Global oil production will almost certainly ‘peak’ and go into sustained decline within the next few years. In addition to the challenge of climate change, we will soon have to contend with a rapidly growing deficit in fuels for transport. This will cause big spikes in energy prices – including natural gas and electricity – with potentially devastating economic and social impacts. This has severe implications for the provision of services by local government. This issue is usually described as ‘peak oil’. It is rarely acknowledged by national governments, but is rapidly gaining credibility among local authorities around the world – and on financial markets. Forecasters differ about the exact date of the peak, but there is a growing consensus that it will happen in the next ten years. To many experts the soaring price of crude suggests that we may be at peak oil now.

Those are the grim words contained in the executive summary of a new report on Peak Oil from The Oil Depletion Analysis Centre and Post Carbon Institute. In their report Preparing for Peak Oil Local Authorities and the Energy Crisis, that authors describe the challenges and offer consultation on how local authorities should deal with the impending energy crisis facilitated by the onset of Peak Oil.

Read the entire report here »

LONDON, July 21 (Reuters) - The looming peak in world oil production will set back international development and threatens to hinder efforts to make poverty history, a report by a group of UK lawmakers said.

While oil’s rally to a record high is causing economic pain in developed countries, its impact on international development is being overlooked, the report by the All Party Parliamentary Group on Peak Oil and development groups RESET and Practical Action said.

“The deepening energy crisis has the potential to make poverty a permanent state for a growing number of people, undoing the development efforts of a generation,” the report released on Monday said.

-snip-

“It is clear that the current level of global energy consumption is unsustainable, from both environmental and geological points of view.”

Referenced Report - 21 Page PDF Document

From the report:

The world is on the brink of an energy crisis that has drastic implications for people in the developing world. As almost every aspect of modern life is sustained by cheap energy, the
impacts of rising oil prices will be profound.

Energy security has become a political priority for governments world-wide, a priority which needs to be reflected in the field of international development. Principal donors of overseas aid and senior policy advisors are encouraged to consider that:

• Vulnerability to energy and commodity price rises must be addressed at all levels – from humanitarian aid to bilateral development;

• Business as usual is not an option: future project funding should include criteria for reducing energy vulnerability - especially in post-disaster recovery and reconstruction settings;

• Food production should be de-linked from petro-chemicals; proven alternatives should be promoted. Transport, diesel-generated electricity, refrigeration, plastics and medicines are all susceptible to increasing energy costs. Availability of all these items is not in question – the question is whether people will be able to afford them as energy becomes scarcer.

This paper urges the British Government and its DFID to invest in research and disaster mitigation strategies in light of the Peak Oil scenarios. Specifically, it recommends that:

• An inter-agency working group on energy security and international development is set up

• Contingency planning for energy vulnerability become an immediate priority

• Training and research aiming to build capacity in local food and energy security is funded and disseminated across the humanitarian and development sector.

Many cities1, and some nations2, realise that global Peak Oil is not only inevitable, but imminent. This paper argues that contingency planning now – and subsequent mobilisation of training and adaptation of programme design – must be seen as a high priority.

This paper looks initially at Peak Oil and the likely political and economic impacts. Next it presents a series of proposals for practical strategies to build resilience in a time of sharply rising energy prices. Viable alternatives are offered in food production, human settlement design and local energy security.

Global oil production is reaching its peak, critical decisions are needed to prepare communities everywhere for the dramatic and irreversible changes ahead. Carrying on with ‘business as usual’ is no longer an option.

We are capable of predicting the outcomes of irreversible energy depletion. Proven and effective strategies that build resilience and reduce energy vulnerability exist. Donors and agencies of international development need to learn and adopt these strategies.

-snip-

The report linked above is from the House of Commons All Party Parliamentary Group on Peak Oil in London.

Very interesting reading!

Credit availability will shrink as banks come under pressure, raising the default rate. Meanwhile, the price of household assets (real estate and stocks) will continue to decline, destroying their creditworthiness. According to Spengler, markets will expect the Fed to continue to ease monetary policy and offer unlimited liquidity to all comers, as it did with the mid-March bailout of Bear Stearns. But instead, he believes, investors will turn away from falling equity markets and buy inflation hedges, pushing oil and commodity prices up further.

The position of American households is so fragile that major institutions might fail. Washington Mutual, America’s largest thrift institution, is now trading at a tenth of its 2007 stock price. It is not clear whether any other institution is willing, or indeed able, to take it over.

Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke knows that something has gone dreadfully wrong. He spent the month of June threatening to do something about the sagging dollar and soaring commodity prices, until the market concluded last week that he was bluffing. Bernanke simply doesn’t have the nerve to raise interest rates into a weakening economy.

READ MORE

In the early years of the 20th century, the availability of cheap oil fueled explosive industrial growth and the development of the world’s leading economies. From the days of “Drake’s Folly” in 1859 Pennsyvania until today, the world has used more than half of the cheap and easy to get to oil. Now, oil supplies are dwindling and the true cost to the world’s economies of our profligate use of oil is only now becoming clear.

America is embroiled in warfare and diplomacy to retain its hold on the Persian Gulf, the world’s richest petroleum-producing region. In this new entry in the popular Groundwood Guides series, James Laxer tells the story of the rise of the giant petroleum companies and how they seized control of oil fields and markets worldwide.

Laxer describes the intricate relationship between oil supplies, money, war, geopolitics and he explains the dynamics of consumption and supply with regard to the world’s production of crude oil.

Laxer concludes by examining the challenges that humanity will face as it comes to grips with the stark reality that oil is a finite resource. He also touches upon the consequences burning the oil that remains including potentially catostrophic climate change.

I discovered Peak Oil just over 2 years ago and have been studying it daily ever since. I’ve come to the only conclusion I possibly can and that is that the world has reached, and surpassed, the peak in crude oil production. I also believe that just about all the bad news we’re getting these days, be it the high price of fuel at the gas pumps or skyrocketing fuel prices or the invasion of a country in order to sieze it’s oil reserves, can be traced directly to the effects of Peak Oil.

In fact, much of the economic pressure and geopolitical posturing currently being witnessed from the decline of the Dollar to the King of Saudi Arabia ordering his oil people to leave some resevoirs in the ground for future generations can be attributed to the slow decomposition of a civilization on the edge of complete collapse as the foundation on which it was built begins to crumble.

Though this site’s domain is “PeakOilSupplies.com”, we will be more than just a place to purchase Peak Oil preparation supplies and gear. We will also be following, hopefully daily, Peak Oil news and information as it happens. Also, I am already developing a Peak Oil education section that will help those new to the subject to obtain a brief and concise picture of what we are talking about here. Peak Oil is perhaps the most challenging issue we’ve ever faced and everyone should be aware of what it means.

And, finally, of course I will be featuring products and services relating to Peak Oil. And before you start giving the business for “profiting on the misery and fear of others and taking advantage of a very serious situation” let me just say…”That’s capitalism.” Actually, I’m joking. My real answer to that is that I offer products and services that will help people prepare for an uncertain future, preparations that could actually end up saving lives. Imagine suddenly being thrust into the cold without shelter and with grocery store supply and distribution chains disrupted. Would you rather stand there wondering “What now?” or would you rather retreat to your safe place, already set up do accomodate you for one year including food, water, etc.? We’ll help you be prepared if you ever need to be and that doesn’t just apply to Peak Oil and the chaos it is sure to bring, but also to hurricane, flood, tornado, earthquakes, and other natural or man-made disasters - or geopolitical stress.

So, for now, please have a look around and if you’d like to participate in posting news and other information to this website, just contact me and we’ll take it from there. 

Onward.