Ludi
01-20-06, 07:00 PM
"What they don't want you to know about the coming oil crisis
Soaring fuel prices, rumours of winter power cuts, panic over the gas supply from Russia, abrupt changes to forecasts of crude output... Is something sinister going on? Yes, says former oil man Jeremy Leggett, and it's time to face the fact that the supplies we so depend on are going to run out
By Jeremy Leggett
Published: 20 January 2006
A spectre is haunting Europe - the spectre of an acute, civilisation-changing energy crisis. The latest wobble over disruptions to gas supplies from Russia is merely the latest in a series of reminders of how dependent our economies are on growing supplies of oil and gas. On Wednesday, Gazprom's deputy chairman was in London reassuring Britain that there would be no risk of disruption to British gas supplies in the fall-out from the ongoing spat between Russia and Ukraine over pricing. The very next day, temperatures in Moscow broke a 50-year record, plunging to minus 30C. Gas normally exported was diverted to the home front. Supplies to the West fell...Is there any chance that the early topping point of oil production is somehow wrong, all just a bad dream? I am sorry to say that I think not. It is important to realise that the early toppers are not advocates or agitators by choice. They tend to have high residual affection for the industry they have spent their lives in. Colin Campbell, for example, the founder of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO), worked for 40 years in the oil industry before retiring to western Ireland. Chris Skrebowski, the editor of Petroleum Review, a leading trade journal of the oil industry, spent nearly a decade arguing against Campbell before conceding that he was right. "In 1995 it all seemed pretty fantastic," says Skrebowski. "I tried hard to prove him wrong. I have failed for nine years. I am now with him. In fact, I think he's a bit of an optimist.""
http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article339928.ece
Soaring fuel prices, rumours of winter power cuts, panic over the gas supply from Russia, abrupt changes to forecasts of crude output... Is something sinister going on? Yes, says former oil man Jeremy Leggett, and it's time to face the fact that the supplies we so depend on are going to run out
By Jeremy Leggett
Published: 20 January 2006
A spectre is haunting Europe - the spectre of an acute, civilisation-changing energy crisis. The latest wobble over disruptions to gas supplies from Russia is merely the latest in a series of reminders of how dependent our economies are on growing supplies of oil and gas. On Wednesday, Gazprom's deputy chairman was in London reassuring Britain that there would be no risk of disruption to British gas supplies in the fall-out from the ongoing spat between Russia and Ukraine over pricing. The very next day, temperatures in Moscow broke a 50-year record, plunging to minus 30C. Gas normally exported was diverted to the home front. Supplies to the West fell...Is there any chance that the early topping point of oil production is somehow wrong, all just a bad dream? I am sorry to say that I think not. It is important to realise that the early toppers are not advocates or agitators by choice. They tend to have high residual affection for the industry they have spent their lives in. Colin Campbell, for example, the founder of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO), worked for 40 years in the oil industry before retiring to western Ireland. Chris Skrebowski, the editor of Petroleum Review, a leading trade journal of the oil industry, spent nearly a decade arguing against Campbell before conceding that he was right. "In 1995 it all seemed pretty fantastic," says Skrebowski. "I tried hard to prove him wrong. I have failed for nine years. I am now with him. In fact, I think he's a bit of an optimist.""
http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article339928.ece