Post #295,935
11/11/07 9:25:18 PM
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The Oil Drum: 12.5 MBbl/day oil production shortfall by 2015
[link|http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/3226|Peak oil: BP, Conoco CEOs say it's here - also IEA's Fatih Birol really freaks out]: [...]
So yes, it is a pretty huge deal that the BP CEO says that half the oil is gone.
But, in a way, this is almost small beer compared to the various bombs dropped by IEA chief economist Fatih Birol in his [link|http://www.ft.com/cms/s/3c8940ca-8d46-11dc-a398-0000779fd2ac,Authorised=false.html?_i_location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ft.com%2Fcms%2Fs%2F0%2F3c8940ca-8d46-11dc-a398-0000779fd2ac.html%3Fnclick_check%3D1&_i_referer=http%3A%2F%2Feurope.theoildrum.com%2Fnode%2F3226&nclick_check=1|interview with the FT]. The interview is very long, but well worth reading in its entirety. I'm providing a few quotes below, but for those of you that arre finding this diary long already, here's the quick summary:
* we are beyond peak oil in the non-OPEC world;
* OPEC officially has lots of reserves - but we don't really know;
* even if they make all the investment plans announced are made and are on time, we'll still have a gap of 12.5mb/d (more than 10% of overall demand) by 2015; we now officially need to beg OPEC to invest more;
* oh, and by the way, that's the smaller of the two energy-related problems we have: climate change is a lot worse.
[...] Peak oil is going to be a big problem for the West, but it's going to be a bigger problem for poor developing countries. It seems clear that very challenging times are coming... Cheers, Scott.
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Post #295,989
11/12/07 7:02:04 PM
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The fun part of oil....
is how much it's used in Agriculture now. :-)
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Post #295,990
11/12/07 7:04:01 PM
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And vice-versa. :-/
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Post #295,991
11/12/07 7:38:41 PM
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The Wall Street Journal came out against ethanol . . .
. . this morning (12-NOV-07 editorial page) and mentioned resistance to ethanol subsidies in both houses of the legislature (which, unfortunately, haven't gotten together one this yet).
They also mention that Texas oilmen are buying up water rights so they can pump water and charge corn growers for it since they're all running out of water.
I repeat what I've been saying all along - converting high grade food into motor fuel is total idiocy.
[link|http://www.aaxnet.com|AAx]
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Post #296,367
11/23/07 3:26:41 PM
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And why does **anyone** believe anything ...
... in the Wall St. Urinal (a.k.a. Fox Bizness) these days?
jb4
"It's hard for me, you know, living in this beautiful White House, to give you a firsthand assessment."
— George W. Bush, when asked if he believed Iraq was in a state of civil war (Newsweek, 26 Feb 07)
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Post #296,369
11/23/07 3:39:45 PM
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It tells you what the Capitalist Running Dogs are . . .
. . thinking this week. They are, after all, the ones with the money, so what they think is going to impact you.
Fox doesn't seem to have had much (if any) impact yet, except to declare the on-line service will be free. Murdock wants 10 million users instead of 1 million.
[link|http://www.aaxnet.com|AAx]
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Post #296,370
11/23/07 3:48:59 PM
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Rather beg to differ
Fox Bizness's editorials are even more Right-wing fanatical bizniss-uber-alles that they were pre-Murdoch. Before, they were predictably conservative. Now they are waaaayyy over the top whacked.
YMMV
jb4
"It's hard for me, you know, living in this beautiful White House, to give you a firsthand assessment."
— George W. Bush, when asked if he believed Iraq was in a state of civil war (Newsweek, 26 Feb 07)
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Post #296,371
11/23/07 4:38:50 PM
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Can't agree to that
there were some right-wing editorials (prior to the buyout) that made Murdock look leftish.
Even [link|http://www.huffingtonpost.com/blake-fleetwood/bill-clinton-the-wal_b_59294.html|Bill Clinton] agreed.
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Post #296,375
11/23/07 6:11:06 PM
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A guy where I worked many years ago . . .
. . had a subscription to Barron's (also published by Dow Jones). I called it "Robber Barron's". It was so far over the right wing wall it made the WSJ look like a Commie propaganda rag.
[link|http://www.aaxnet.com|AAx]
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Post #296,422
11/24/07 4:48:26 PM
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Barron's sample.
Today's piece in Barron's Up & Down Wall Street: The World's two biggest jackasses -- and, believe us, given the enormous population of that particular species, there was some very stiff competition to earn that coveted ranking -- are Hugo Chavez and Mahmoud Ahmadinjad, respectively but not respectably, the presidents of Venezuela and Iran (you'd run, too, if Mahmoud was you president.)
Hugo, as befits his name, is beefy; Mahmoud can't find a suit small enough to fit him. Hugo's clean shaven, perhaps the better to show off his significant jowls. Mahmoud to his credit has managed to achieve the impossible: cultivate a permanent five-day beard. In an earlier incarnation, they might have made it as one of those numerous pairs of not-very-comical comics on the old burlesque (hardly the least of reasons burlesque went belly up)
o o o. Reads like Ashton with Coulter virus infection! :) I happen to have a Barron's subscription. Ordinarily, I would not read it. But, my wife subscribed to Smart Money, another Dow Jones publication, and a year's worth of Barron's was available for one dollar! Two cents a week to have it mailed to me seems about right. Their positive or negative mention about a company often "moves the market" for that company on the following Monday. Alex
Nobody has a more sacred obligation to obey the law than those who make the law. -- Sophocles (496? - 406 BCE)
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Post #296,003
11/12/07 9:07:28 PM
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All of which causes me to pine for my 'Ami-6' ...
That's a Citro\ufffdn "six taxable HP, en Francaise". A kinda upscale, less-slab-sided version of that legendary Deux Cheveaux (2-CV) which most would recognize.
{Sob} - was destroyed many moons ago by a jerk gawking at a friend in a filling station, about 4 blocks from home. Gutless, indestructible 2-cyl. air cooled engine - beat MPG of transistorized $20K+ toys du jour -- designed ~ 50 years ago. Rubber bands formed the seat bottoms; it was a comfortable baby-buggy, entirely suited for non-manic motoring, with the usual caveat in a land of cel-fone distracted speeding Assault Vehicles: vulnerable to F=MA (especially '-MA'.)
I see present luxo-barge being retired long before its half-life is even dented. Will welcome that, even (just as I'd hoped in '73) - but Muricans will fight to the end for those $Gawd-given Rights-to-Excess. Predictaby.. even as foreclosure looms.
But we knew that.
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Post #296,004
11/12/07 9:40:55 PM
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There's a 2CV on the road around here that I see sometimes.
She commutes on the Beltway in the mornings. Brave woman. :-)
I've never seen an [link|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citro%C3%ABn_Ami|Ami]. They still made them until 1978! You must have some fun memories. There's one on [link|http://cgi.ebay.com/CITROEN-AMI-6-1961-1-43_W0QQitemZ110145203209QQcmdZViewItem|ebay].
;-)
There are going to be a lot of business opportunities when the oil production plateau becomes common knowledge. It would be nice to think that it'll cause real changes in [link|http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/cars/rules/cafe/overview.htm|CAFE] and the like, but I can't help but think back to the late '70s and the giant conversion vans that were popular during those times... :-(
Cheers,
Scott.
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Post #296,026
11/13/07 7:20:28 PM
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Thanks for nostalgia link -
Esp. [link|http://www.citroenet.org.uk/passenger-cars/michelin/ami/ami-6/ami-6-01.html| this one] showing a factory lot-full. {sniff} Alas, I can't even recall its year (as regards the gradual HP increases.)
Pity that we lost the Citro\ufffdn US distributor, when it became clear that Muricans just would Not keep the hydraulic fluid changed/clean -- thus eating away at everything from brakes to suspension.. thus an undeserved 'unreliable' tag; yeah: blame the mfg for your slovenliness.
(I owned several of the larger DS ~'Day-Ess' == Goddess; two bought new, one DS-21 picked up in Paris. Nary a problem, just ordinary pretty simple maintenance. Slick body drag coeff. == decent mileage cruising at 80+)
I'd have one now, most likely, if US distrib. had remained -- despite awareness of the overall mechanical, assembly superiority of the early-'90s Japanese sleds built for the Upwardly Mobile.) No matter that the Ami had none of that complexity, either; then as now, only few Muricans appreciate the stress-free simplicity of underpowered things (does Puritanism cause National penis-envy?) I see why they left -- no change in our HP obsession.
Should be an Interesting next decade - maybe old 2-CVs will bring $10K+ -??- perfect reverse-status symbol while sneering at the expense of the hybrids, especially when the battery packs die. Love. It.
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