Natural gas is also used to make plastics and other products. It can even be transformed into gasoline but that would be wasteful IMHO. 

 https://www.igu.org/natural-gas-abundant-and-accessible

Natural Gas is Abundant and Accessible

 

A well pad in North America's abundant Marcellus Shale formation.

 

The world’s natural gas reserves are so substantial that they will be enough to fuel the world’s thirst for energy and electricity for the next 250 years – and that’s before taking into account the development of increasingly efficient power generation technologies.

Global proven reserves of natural gas amount to 187.3 trillion cubic meters at the end of 2012.   

Natural Gas can fuel the world’s energy needs for 250+ years.

This combination of abundance and accessibility is hardly matched by other fossil fuels. The search for oil is getting harder and more expensive. There aren’t any new conventional supergiant fields to be found, outside of the Antarctic.  No new supergiant since Caspian in 1980s] Even renewable energy sources are significantly challenged in meeting growing demand. While the sun shines and the wind blows in many places, the ability to convert that technology into electricity is constrained by the limitations of available technology to transmit and store that energy. 

[ronwagn + 6,290]

20 hours ago, Jan van Eck said:

It is far worse than that. The majority of the population of India does not even have an outhouse to poop in.  Indeed, the majority do not even have an open pit, never mind the outhouse enclosure.  That's right: 500 million Indians, pooping on the ground outdoors, out by the railroad tracks. Welcome to modern India, a land swamped in poop. 

I always wanted to tour India, but will probably not spend the money on it. I hear that poverty and crowding is pretty much of a downer. 

On the bright side, they can start using all that poop for making biogas. The residue can be used for fertilizer as it is here in Illinois. Actually, I think we use all the poop and whatever comes with it, but it is processed in the sewage plant first. The biogas plants are becoming more common, but not without a lot of political encouragement. 

See my Biogas topic https://docs.google.com/document/d/1N-TLMeHsKYBCirxS0vbqMGHpU2SmyLuCc7bqp8eYXVM/edit

[ronwagn + 6,290]

16 hours ago, Jan van Eck said:

Not quite, Bill. Remember that liquid fuels (diesel, kero, gasoline) can be made from coal.  That is an old technology.  Recall that the German Wehrmacht attempted a Blitzkrieg across the Ukraine in order to seize the oilfields of the Caucasus.  That failed.  Nonetheless, the entire German war machine was fuelled by synthetic gasoline from coal, and Germany (and conquered areas) has limitless coal.  So if pumped oil gets scarce, then coal it will be.  You can also make gasoline out of garbage, and industrial waste, and household trash including plastic grocery bags, lots of options there once you go to catalytic reactions inside cooking vats. 

 

Meanwhile, you can expect that new nuke generators will be on-line, providing for a nuke power experience.  I see that as inevitable, and coming fast.  Stick around and watch how the Iranians will do it.  they will be front-runners.  Cheers. 

Gasoline can also be made out of natural gas, but that would be a waste IMHO. 

[Wombat + 1,028]

On ‎4‎/‎11‎/‎2019 at 11:05 AM, Bill Simpson said:

We don't need to run out, for big problems to occur. Soon after the supply can no longer meet the demand, at a cost we can afford, the economy will be forced to shrink because it takes energy to move goods and people to their jobs. It takes oil to grow most food too, but play like that doesn't even matter.

A shrinking economy is called a recession. If less and less oil is on the market, that shrinking will continue because less & less transport services will be available, unless you plan to carry everything on your back. With global debt now at about $245 TRILLION, it won't take that many bankruptcies to wipe out the entire banking system. If you doubt it, reflect on the 2008 subprime housing loan crisis. A shrinking economy from fuel in short supply everywhere will make a few million defaulted housing loans seem trivial in comparison. 

A banking meltdown will take all economic activity with it because not much happens without payments being made through banks. Even the electric grid might go down. That would starve 80% of the population within 2 months. As would no fuel from the refineries shutting down. Remember the schools closing from Hurricane Katrina shutting a few Gulf Coast refineries?

So no, you don't have to run out of oil to starve. You only need a global decline in total oil production to get the ball rolling. So you don't have as long as you think before a catastrophe hits. Maybe only 15 years.

Good reason for a rapid shift to EV's powered by renewables/nuclear?

[MaxNix + 12]

I think long before the world runs out of crude oil or natural gas, costs will dictate replacement with something better.  My favorite quote on the subject is "the Stone Age didn't end because we ran out of stones".  As of 2019, it looks like various sources of electrical power, and power storage, are the likely next Big Thing.

[Fred czubba + 15]

Hydrocarbons will always remain a part of the energy picture to some degree. Natural Gas will play a large role and nuclear fusion with smaller reactors will also play a huge role. The renewables,  solar ,wind and others will also have their share. EV  technology will be more active  even in the marine industry for smaller tasks like ferrys. The key technologies that will reduce demand are efficiency and improved  technology.

[Keith boyd + 178]

When the world runs out of natural oil (and then coal and gas)  a few thousand years from now, we will most likely have to make synthetic oil out of co2 and water using nuclear energy. You can reverse the chemical reaction of burning  oil if you I put in  a lot of energy. Maybe bio fuel will have a role but bio fuel cant come close to replacing natural oil. Wind and solar will continue to be a small contributor. The world will have to be powered with nuclear and hydro. The alternative is going back to the iron age after losing 90% of the worlds population and survive with wood as a renewable but really poor fuel. Without oil and nuclear the world could only support 500 million people. With abundant nuclear power a world population of 50 billion is no problem. 

[footeab@yahoo.com + 2,129]

On 4/8/2019 at 4:48 AM, Meredith Poor said:

Anyone that looks at the diesel pumps in their local gas station sees placards that notify users that some percentage of the diesel is 'green',

*** Never ever put that crap in your diesel car/truck.  It oxidizes VERY fast destroying your fuel tank with plating out crap, blocks injectors in short order, and puts massive wear on your injectors as well pumping that hard garbage through.  I had an old truck which I got for free because previous owner put that crap in the truck.  I had to clean EVERYTHING out.  Idiot bought a new diesel and did same thing by putting "green" diesel in it and now 5 years in, is having the same problems.  He drives less than 10,000miles a year. 

Now this is a matter of refining, but let the green idiots destroy their cars/trucks first till they get it right before filling your fuel tank with the garbage.