Former Shell CEO predicts blackouts, gas lines

[Subdivisions]

The source headline characterizes John Hofmeister as a "former Shell executive". But he was actually the http://www.google.com/search?q=Hofmeister%20CEO%20Shell&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&oe=UTF-8&rlz=1I7GGLR_en&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbo=u&tbs=nws:1&source=og&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wn">CEO of Shell. So I have edited my headline to reflect that reality that dallasnews.com seems to have missed until the fourth paragraph, and a weak attempt at that to show this man's prominence in the fossil fuels industry.

Americans are on the path toward blackouts and gas lines, and the federal government's tools to prevent it are broken.

And John Hofmeister, the former Shell executive who made this prediction at a World Affairs Council breakfast on Friday, said he's an optimist. Some of his energy industry friends expect worse, he said.

"Within a decade I predict the energy abyss looks like brownouts, blackouts and gas lines," said Hofmeister. "Our federal government, when it comes to energy and the environment, is dysfunctional, it's broken, and it's unfixable in its current form."

...snip...

http://energyandenvironmentblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2010/06/former-shell-exec-predicts-bla.html

From the comments:

Steve T
3:07 PM on June 21, 2010

Below is a summary of http://www.lloyds.com/News-and-Insight/360-Risk-Insight/Research-and-Reports/Energy-Security/Energy-Security">a report by Lloyds of London and Chatham House to the British business sector. It echoes a similar but broader report commissioned by the U.S. Department of Energy completed in 2004 by Robert Hirsch. The Department was so shocked by the conclusions and recommendations of the report that it did not publish it for almost two years; however, it was leaked to the Web after one year and that caused its release. The mainstream press has yet to cover the report or its treatment by the Department of Energy. However, the cat’s out of the bag and other governments are beginning to address the world’s uncertain energy future. The Lloyds report focuses specifically on businesses.

"We can expect dramatic changes in the energy sector in the coming decades. This report encourages businesses, both in the energy sector and beyond, to look at how this will impact their firms. The transition towards a low-carbon economy and the interim volatility in traditional fossil fuel markets presents businesses with numerous risks but also opportunities. In order to reduce potential vulnerability and seize opportunities, business should be aware that:

1. Energy security is now inseparable from the transition to a low-carbon economy and businesses plans should prepare for this new reality. Security of supply and emissions reduction objectives should be addressed equally, as prioritizing one over the other will increase the risk of stranded investments or requirements for expensive retro-fitting.

2. Traditional fossil fuel resources face serious supply constraints and an oil supply crunch is likely in the short-to-medium term with profound consequences for the way in which business functions today. Businesses would benefit from taking note of the impacts of the oil price spikes and shocks in 2008 and implementing the appropriate mitigation actions. A scenario planning approach may also help assess potential future outcomes and help inform strategic business decisions.

3. A ‘third industrial revolution’ in the energy sector presents huge opportunities but also brings new risks. Of particular importance for new technologies is the risk of constraints on raw materials such as rare earth metals, as scarcity may drive up costs. The rapid and widespread diffusion of some new technologies may also incur negative environmental implications.

4. Energy infrastructure will be increasingly vulnerable to unanticipated severe weather events caused by changing climate patterns leading to a greater frequency of brownouts and supply disruptions for business. This throws out a critical challenge to energy providers, investors and planners in terms of choosing the location of new infrastructure and fortifying existing plants and networks. Those businesses for which uninterrupted access to energy is of fundamental importance should actively consider investing in alternative energy supply systems.

5. Increasing energy costs as a result of reduced availability, higher global demand and carbon pricing are best tackled in the short term by changes in practices or via the use of technology to reduce energy consumption. The wider use of renewable energy and even self generation, bring added price and supply security benefits.

6. The sooner businesses reassess global supply chains and just-in-time models, and increase the resilience of their logistics against energy supply disruptions, the better. The current system is increasingly vulnerable to disruption, given the trends outlined in this report.

7. While the vast majority of investment in the energy transition will come from the private sector, governments have an important role in delivering policies and measures that create the necessary investment conditions and incentives. If the global carbon market is to become a reality then government action must be taken to bring additional price stability and transparency. Investing in a secure, low-carbon energy future may have higher upfront costs, but will deliver lower cost energy in the future. Sound renewable energy and demand side measures are crucial elements in delivering the necessary energy services for businesses and the expected return on investments."

...snip...

----------------------------------------------------

From http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/David-R.-Francis/2010/0621/After-BP-oil-spill-peak-oil-seems-nearer-than-ever">The Christian Science Monitor:

After BP oil spill, 'peak' oil seems nearer than ever

In a geological sense, the world is still awash in oil. The US Geological Survey estimates 3,000 billion barrels of conventional crude are buried in the world, about a 46-year supply if no more oil is found, according to the National Center for Policy Analysis, a public-policy research firm in Dallas.

The problem is getting oil out of the ground. Much oil is inaccessible – or so expensive to drill that it's not feasible even if oil prices surged. Sometimes the environmental risks (think BP's Deepwater Horizon fiasco) may be too high.

Estimates vary on when oil production will climax. Take your pick. Peak oil:

•Happened five years ago, holds Matthew Simmons, chairman emeritus of Simmons & Co. International, a Houston investment-banking firm for the energy industry.

•Will be reached within five years – or "we may have already reached it," says Richard Miller, a London consulting geologist who up until 2008 worked for BP preparing private reports on prospects for peak oil.

•Will happen around 2025, according to Leo Drollas, chief economist of the Centre for Global Energy Studies in Lon­don. He figures the world has 6 million barrels per day (b.p.d.) of unused conventional oil output capacity, about 4 million of that in Saudi Arabia. In addition, Canada has about 170 billion barrels in its oil sands, and Vene­zuela has some 400 billion barrels of heavy oils, more than Saudi Arabia's conventional oil reserves.

...snip...

Typically, production losses are offset by new finds (OP ED: new finds peaked in 1964...see image below.). The International Energy Agency has calculated that it would take the discovery of six new fields the size of those in Saudi Arabia to maintain current world oil output through 2030, Miller says.

"I don't know where they are hiding," he adds.

http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/David-R.-Francis/2010/0621/After-BP-oil-spill-peak-oil-seems-nearer-than-ever

[grasswire]

1. oboy

kind of makes my plans for today seem insignificant. I need a push mower.

[Subdivisions]

2. We've been living fast and loose, taking it all for granted. But the changes

that are coming don't have to be a bad thing. It's all a matter of how we want to wind down the Petroleum Age and manage the Age of Descent. Either we can individually accept the inevitability of a future with less and less energy and choose to alter our lifestyles accordingly or we can fly off the cliff all at once and meet our fate at the bottom of the http://dieoff.org/page125.htm">Olduvai Gorge.

Take your pick.

[bananas]

3. He wants more oil and coal

He's not predicting "peak oil", his website sounds like astroturf for more oil and coal:

http://www.citizensforaffordableenergy.org/more-energy.htm

<snip>

The truth is there is no shortage of energy resources of any kind in our country. There is more oil available than we have ever consumed; more coal than any other country on earth; the opportunity for clean coal power production has never been better; more natural gas; more opportunity for liquefied natural gas; more oil in U.S. shale than in all of Saudi Arabia; more bio-fuels practically by the month; more solar; more wind; and more potential for hydrogen than ever before. Meanwhile we continue to benefit from robust hydro-power and nuclear energy production and out there in the future are more opportunities for geo-thermal power. The bottom line is the U.S. has ample energy resources for whatever we choose to do in the future.

Our problem is the lack of a comprehensive, holistic and coherent energy strategy for the short, medium and long term future. The nation has lacked a plan for generations. There has been energy legislation in each of 2005, 2006, 2007 and more is proposed for 2008. Yet each of these bills has come about as a result of a divisive, politically abrasiveness process that has diminished the potential outcomes and even contradicted actions taken in a prior bill just a year or two before. The politics of partisan paralysis has dominated energy legislation; the American people are suffering the consequences.

Citizens for Affordable Energy is prepared to put forth a comprehensive and coherent short, medium and long term plan in consultation with American citizens for political leadership to consider. In the coming months and years information will be disseminated about the supplies of energy to meet future demand. Supply information will be provided without partisan bias and ideological rhetoric. The pluses and minuses of various types of energy supplies from coal, oil and gas to nuclear, bio-fuels, solar and wind, etc. will be presented in their stark realities and without political preference. Citizens have the right to sound, factual information upon which to make rational choices. We plan to make such information available without overwhelmingly complex technical language, which makes the subject incomprehensible. We hope to play a role in informing future choices.

[bananas]

4. LOL - A review of his book "Why We Hate Oil Companies"

A review of the audiobook version:

http://www.audible.com/adbl/site/products/ProductDetail.jsp?BV_SessionID=@@@@1566936051.1277165723@@@@&BV_EngineID=ccchadekkedkeikcefecekjdffidfgi.0&productID=BK_ADBL_002238&redirectFlag=

<snip>

"I hate false flag operations"
By: Matthias (Singapore, Singapore)
May 28, 2010

I bought this audiobook when no reviews were available on audible or amazon. I hadn't thought much about the oil industry before.

However, Hofmeister doesn't really seem to hate the oil industry - instead he wants to "educate" people on "affordable energy solutions" and so on (see his website).

Well, personally I don't like "education" where people are tricked or manipulated right at the beginning. If Hofmeister doesn't hate oil companies, his book shouldn't have "we" in the title. He founded an organisation "Citizens for Affordable Energy" - but there seem to be no more citizens involved than Hofmeister and a few empoloyees; the organisation is incorporated and based in Houston, TX, by the way, and their goal is "To educate citizens and government officials about pragmatic, non-partisan affordable energy solutions, environmental protection, energy alternatives, efficiency, infrastructure, public policy, competitiveness, social cohesion, and quality of life." - One wonders how they earn their money, and to me it looks just like a front organisation for the oil industry.

Now to the audiobook: I couldn't bear listening to all the whining and finger pointing Hofmeister presented to so far. I tried different chapters, but usually he just blames politicians - which seems to be his explanation why people hate oil companies: Bad politicians like to blame the oil industry. Well, if I had been interested in such stories I may have bought a book titled "Why We Hate Politicians".

So as I didn't listen to the complete book I cannot tell if it actually has some educational content. But I don't care, because if I want to learn about the oil issue I surely don't want to get my information from a not very convincingly veiled mouthpiece of the oil industry.

<snip>

[Subdivisions]

9. I'm sorry. I do not know of Matthias of Singapore and so was not

aware that we were supposed to accept his opinions as gospel.

[bananas]

5. Why did you snip this from your first link?

He wants less regulation and more oil, coal, and nuclear:

http://energyandenvironmentblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2010/06/former-shell-exec-predicts-bla.html

<snip>

The Houston resident has a solution. He wants the U.S. government to get out of the energy business. He would shift oversight of energy and the environment to an independent agency, similar to the Federal Reserve.

He worries that the U.S. won't have enough energy because of the way government restricts using various types of existing technology, such as oil, coal and nuclear power. But the U.S. hasn't developed the alternative technologies to be able to replace fossil fuels.

<snip>

[LanternWaste]

6. Relevant omissions are usually quite telling...

Relevant omissions are usually quite telling. Nice catch. +1

[Subdivisions]

8. Telling of what? What are you implying about my motives? Have you

ever read any of my relevant posts on this topic?

Do you have anything constructive to say about the situation with oil or energy in gerneral?

[Subdivisions]

7. Because I expected you to read the rest of the article. What are you

trying to imply with your question?