4/11/11

Many

Slides

Are

From

Prof.

Tom

Murphy

(with

Permission)

Thank

You

Prof.

Murphy

Chapter 2: fossil fuels

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A brief history of fossil fuels

•  Here today, gone tomorrow

•  What will our future hold?

–  Will it be back to a simple life?

–  Or will we find new ways to produce all the energy we
want?

–  Or will it be somewhere in the middle

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1018 Joules/yr
Percent of
Source
(~QBtu/yr)
Total

Petroleum*
158
40.0
Global
Coal*
92
23.2

Energy:
Natural Gas*
89
22.5

Hydroelectric*
28.7
7.2
Where
Nuclear Energy
26
6.6
Does it
Biomass Come
(burning)*
1.6
0.4

Geothermal
0.5
0.13
From?

Wind*
0.13
0.03
* Ultimately derived
from our sun
Solar Direct*
0.03
0.008

Sun Abs. by then radiated Courtesy David
Bodansky (UW)
Earth*
2,000,000
away

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Finding Oil

•  Oil is trapped in special (rare) geological structures

•  Most of the oil in the world comes from a few large wells

•  About one in ten exploratory drillings strike oil

–  and this in places known to be oil-rich: get nothing in most of world

The Oil Window

•  Organic material must be deposited without decomposing

–  oxygen-poor environment: usually underwater with poor flow

•  Material must spend time buried below 7,500 feet of rock

–  so that molecules are “cracked” into smaller sizes

•  But must not go below 15,000 feet

–  else “cracked” into methane: gas, but no oil

•  So there is a window from 7,500 to 15,000 feet

•  Additional circumstances must be met

–  existence of “caprock” to keep oil from escaping: even a drop per
second depletes 20 million barrels per million years

–  source rock must be porous and permeable to allow oil flow

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The hydrocarbons
kJ per gram

55 48
•  All fossil fuels are
essentially hydrocarbons,
51 48
except coal, which is
mostly just carbon

•  Natural Gas is composed 50 48
of the lighter
hydrocarbons (methane
through pentane)
46 48
•  Gasoline is hexane (C6)
through C12

48 48
•  Lubricants are C16 and up

(1 Cal = 4.184 kJ) Read about Petroleum refining!

Hydrocarbon Reactions

•  Methane reaction:



CH4 + 2O2 → CO2 + 2H2O + energy



1 g
4 g
2.75 g 2.25 g
55 kJ

•  Octane reaction:



2C8H18 + 25O2 → 16CO2 + 18H2O + energy



1 g
3.51 g
3.09 g
1.42 g
48 kJ

•  For every pound of fuel you burn, you get about
three times that in CO2

–  one gallon of gasoline → ~20 pounds of CO2

–  occupies about 5 cubic meters (1300 gallons) of space

Q×2

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Aside: Carbohydrate Reactions

•  Typical carbohydrate (sugar) has molecular structure like:
[CH2O]N, where N is some integer

–  refer to this as “unit block”: C6H12O6 has N=6

•  Carbohydrate reaction:



[CH2O]N + NO2 → NCO2 + NH2O + energy



1 g
1.07 g
1.47 g 0.6 g
17 kJ

•  Less energy than hydrocarbons because one oxygen
already on board (half-reacted already)

•  For every pound of food you eat, exhale 1.5 lbs CO2

–  Actually lose weight this way: 0.5 to 1.0 lbs per day in carbon

–  Must account for “borrowed” oxygen mass and not count it

So where does our petroleum go?

•  Each barrel of crude oil goes
into a wide variety of
products

•  Most goes into combustibles

•  Some goes to lubricants

•  Some goes to pitch and tar

•  Some makes our plastics

•  40% of our energy comes

from petroleum

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Participation Questions

(write on piece of paper with
name and hand in)

1. How long do you think the world’s oil will last?

2. What do you think about nuclear energy?

3. Given Fukushima nuclear accident, should I visit Tokyo next
month for a conference?

Who’s got the crude oil resources?

Data from several

years back (Doesn’t
count discoveries
yet to be made)

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Countries with top oil reserves (World Oil Journal 2006)

Saudi Arabia
262 Gbbl (Billion barrels)

Iran
132 Gbbl

Iraq
115

Kuwait
101

United Arab Emrites
70

Venezuela
53

Former Soviet Union
48

Nigeria
37

Libya
34

USA
21.7

China
16

Mexico
12.3

Canada
12

Brazil
11.9

Algeria
11.3

Angola
9

Norway
8

Sudan
6.1

Indonesia
5.0

India
4

Let’s get our barrels straight

•  An oil barrel (bbl) is 42 gallons, or 159 liters

•  In the U.S., we use about 24 bbl per year per
person

–  average person goes through a barrel in 15 days

–  recall: 60 bbl/yr oil equivalent in all forms of energy: oil
is 40% of our total energy portfolio

•  That’s 7.2 billion bbl/yr for the U.S.

–  20 million bbl/day

•  For the world, it’s 25 billion bbl/year

–  69 million bbl/day

•  100 Qbtu/yr = 17 Gboe/yr: world 400 Qbtu/yr = 69 Gboe/yr
(Gboe = billion barrel oil equivalent ~ 5.8 QBtu)

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Excerpts from Table 2.2 in book (but in

Gbbl/year instead of Mbbl/day )

Country
Prod (Gbbl/ Reserves No. Prod. years left

year)
(Gbbl)
Wells

Saudi 3.3
262.7
1,560
80

Arabia

Russia
2.9
69.1
41,192
24

U.S.
2.1
29.4
521,070
14

Iran
1.4
130.7
1,120
96

China
1.2
23.7
72,255
19

Mexico
1.2
16.0
13

Norway
1.0
10.1
833
10

U.A.E.
0.86
97.8
114

Canada
0.81
16.9
54,061
21

Kuwait
0.80
96.5
790
121

Notes on Table 2.2

•  Not a single country matching U.S. demand of 7.2 Gbbl/
year

•  Reserves:

–  Non-OPEC proved reserves: 173 Gbbl

–  OPEC reserves: 882 Gbbl

–  Total: 1055 Gbbl

•  To maintain current production of 25 Gbbl/year…

–  this will last 42.5 years

–  means entries in previous table with longer timescales than this
would have to step up production, if they can

–  may not be possible to extract oil fast enough for demand

–  Saudi Arabia used to produce at less than 100% capacity, now
running full-out

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How long will the world oil

supply last?

•  Not as long as you might think/hope

•  We’ll be spent before the century is done, but
we’ll have to scale down oil usage before then (in
the next few decades)

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How about the U.S. Supply?

•  The estimated total U.S.
supply is 230–324 billion bbl
(currently used about 200
Gbbl of this)

•  We’ve used >60% of this,
leaving 130 billion barrels
max

•  Production is already down to
60% of peak

•  At current rate of production,
must be exhausted before
2070

•  If we used only U.S. supply,
we’d run out in 18 years!!

•  If lower total above is right,
less time
Q

Discovery must lead production

•  There must be a lag between the finding of
oil and delivery to market

•  In the U.S., discovery peaked around 1950,
production peaked in 1970

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Various Estimates of Oil

Remaining

•  To date, we’ve used about 1000 billion barrels of
oil worldwide

•  We seem to have about this much left

–  halfway through resource

•  There will be some future discovery still, but
likely small beans

–  ANWR (Arctic National Wildlife Reserve): 5–10 Gbbl
~ 1 years’ worth at U.S. consumption rate

•  In any case, production unlikely to increase
appreciably from this point forward

–  will soon fail to pump as fast as today’s demand

Q

Worldwide Discovery and

Production

•  discovery peaked before 1970; production
peak soon to follow

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King Hubbert

•  Geophysicist at the Shell lab in
Houston

•  In 1956, he presented a paper
“Nuclear Energy and Fossil Fuels”
at a meeting of the American
Petroleum Institute in San Antonio

•  He made predictions of the peak
year of US oil production based on
two estimates of the ultimate
production

(Dave Rutledge: Caltech 2007)

The Hubbert Peak Idea

•  Hitting new oil field must
precede assessment of oil
capacity

•  Discovery peak (numerical
assessment) must follow hits

•  Production peak follows
discovery (assessment)

•  Area under three curves the
same (total oil resource)

•  Deffeyes estimates that we’ve
hit 94%, discovered 82%, and
produced 50% as of about 2005

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exponential
Logistic (“S”) curves

rate of growth

Logistic curves result from growth limited by a

logistic finite resource: at first exponential, but unable to
sustain exponential once resource limits kick in

resource Qmax

marks half-way point

time
Qmax

resource

time

Rate plot for U.S.

•  Can plot rate of production (P:
annual production) divided by
resource (Q: total produced to
date) against total resource, Q

–  P/Q is like an interest rate:
fractional increase per year

Peak Production; •  A “logistic” or S-curve would
half consumed
1970 follow a straight line sloping
down

•  U.S. oil production does so
after 1958

•  When you get to zero P/Q,
you’ve hit the end of the
resource: no more production

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Growth-Rate Plot for US Crude Oil

10%

Growth Rate for Cumulative .

5%
Trend line is for normal fit
(225 billion barrels)

0%
0 100 200
Cumulative Production, billions of barrels

•  EIA data (cumulative from 1859, open symbols 1900-1930, closed symbols 1931-2006)

(Dave Rutledge: Caltech 2007)

Same fit, in rate history plot

•  The best-fit line on the
previous plot produces a
decent fit to the rate
history of oil production in
the U.S.

•  Supports the peak position
well, and implies a total
resource of about 225
Gbbl

•  In this case, much proven
reserves (22Gbbl) will not
increase as many expect!

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World Data

•  After 1983, world data follows logistic curve

–  shows us halfway along 2,000 Gbbl at 2005

–  implies we’re at the peak right about now

2×Q

British Coal

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British Coal Production

(Slides from Dave Rutledge: Caltech: 2007)

300

Annual Production, Mt .

200

100

0
1850 1900 1950 2000

•  Data from the US National Bureau of Economic Research (1854-1876), the

Durham Coal Mining Museum (1877-1956), and the British Department of Trade
and Industry (1957-2006)

•  In the peak production year, 1913, there were 3,024 mines

Growth-Rate Plot for British Coal

Growth Rate for Cumulative .

4%

2%

0%
0 5 10 15 20 25

Cumulative Production, Gt

•  1854-2006, 1853 cumulative from William Jevons, The Coal Question

•  Already near the trend line in 1854

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Remaining Production for British Coal

0.2%

Growth Rate for Cumulative .

10% per year

0.1%

Trend line for

200Mt remaining
0.0%
26.2 26.4 26.6

Cumulative Production, Gt

•  Data from the UK Department of Trade and Industry (1993-2006)

•  6 producing underground mines ⎯ several with less than ten years of coal

•  35 strip mines are producing, but there are difficulties in getting permits for new mines

Reserves vs Remaining Production

1000
Resources + Reserves
Hull
100
Reserves

10
Gt .

Remaining
Production
1

0
1850 1900 1950 2000

•  1864 reserves from Edward Hull of the Geological Survey

•  Other data from the World Energy Council Surveys of Energy Resources

•  Resources include seams of 2ft or more at depths of 4000ft or less

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Fraction of Reserves Eventually Produced

% of Reserves Eventually Produced .

40%

Hull
Hull

20%

0%
1850 1900 1950 2000

•  1864 reserves from Edward Hull of the Geological Survey

•  Other data from the World Energy Council Surveys of Energy Resources

•  Will use trends if they exist, reserves otherwise

How Much Oil do the Saudis

Have?

Growth Rate for Cumulative .

10%

Trend line is for 1978 RAND

5%
study (90Gb remaining)
Official Saudi reserves are
264 billion barrels

0%
0 50 100 150 200
Cumulative Production, billions of barrels

•  EIA data (open 1975-1990, closed 1991-2006), 1975 cumulative from Richard Nehring

•  Matt Simmons was the first to call attention to this anomalous situation in his book, Twilight in
the Desert

(Dave Rutledge: Caltech 2007)

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Excerpts from Table 2.2 in book (but in

Gbbl/year instead of Mbbl/day )

Country
Prod (Gbbl/ Reserves No. Prod. years left

year)
(Gbbl)
Wells

Saudi 3.3
262.7
1,560
80

Arabia

Russia
2.9
69.1
41,192
24

U.S.
2.1
29.4
521,070
14

Iran
1.4
130.7
1,120
96

China
1.2
23.7
72,255
19

Mexico
1.2
16.0
13

Norway
1.0
10.1
833
10

U.A.E.
0.86
97.8
114

Canada
0.81
16.9
54,061
21

Kuwait
0.80
96.5
790
121

Countries with top oil reserves (World Oil Journal 2006)

Saudi Arabia
262 Gbbl (Billion barrels) (Rutledge says only 90!)

Iran
132 Gbbl

Iraq
115

Kuwait
101

United Arab Emrites
70

Venezuela
53

Former Soviet Union
48

Nigeria
37

Libya
34

USA
21.7

China
16

Mexico
12.3

Canada
12

Brazil
11.9

Algeria
11.3

Angola
9

Norway
8

Sudan
6.1

Indonesia
5.0

India
4

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Shouldn’t we therefore
discourage oil usage?

•  In this country, so far no such thing!

•  U.S. taxes on gasoline are 6.5 times lower than in
most industrialized countries (about 32 cents per
gallon in the U.S.)

•  No meaningful increase in CAFE or efficiency
standards

•  Efforts on the part of the U.S. to keep oil prices
low have lead to numerous questionable actions
on the international scene

Natural Gas

•  Extracted as oil-drilling byproduct

–  was once burned off at well head as means of disposal

•  Mostly methane, some ethane, and a little propane,
butane

•  2 times cheaper than electricity per energy content,
comparable to gasoline per joule

–  But getting more expensive; in 2004, nat gas was 3.5
times cheaper than electricity, now only 2.1 times cheaper
than electricity (for same energy) (and 2.5 times cheaper
than current gasoline)

•  Well-suited to on-the-spot heat generation: water
heaters, furnaces, stoves/ovens, clothes dryers

–  more efficient than using fossil-fuel-generated electricity

–  Less CO2 than burning gasoline or coal

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Distribution of natural gas

•  Impractical to ship: must route by pipe

•  1.3 million miles of pipe (250,000 miles of mains)

How much do we use, and where do we get it?

•  In 2003, we used 21.8 Tcf (Tera-cubic feet, or 1012ft3); about 23
QBtu (23% of total)

–  (Luckily 1QBtu ~ 1 Tcf nat gas)

•  Out of the 21.8 tcf used, 88% was domestic

–  11.8% from Canada

–  0.08% from Algeria (shipped in liquefied form)

–  0.03% from Mexico

•  Total U.S. has used about 1,100 Tcf to date

•  You pay about SDG&E about $1.10/therm (they pay about
$0.56/therm; therm (=100,000Btu) is about 100cf of nat gas
(electicity is about $0.14/kWh => 1 therm worth of electricity
costs about $4.00

(1 therm worth of gasoline costs about:

($4.10/gal)(1 gal /125,000Btu)(100,000Btu/1 therm) = $3.28.

(nat gas that contains 1 gal gas worth of energy costs about:

($1.1/therm)(1 therm/100,000Btu)(125,000Btu/1gal gas) = $1.38/gal

So if your car ran off natural gas it would cost about $1.38 gal equivalent

Q

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How much do we have left?

•  Estimated recoverable amount: 871 tcf

•  40 years at current rate

•  Estimates like this do account for future discoveries

–  present proven reserves provide only 8 years’ worth

–  Are discoveries going to be made as predicted? (2006 numbers now show proved reserves at about
204 tcf, not 189)

–  And above assumes we don’t increase usage of this cleaner and cheaper energy source

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Countries with top nat gas reserves (World Oil Journal 2006)

Russia
1689 (Tcf)
290 Gboe

Iran
965
160

Quatar
906
150

Saudi Arabia
243
41

UAE
205
35

USA
204
35

Nigeria
182
31

Algeria
160
27

Venezuela
151
26

Australia
120
20

Indonesia
92
16

Iraq
84
14

Norway
83
14

Eygpt
67
11

Kazakhstan
65
11

Malaysia
58
10

Kuwait
57
10

China
56
10

Canada
54
9

Libya
52
9

Netherlands
51
9

Afghanistan and natural gas?

Check the article: by John Foster

http://www.policyalternatives.ca/documents/National_Office_Pubs/2008/

A_Pipeline_Through_a_Troubled_Land.pdf

TAPI backed by U.S. runs through Taliban Kandhar areas; U.S. opposes IPI which would help
Iran (both cost around 7 billion $).

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World Natural gas

•  Total proven reserves about 6200 Tcf ~ 1060Gboe
~ 6000 Qbtu, about same energy content as
world’s oil proven reserves

•  U.S. only 3% of total

•  Undiscovered amount quite uncertain

•  Could also get methane from coal seams, fracking
shale deposits, deep sea hydrates; potentially large
amounts

•  LNG: Transport at T=-260F makes 600 times
smaller volume

Coal

•  Coal is a nasty fuel that we seem to have a lot of

•  Primarily carbon, but some volatiles (CO, CH4)

•  Reaction is essentially C + O2 → CO2 + energy

•  Energy content varies depending on quality of
coal, ranging from 5–8 Cal/g

•  Highly polluting because of large amounts of ash,
sulphur dioxide, arsenic, and other pollutants, plus
must dig up ground over large areas

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Coal

•  Coal made differently from other fossil
fuels and found differently

•  Starting 300 million years ago, swamps

•  Lies in strata called seams 2-8ft thick
usually about 300 ft down

•  In U.S. Rocky Mountain coal is cleanest,
but not highest energy content.

American Coal

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Western Coal

Cal/lb

Natural
Coal types and composition

Graphite fixed carbon 3700

Anthracite ash 3200

Bituminous 3800

Bituminous 3400
sub-
bituminous 2900

Lignite 2700

Peat moisture content 2300

Wood volatile matter 2200

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kJ/g

Natural
Coal types and composition

Graphite fixed carbon 34

Anthracite ash 29

Bituminous 35

Bituminous 31
sub-
bituminous 27

Lignite 25

Peat moisture content 21

Wood volatile matter 20

Use of Coal

•  88% of the coal used in the U.S. makes
steam for electricity generation

•  7.7% is used for industry and transportation

•  3.5% used in steel production

•  0.6% used for residential and commercial
purposes

•  0.00001% used on Halloween for trick-or-
treaters

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US Coal Production

1,000
Annual Production, Mt .

Total

500

West of the
Mississippi

0
1850 1900 1950 2000

•  Data from the USGS (Robert Milici)

•  Will consider the East and the West separately

(Dave Rutledge: Caltech 2007)

Anthracite in Pennsylvania

80
Annual Production, Mt .

60

40

20

0
1850 1900 1950
•  Data from the USGS (Robert Milici)

•  Anthracite is a grade of coal used for home heating that burns with little smoke

(Dave Rutledge: Caltech 2007)

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Growth-Rate Plot for PA Anthracite

6%
Growth Rate for Cumulative

4%

2%

0%
0 1 2 3 4 5
Cumulative Production, Gt
•  Data from the USGS (Robert Milici) cumulative from 1800, symbols 1875-1995

•  16% of the 1913 reserves were eventually produced

(Dave Rutledge: Caltech 2007)

Estimated Worldwide Coal Reserves

Country
Amount
Percentage

(G tonne/Gboe)
of Total

United States
250 Gtonne / 1400 Gboe
25

Russia
230 / 1290
23

Europe
138 / 770
14

China
115 / 640
12

Australia
82 / 460
8.3

Africa
55 / 300
5.6

South America
22 / 120
2.2

Mex/Canada
7.7 / 40
0.8

Total
984 Gtonne / 5300 Gboe
100

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When will coal run out?

Note numbers

are much larger

than current

estimates; the

estimates changed

recently!

•  We use 109 tonnes of coal per year, so the U.S. supply alone could last as
long as 250 years at current rate

•  Using variable rate model, more like 75-100 years

–  especially relevant if oil, gas are gone

•  This assumes global warming doesn’t end up banning the use of coal

•  Environmental concerns over extraction also relevant

Shale Oil

•  Possibly 600–2000 billion barrels of oil in U.S.
shale deposits

–  compare to total U.S. oil supply of max 230 billion bbl

•  Economically viable portion may only be 80
billion bbl

•  8 times less energy density than coal

–  lots of waste rock: large-scale disposal problem

–  takes lots of water

•  Maximum rate of extraction may be only 5% of
our current rate of oil consumption

–  limited by water availability

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Fort McMurray, Alberta

Oil Sands

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Tar Sands

•  Sand impregnated with viscous tar-like sludge

•  Huge deposit in Alberta, Canada

–  300 billion bbl possibly economically recoverable

–  Perhaps 1/3 of world total

•  It takes two tons of sands to create one barrel of oil

–  energy density similar to that of shale oil, much less
than coal

–  Needs to be heated => Canada nuclear plant just for
that!

–  Takes lots of water

•  In 2003, 1 million bbl/day produced

•  2002 production cost was $20 per barrel, so economically
competitive;

Canadian Oil Sands

•  1.0 Mb per day in 2005, increasing 8% per year

•  35Gb reserves for mining (comparable to one year of
world oil production)

•  140Gb reserves for wells

–  Production with a steam process

–  Production and upgrading to synthetic crude oil use 25% of
the oil energy equivalent in natural gas

–  Canadian gas reserves are 10Gboe (end of 2005)

–  Annual gas production is 12% of reserves per year

–  Challenges in meeting obligations under the Kyoto
agreement

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Question

1.  List the current useful reserves of fossil fuels from largest
to smallest

a.  oil, nat gas, coal, tar sands, shale oil

b.  Coal, oil, nat gas, tar sands, shale oil

c.  Natural gas, coal, oil, tar sands, shale oil

d.  Tar sands, shale oil, coal, natural gas, oil

e.  None of the above s correct

Summary of world fossil fuel sources

•  Oil:

1000 Gbbl (trend) - 1500 Gbbl

•  Nat gas:
~1000 Gboe (proved) -? (exploration not as complete as oil)

•  Tar sands:
~500 Gboe (quite uncertain how much economically recoverable)

•  Rutledge uses Hubbert trend analysis to estimate total liquid/gas
hydrocarbons to be 3000Gboe; German govt. says 2700Gboe

•  Coal: World Energy Council (used by DoE) says ~5000 Gboe, but
Hubbert type trend analysis says only 3200 Gboe; IPCC uses old
numbers of 18000 Gboe (important since burning this gives predictions of climate
change, sea level rise, etc.)

•  Shale oil:
80Gboe - 800Gboe or more depending on price, etc.

•  Deep sea clathrate (methane hydrates): could be more energy in
these than all of the above combined! (but no one has figured out how to get at
them and to turn it in to useful energy)

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Growth-Rate Plot for World

Hydrocarbons

6%

Growth Rate for Cumulative .

4%

2% Trend line for

3Tboe remaining

0%
0 1 2 3

Cumulative Production, trillion barrels of oil equivalent

•  Oil + natural gas + natural gas liquids like propane and butane

•  Data 1965, 1972, 1981, 2006 BP Statistical Review (open 1960-1982, closed 1983-2005)

•  The German resources agency BGR gives hydrocarbon reserves as 2.7Tboe

–  Expectation of future discoveries and future OPEC oil reserve reductions

–  Includes 500Gboe for non-conventional sources like Canadian oil sands

World Hydrocarbon Production

4
Cumulative Production,Tboe .

3Tboe remaining
1

0
1960 1980 2000 2020 2040 2060 2080 2100

•  Cumulative normal (ultimate 4.6Tboe, lms fit for mean 2018, sd 35 years)

•  IPCC scenarios assume that 11 to 15Tboe is available

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Reserves-to-Production Ratio for UK Coal

900

R/P ratio, years 600

300

0
0 50 100
Years since Edward Hull's
Reserve Survey in 1864

•  1864 reserves from Edward Hull of the Geological Survey

•  Other data from the World Energy Council Surveys

•  Current R/P ratio is 7 years

Cumulative British Coal

Production

Cumulative Production, Gt .

Pre-war fit
20

Post-war fit

10

0
1850 1900 1950 2000

•  Pre-war lms fit (1854-1945, ultimate 25.6Gt, mean 1920, sd 41 years)

•  Post-war lms fit (1946-2006, ultimate 27.2Gt, mean 1927, sd 39 years)

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Why Are Coal Reserves Too High?

•  It seems likely that
there are many social,
environmental, and
technical hindrances
that are not fully taken
into account in the
reserve estimates

•  The German Energy
Watch Group was early
in pointing out that
there is a problem with
reserves worldwide

•  Here are some technical
restrictions from the
USGS 2000 National
Coal Assessment for
the Illinois basin

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