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mankind to make a fundamental choice about what its moral "True North" really is. As the conference ended, Campbell and others debated whether to take the conference to Brussels ("Broadway", as he called it), home of the European Union, in 2005 or go to Portugal. I couldn't help thinking, "What are you waiting for?" mankind to make a fundamental choice about what its moral drop. Millions in colder regions would freeze..." "True North" really is. It was a tepid entry from the Post, but a start. The story relied As the conference ended, Campbell and others debated whether _ on generalities about peak and decline, to the exclusion of all the to take the conference to Brussels ("Broadway", as he called it), hard data that have surfaced over the last two years. home of the European Union, in 2005 or go to Portugal. I Simultaneously, it tried to give false comfort without foundation. couldn't help thinking, "What are you waiting for?" Just over a month before, on April 26, the Moscow Times had been a bit more direct. "G-7: Oil Price Threatens World The World Awaits Confirmation Economy" was the headline, and the story minced no words: When I got back from the extended trip to Berlin, Cologne and "...In a statement released after talks in Washington, the G-7's Toronto, it was like all the "real-life" things that weren't men- central bankers and finance ministers singled out energy costs as a tioned in Berlin had ganged up on me. My in-box was flooded __ risk to global growth. Crude oil prices are up about 37 percent with Peak Oil stories from all over the world. The stories were from a year ago and have risen 11 percent to nearly 11-year highs coming out daily now; they seemed like pellets from a massive around $37 per barrel since the officials last met in Florida on shotgun blast which people had not yet realised had been Feb. 7. unleashed by only one trigger-pull and only one shooter. It had "Tt is obvious that rising oil prices can have a negative effect on always been inevitable that, sooner or later, people, politicians world GDP growth,’ said US Treasury Secretary John Snow. and the markets would get it, perhaps all at once. It was the German Finance Minister Hans Eichel said the Organization of "later" possibility that scared most of us in Berlin. Petroleum Exporting Countries must ‘live up to their responsibility If one scratched any surface in early June 2004, as the G8 for the global economy’..." nations gathered in Georgia with energy and the Middle East as These stories were followed shortly thereafter by more which their most pressing concerns ("G8 offers opportunity for Bush", edged dangerously close to the panic line. And all throughout CNN, June 7), as gasoline prices con- May and June, webs of sophistry were tinued to rise, as a wave of terror spun forth by pundits who misrepre- attacks forced foreign technical service sented data with only one real intent: a workers to flee Saudi Arabia, as Saudi | "| eonventional oil production desperate effort to "protect" the mar- Arabia continued not to increase pro- kets. That effort had apparently failed. duction and as more data streamed in has already peaked and Some, like Sterling Burnett ina suggesting ht .cutinone could | ig declining. For every (ovo Crovl Oyo Moy 2 The biggest fear, however, subtly 10 barrels of conventional oil oil to last for 500 years. Not even the acknowledged by global policy-makers chief critics of Peak Oil would do that. and not-so-successfully masked, is consumed, only four new Others, like Victor Canto of the about energy. On June 6, Peak Oil barrels are discovered." National Review ("Hubbert's Holes", arrived in the Washington Post. Ina June 4), said it was all a matter of eco- story titled "After the Oil Runs Out", nomics; need and price would produce James Jordan and James Powell wrote: a painless substitution with some new "If you're wondering about the direc- energy source he wasn't quite able to tion of gasoline prices over the long term, forget for a moment describe or hadn't fully researched. about OPEC quotas and drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Even the shameless George F. Will, writing in the New York Refuge and consider instead the matter of Hubbert's Peak. That's Post ("America After Oil", June 13), while not fully able to say not a place, it's a concept developed a half-century ago by a geol- that Peak Oil isn't real, suggested that everything is a function of ogist named M. King Hubbert, and it explains a lot about what's price and that throwing money at the problem would soften the going on today at the gas pump. Hubbert argued that at a certain blow, while at the same time offering an unfounded morsel of point oil production peaks, and thereafter it steadily declines hope for the easily frightened by saying, "But, then, Alaska may regardless of demand. In 1956 he predicted that US oil produc- have three times more reserves than originally estimated". tion would peak about 1970 and decline thereafter. Skeptics George, we've been there. Estimated reserves? Probable scoffed, but he was right... reserves? Proven reserves? Ultimately recoverable reserves? "It now appears that world oil production, about 80 million The kind of reserves that caused Shell to revise its "booked" barrels a day, will soon peak. In fact, conventional oil production reserve figures downwards four times in one year? (Canadian has already peaked and is declining. For every 10 barrels of Broadcasting Co., May 24) The kind of reserves that caused the conventional oil consumed, only four new barrels are discovered. IEA's Chief Economist Faith Birol to state that a deep, new trans- Without the unconventional oil from tar sands, liquefied natural parency is needed in the reporting if we are to find out how much gas and other deposits, world production would have peaked there really is? The kind of reserves that British Petroleum was several years ago... forced to defend on June 14 (AP Business Wires), while warning ",,..Lost in the debate are three much bigger issues: the impact that new calculations might result in downward revisions? The of declining oil production on society, the ways to minimize its kind of reserves that serve only to define share values and which effects and when we should act. Unfortunately, politicians and exist only in the minds of economists, brokers and stockbrokers? policymakers have ignored Hubbert's Peak and have no plans to The kind of reserves which cannot and will never be pumped into deal with it. If it's beyond the next election, forget it. your gas tank, or be used to grow and transport your food, or get "To appreciate how vital oil is, imagine it suddenly vanished. you to work? The kind of reserves that prompted Business Week Virtually all transport—autos, trucks, airplanes, ships and trains— to ask on June 21, "Why isn't Big Oil drilling more?", or Steve would stop. Without the fertilizers and insecticide made from oil, Raabe of the Denver Post to write on June 13, "US Faces Reality food output would plunge. Manufacturing output would also Check Over Oil", or Alex Berenson to write in the New York "conventional oil production has already peaked and is declining. For every 10 barrels of conventional oil consumed, only four new barrels are discovered." 14 = NEXUS www.nexusmagazine.com AUGUST —- SEPTEMBER 2004