Running out of oil: Petroleum production could peak in the next decade. (Environment).

World oil production will probably peak before 2010 and then decline, triggering higher energy prices and global economic disturbance, according to Princeton University geologist Kenneth S. Deffeyes.

"There will be chaos in the oil industry, in governments, and in national economies.

Deffeyes's forecast builds on the work of geophysicist M. King Hubbert, who in 1956 predicted that U.S. oil production would peak in the early 1970s. Hubbert estimated that conventional U.S. oil discovery and production could realistically yield 150 to 200 billion barrels of oil; he then made estimates of future oil production rates under both scenarios. His predicted peak of "the early 1970s" was based on the optimistic production estimate of 200 billion barrels of oil. That peak was in fact reached in 1970, notes Deffeyes, who worked with Hubbert at the Shell Oil research lab in Houston.

"Around 1995, several analysts began applying Hubbert's method to world oil production, and most of them estimate that the peak year for world oil will be between 2004 and 2008," writes Deffeyes. The range of this prediction reflects estimates of probable world oil production of 1.8 or 2.1 trillion barrels.

Deffeyes asserts that the coming oil crisis cannot be avoided. He suggests that U.S. political leaders, the news media, and the public are either unaware of or uninterested in the problem. Although detailed reports forecasting the peak in world oil production have appeared in such journals as Science, Nature, Scientific American, and the Oil and Gas Journal, the issue was not debated in the U.S. presidential election of 2000.

The oil industry itself maintains its focus on such issues as improving technology, drilling deeper for oil, finding new reserves, and accelerating production. None of these measures can have a significant impact on the coming oil shortage, argues Deffeyes.

Myth: New technology will boost oil production. In fact, in the 1980s, oil companies invested heavily in research and technology. Those innovations significantly enhanced oil exploration and production operations. "Most of those wheels have already been invented," writes Deffeyes.

Myth: Drilling deeper is the answer. Below a depth of 15,000 feet it is possible to find natural gas, but little oil. Drilling rigs capable of penetrating to that depth have been in operation for more than 60 years.

Myth: New oil reserves will be located. Deffeyes contends that the only remaining unexplored area that promises abundant petroleum production is a portion of the South China Sea, where six different countries claim drilling rights. "Although the South China Sea is an attractive prospect, there is little likelihood that it is another Middle East," he writes.

Deffeyes's unsettling message is that, although society has been slow to respond to the Hubbert's Peak forecast of world oil decline, a permanent drop in oil production will nevertheless begin within the next decade. Humanity has a brief period in which to wean itself from crude oil, increase energy conservation, and design alternative energy sources.

"In a sense, the fossil fuels are a one-time gift that lifted us up from subsistence agriculture and eventually should lead us to a future based on renewable resources," Deffeyes concludes.

Source: Hubbert's Peak: The Impending World Oil Shortage by Kenneth S. Deffeyes. Princeton University Press. www.pup.princeton.edu. 2001. 208 pages. $24.95. (Order online from www.wfs.org/specials.htm.)

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