(blue = exports, red = imports)
However, as the folks at The Oil Drum point out, there's three big problems with this. The first is that the Middle East almost certainly doesn't have that much new oil:
[T]he [projected] growth in [oil] supply comes by and large from about 40mbd of "Exploration Potential"....OPEC [oil] production at the moment...is just around 30mbd. So the NPC wants us to believe that there is a whole other OPEC plus a third waiting to be discovered. (emphasis mine)Here's a graph of new oil discoveries over the past few decades:
(blue = past discoveries, red = future discoveries)
That doesn't look promising.
The second problem is that the Middle East may not even have the oil they say they have now. In the mid-80s, Middle East countries all reported a sudden huge increase in the amount of oil they had in the ground. Coincidentally, this was exactly the time when Middle Eastern oil production switched from Western companies to Arab government-owned oil companies. Think they might be lying? You wouldn't be the only one.
Maybe that's why, earlier this year, Kuwait suddenly reported that it only had half the oil it had previously claimed. Hmm. Could a similar thing happen with Saudi Arabia?
The third problem, of course, is politics in the Middle East. Consider Iraq, where politics comes from the barrel of an AK-47. Iraqi oil production has crashed, and isn't likely to recover until the war is over. Which is to say, not for a long time. And then there's Iran, where oil money is doled out to supporter of the regime instead of reinvested, and where sanctions have denied the government the technology to improve oil extraction. In other words, the Middle East is not a very reliable place to get oil from.
The Oil Drum sums it up:
So in summary, the NPC report is saying that production will increase by around 25% over the next twenty five years, but this increase is entirely reliant on finding large amounts of new oil, mainly in the Middle East. Unfortunately, it is rather unlikely that the existing claims of oil reserves in the Middle East are true, and even less likely that massive amounts more oil can be found there. Even if it could, the Middle East is the least politically stable region of the world, and relying ever more heavily on it for critical inputs to our economy is likely to be fairly painful at regular intervals.In other words: Bye bye, oil.
So what are we going to do about it? Quietly, America's big oil companies have suggested increasing vehicle fuel economy:
Based on a detailed review of technological potential, a doubling of fuel economy of new cars and light-trucks by 2030 is possible through the use of existing and anticipated technologies, assuming vehicle performance and other attributes remain the same as today. The 4 percent annual gain in CAFE standards starting in 2010 that President George W. Bush suggested in his 2007 State of the Union speech is not inconsistent with a potential doubling of fuel economy for new light duty vehicles by 2030. Depending upon how quickly new vehicle improvements become incorporated in the full fleet average, it should be possible to lower U.S. oil demand by about 3-5 million barrels per day by 2030. Additional fuel economy improvements would be possible by reducing vehicle weight, horsepower, and amenities, or by developing more expensive, step-out technologies.Great. After decades of using all their power and influence to discourage the shift to more fuel-efficient technologies, big oil companies are suggesting that, oh yeah, it might be time to start thinking about conserving oil after all. Is it possible to somehow kick these people out of our country?
My only consolation is that, with oil running out, Exxon's days are numbered.
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