Oil in Cuba

[esskreemr]

Originally Posted by Maeve_Mari

It is the Oil, Stupid!

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One thing it left out was that Hamid Karzai (You know the elected President of Afghanistan) is a former employee of UNOCAL... I'm sure that comes as a shock to everyone...

[esskreemr]

Originally Posted by Maeve_Mari

It is the Oil, Stupid!

One thing it left out was that Hamid Karzai (You know the elected President of Afghanistan) is a former employee of UNOCAL... I'm sure that comes as a shock to everyone...

[Larrison]

Originally Posted by Gav

A correction. All the really BIG oilfields have been found. [ ... ] So all that these little finds do is stave of starvation a little bit. These new finds will not really add any real longevity to the supply. Efficiency, some recycling, plus new technology to 'scrape the bottom' will enable oil companies to maintain some levels and to eke them out but it doesn't change the fact that Oil is a finite resource (unless you don't mind waiting around a few million years to get more).

*shrugs* Oil, shmoil. There's lots of fossil hydrocarbons around -- just not that much light oil that's easily extracted. Most of the easy to find, easy to extract stuff has been found, I'll agree with.

But there's lots of "Oil" around -- for example, the Northern US/ Canadian oil sands and oil shale have enough in known fields to provide around 200 (yes, multiple centuries) of oil, except that it costs around $15 per barrel to produce it, compared to production costs of $1 per barrel or less in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. But with oil at $40 per barrel, you can produce it and make money, so there is a lot of new production going in to the oil sands fields.

And if you want to move a little farther down the easy production chain, there's coal. The US alone has around 500 years of world oil equivalent reserves in coal. And the production of "synthetic petroleum" from coal is a well known industrial process -- Nazi Germany had it as a primary source of gasoline and kerosine in WWII, and apartheid-era South Africa had it as their primary source. Production cost is a bit more expensive -- around $20-25 / barrel last time I looked. But with oil prices of $40 per barrel....

Are we going to run out of "oil"? Heck no. Are we going to run out of cheap, easily refined light hydrocarbons in big fields? Perhaps... and probably. But are we going to stop producing oil because we can't find any more? Nahhhhh...

[Gav]

Perhaps I should have said Crude Oil... That is, after all, what we have been discussing.

Running out of Crude oil will not stop there being any oil sloshing around however you are naive if you think that you will be able to afford to drive your huge SUV's and Hummers.

Incidentally I am well aware that RSA used Shale Oil, my father was a Chemist: who did some work over there helping them with that process.

While we are mentioning Nazi Germany. Why do you think that the Germans obsessively trying to capture the Eastern European oil fields if Shale Oil is so easy to refine? Additionally, the Shale oil process is hardly without it's own pitfalls ...

So what point are you trying to make exactly? Are you just trying to be a pedant?

[Soldier]

Perhaps his point was just that while running out of crude oil is certainly a problem, it does not mean that everything which runs on oil will suddenly be inoperable - it will be a setback, certainly, but not a complete halt.

[Larrison]

Gav writes: >>So what point are you trying to make exactly? Are you just trying to be a pedant?<<

The point I was trying to make was that I saw the statements that we're "just staving off [oil] starvation a little bit" and "these new finds will not add any real longevity to the supply", and we're starting to "scrape the bottom" (I apologise for bit for that coming out of context, but I believe represents the sense of the statement as made). My intepretation of your basic statement was that you were stating that we are soon to be facing a substantial shortfall in the ability to refine and use oil because the supply was going to be all used up. If you did not mean this, and I misinterpreted your position, my apologies.

My statement >>"Are we going to run out of "oil"? Heck no. Are we going to run out of cheap, easily refined light hydrocarbons in big fields? Perhaps... and probably. But are we going to stop producing oil because we can't find any more? Nahhhhh...<< was directed at that -- what I intepreted as your position that we're going going to run out of oil, and there's nothing to replace it. [Ref: "staving off starvation", "scraping the barrel", and "new finds will not add any real longevity"] My point was there are are other alternative sources of hydrocarbons which can produce substantially more hydrocarbon-based oil-like fuels than just oil/ petroleum. But they are going to cost more...

I do agree with your second statement that "ANd also expecting oil to remain cheap strikes me as quite daft as well", in that I expect oil (or oil-like hydrocarbon fuels) to increase in price. The price today for oil is *less* that it was 20 years ago, adjusted for inflation -- and I sure expect the price of oil and its products to go up.

[SamIam]

It is a common misconception that the world will run out of oil in the near future. If you look at global oil supply predictions most will agree that global oil production rates will plateau somewhere between 2010 and 2040. This means that the rate at which oil is produced (i.e. barrels of crude per day) will peak and then start to decline. Most models predict that the decline will be steeper than the build up.

The problem is that the rate of oil consumption continues to rise sharply (IIRC it doubles in less than 10 years, but I might be off by a bit).

It's easy to imagine the consequences from these two simple trends. Mostly they result in sharply increased oil prices. Built into this rather simple scenario is if supply is constrained too much then economies suffer and demand drops so there is a bit of a negative feedback. Yet this still means that current rates of economic growth are not sustainable in a petroleum-fueled system. This is especially true if all those upwardly mobile Indians and Chinese citizens also want to drive Hummers.

Claiming that oil sands and oil shales can make up the shortfall is a bit of a red herring. Sure there might be 200 years of reserves on the books, but that is at the currently low rates of exploitation of these reserves. There is just no way that the production rates can be ramped up to make up for the forseeable shorftall. In addition producing oil from these sources requires alot of energy, commonly in the form of natural gas, which is itself currently in decline. On top of that is our illustrious governments decision to ratify Kyoto which may put a bit of a damper on investment in the oil sands.

That is the situation in a nutshell, much simplified, but essentially the current state of afairs. There are always unknowns, such as technological advances and discovery of new deposits, but the overall trend should hold out. The biggest uncertainty is the timing of the peak.

What this means for the average guy: if you're an older ****(vile wind) like me you can probably soldier on paying a little more each year for everything, for you youngsters, likely a change in lifestyle/quality of life awaits you as energy costs start to squeeze the economy in the next few decades.

Much as I hate to say it, strategically, I think the Shrub has the right idea: if you control the sources of oil you will wield a big stick globally. Unfortunately I think he has dropped the ball tactically in his Middle East adventures. Ensuring supplies would likely have been easier by playing nice than by being the playground bully. Good thing we have Mr Dithers around to keep us inoffensive to most of the world.

Interesting times they truly are.

[SamIam]

Thought this powerpoint presentation might be of interest to those who want more information. it deals mostly with North American gas supplies but has some general energy supply info as well.

http://www.canadiangaspotential.com/...sis_hughes.pdf

Bear in mind the source and the audience for the presentation. but I have seen many similar forcasts and conclusions (both for oil and gas), varying only in the timing for the shortfalls and not in the overall shape of the trends.

BTW, I attended the presentation and it wasn't alarmist or overly optimistic in in tone. I don't believe the author had any specific agenda to push. But then you never know do you.

Remember these are forecasts, not inevitable, they rely on current usage trends to continue relatively unchanged.

[SamIam]

Sorry, one more. I realized I never addressed the main topic of the thread.

If there was significant oil in Cuba there would also be WMD, an imminent threat to security, a leader more evil than Hitler, and a virginal princess in need of rescue.

Good thing therefore that small Canadian independent oil companies have so far come up dry in Cuba.

I've been to Cuba on holiday and can report that they gladly accept US dollars, toothpaste, running shoes, toilet paper, etc. Also, most Cubans will gladly tell you what they like and dislike about their country. Though the atmosphere in some areas of Havana were a bit oppressive, some of that dismal Soviet-era architecture and lots of guards and guns. But then I've also been to Washington DC and seen similar stuff

Trying to skate along the middle of the road and hoping not to get flattened.
Long live the Canadian way!!!

[Svidrigailov]

I think US Policy towards cuba is as irrational as the Mafia Miamense that runs it. If you've ever asked a miami cuban what they think of castro (especially one old enough to remember being exiled) chances are you will evoke a response that will encompass most of Cuba's vast and colorful repertoire of insults. These people bay for his blood...

It so happens that, as a group, miami cubans are affluent, well connected in washington, and live in a swingstate where there is a more or less even democrat republican split. Thus they have a lot of clout in determining how the US treats cuba.