Random Rambling

Michael Crichton, RIP

Michael Crichton passed away on November 4th, 2008. Mr. Crichton, “the father of the techno-thriller,” is the author of 21 books including The Andromeda Strain, Congo, Jurassic Park, Timeline, The Lost World, Prey, and State of Fear, selling more than 150 million copies and translated into 36 languages, with twelve made into films. The recipient of an Emmy, a Peabody, and a Writer’s Guild of America award for the TV series, ER, he is a graduate of Harvard Medical School, and has been Visiting Lecturer in Anthropology at Cambridge University; Henry Russell Shaw Traveling Fellow; post-doctoral fellow at the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences; and Visiting Writer, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Michael Crichton’s latest best-seller, State of Fear, an indictment of Climate Change Fear Mongering, may in time be viewed as a landmark, both cautionary and prophetic. Is environmental debate today, including global warming, bio-technology, and other issues, based on science or politics? Are popular accounts of such issues rooted in science or phantom risks? Are government policies focusing on the trivial while ignoring the real, and in the process wasting limited resources, crippling human innovation to address true dangers, and inviting tyranny?

Statistical Illusions:

There is nothing scientific about Climate Models. Climate Models in many ways resemble econometrics and statistical modeling used by Keynesian and Monetarist economists. Models are statistical illusions. Economists who make prognostications about the future based on econometric models are often proven wrong, and when they are right, it is purely out of luck. That doesn't stop economists from continuously making new statistical predictions about the future.

There is no denying that certain trends in economy can be prescienlty predicted, but that always comes from understanding of the laws of economics and an understanding of human behavior. These factors are subjective and impossible to quantify.

Then there is the Heisenberg's uncertainity principle: Observation affects the observed - Heisenberg was speaking about subatomic particles. Mises spoke about the same certainity regarding human behavior. Once people get the wind of certain trends, crowding into that trend will make the trend null and void. Or if human beings get to know that they are being observed for certain purposes, they consciously or subconciously adjust their behavior.

Statistics is one of the most misused branch of mathematics. You can look at data from the financial markets correlate it to planetory positions and may be able to find that they follow some obscure patterns, but that doesn't make it a scientific truth. There are infact financial advisors who help you make investments based on astrology ;-)

Statisticians look at patterns in the past and they project it into the future, but often to their dismay, the future fail to resemble the past. According to these geniuses, if market has been going up, their models will predict that they will continue to go up. If globe has been warming, it will continue to heat up. Then much to their chagrin, future fails to resemble the past.

Black Swan is a term popularized by statistician finance professor Nassim Nicholas Taleb, who wrote a book by the same title - "Black Swan: Impact of the Highly Improbable." The term Black Swan would have been an oxymoron in the good old days a few centuries ago, because swans by definition were always white. Then the Europeans started colonizing australia in 1788, and they found black swans for the first time.

Once of the recent black swan event was the historical election of Mr. Barack Obama to the presidency of the United States of America. It was a statistical impossibility. If you sample the data, none of the previous 43 U.S Presidents were of African American ethnicity, which should make some statisticians conclude that probability of a black person getting elected as the Commander in Chief is 0. Yes, Mr. Obama overcame great odds, but it is impossible to overcome zero odds, and one would be crazy to even attempt. We know there are more factors affecting the electability of a person than just his/her race.

Another example that Mr. Taleb sites in his book is the life of a Turkey. Turkey grows up on a farm. It's life is rather easy - the farmer takes care of it, every morning it wakes up and there is enough food to eat, provided by the farmer of course. One day is hardly different from the other. Then, one fine morning in november, Turkey gets jolted from it's sleep and gets its head chopped off - Happy Thanks Giving.

Global Warming theory is nothing like Theory of Relativity or Boyle's law. There are very little if any, absolute, proven, and quantifiable relations between the various factors that affect the climate. Scientists may not even know entire list of factors that affect global climate and how precisely these factors interact with each other.

Is it really random rambling? or is there a statistical pattern to it?

Cool It

If you have exposed yourself to jet set/carbon trader/gazillionaire Al Gore's global warming propaganda (I have), you owe it yourself to know the other side of the debate( debate is hardly over ). I found this book very interesting - "Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming ".

Or you could watch "The Great Global Warming Swindle". It is free on video.google.com

Or you could read this short article - "I was on the global warming gravy train".

After having observed the environmentists for a while, I have come to the conclusion that environmentalism is a religion, a very intolerant one. According to the environmentalists, if you refuse to dogmatically follow the Gaia any other intolerant enviro-doctrine, you will fry along with the rest of the planet. In that respect, environmentalists are very similar to evangelicals - they both peddle salvation.

Radical environmentalists believe that the earth's human carrying capacity is about 400 million. They hope and pray for a massive human die-off that will reduce the population by 90% ( Oil Shock is not making this up ). Their view of the human race is akin to that of a virus/disease that should be stopped.

In other news from the energy universe, protests in europe turn violent

(Images courtesy of Mish's global economic analysis )

Carbon control treaties were meant to raise the price of fuel and reduce consumption. Now that the treaty getting closer to achieving its stated goals, the carbonistas don't like the outcome.

It is even silly to believe that a bunch of Soviet style central planners could just press a few buttons, pull a few levers and there by command and control the global climate.

Am I suggesting that the environmentalists the only reason for the pain at the pump? Not at all. But the NIMBY/BANANA groupies are adding to the troubles.

Peak oil Linkfest - 07/13/07

President: Iran not to halt uranium enrichment work

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says the West should not expect his country to suspend uranium enrichment. He made the comment as a delegation from the UN nuclear watchdog arrives in Tehran.


Reader Mail: Peak Oil, Global Economy Shifts Away From US Towards Asia

Some questions about Peak Oil from a reader. And by the way, while we don’t always have space to publish your questions and comments in the e-mail edition of the Daily Reckoning, there is plenty of room in the comments section under any post on the website. You can respond directly to other readers, too. Here’s a question:


Play peak oil before you live it

On April 30, 2007, an oil crisis shook the world. Supply chains were interrupted, and in the ensuing weeks the price of gas pushed higher and higher, peaking around $7 per gallon. The American economy sputtered to a halt as shortages spread -- Detroit's car factories cited lack of demand and shut down for the duration, trucking fleets scrambled for fuel to move their cargo, supermarkets jacked up their prices, and commuters bitched and moaned and grudgingly changed their lifestyles. Looting broke out, along with the occasional riot.


IEA boss denies and confirms peak oil in same breath

It seems that the International Energy Agency, the intergovernmental energy watchdog, has been going in overdrive lately. First, we had the interview of its chief economist warning us that we were going toward a wall without Iraqi oil, then the recent publication of their yearly outlook report predicting shortages within 5 years, and now we have another disquieting interview in Le Monde, the big French daily, with Claude Mandil, the head of the Agency, who pulls no punches, despite an apparent denial of "peak oil". Follow me below the fold for a translation.


OPEC says no plans for increased production; crude prices continue upward

Light, sweet crude for August delivery was up 99 cents a barrel to trade at $73.55 midday on the Nymex. London Brent crude made its way above $76 a barrel before settling at $75.44 a barrel – up $1.36.


Why does Kuwait keep its oil reserves secret?

Kuwait's Acting Oil Minister Mohammad Al-Olaim has reaffirmed the oil reserves at 100 billion barrels under the pressure from the members of parliament.

Some lawmakers had threatened not to pass this year's budget, which is with a projected deficit of around 10.3 billion U.S. dollars, if the oil sector didn't tell them the truth about the country's oil reserves.


Global Warming May Spawn Floods of Beaches and Cities

Global warming may spawn more flooding at northeastern U.S. beaches and cities and disrupt the ski industry unless heat-trapping emissions are curbed, scientists said in a report.


'Swindle' director hits back at critics

THE director of a controversial documentary about global warming airing on ABC television tonight says he's been vilified for challenging popular theory.

Briton Martin Durkin directed The Great Global Warming Swindle, which seeks to debunk the idea that climate change is being caused by human activity.


The Peak Oil Crisis: A Tale of Two Reports

In the last few days, two important reports on the prospects for world oil production were “released.” While these reports reach diametrically opposite conclusions, each of them, in its own way, is likely to make a contribution to the debate over just when the economic troubles occasioned by the peaking of world oil production will occur.


Platts Survey: OPEC Oil Output Up Slightly in June, Well Above Target

The 10 members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) bound by the group's crude oil output agreements boosted production by 40,000 barrels per day (b/d) to 26.6 million b/d in June, from a revised May level of 26.56 million b/d, a Platts survey showed July 11. This is well above the 25.8 million b/d production target set in February by the so-called OPEC-10.


Net Oil Exports and the "Iron Triangle"

As Matt Simmons pointed out several years ago, the critical problem with post-peak exporting regions is that we would have two exponential functions (declining production and generally increasing consumption) working against net exports. From the point of view of importers, it is quite likely that we are facing a crash in oil supplies. In my opinion, what I have described as the “Iron Triangle” is doing everything possible to keep this message from reaching consumers.


U.K. Parliament Members Form `Peak Oil' Study Group

The U.K. parliament formed a group to study peak oil, the theory that world oil production is approaching its zenith, as British lawmakers face up to the country's future as an energy importer.

The All-Party Parliamentary Group on Peak Oil and Gas, which held its first meeting June 26, comprises 32 members of the House of Commons, or lower chamber, and seven from the House of Lords, or upper chamber.


Ethanol Boondoggle: Your Taxes at Work

In recent years, the price of gasoline has soared as the supply of crude oil has risen in response to unprecedented global demand. But never fear, Uncle Sam is here! Citing the need to decrease our country’s dependence on foreign and potentially unreliable sources of energy, Congress, encouraged by President Bush, has passed laws mandating that ever-greater quantities of corn-based ethanol (CBE) be produced, and subsidizing this production with tens of billions of dollars. Could it be that our leaders are finally demonstrating bipartisan unity for the good of the country? Well, “unity,” yes, “good,” no.


The Coming Conflict in the Arctic

Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President George W. Bush spent most of their time at the “lobster summit” at Kennebunkport, Maine, discussing how to prevent the growing tensions between their two countries from getting out of hand.

The media and international affairs experts have been portraying missile defense in Europe and the final status of Kosovo as the two most contentious issues between Russia and the United States, with mutual recriminations over “democracy standards” providing the background for the much anticipated onset of a new Cold War. But while this may well be true for today, the stage has been quietly set for a much more serious confrontation in the non-too-distant future between Russia and the United States – along with Canada, Norway and Denmark.


Climate Expert Questions Gore's Global Warming Campaign

This past weekend concerts took place around the world to focus attention on the problem of global warming, which former U.S. Vice President Al Gore says is the greatest single threat facing humankind today. Most of the world's scientists agree that it is a problem and that it is largely caused by human use of fossil fuels, which produce so-called greenhouse gases that trap the Earth's heat. Al Gore and scientists who wrote the United Nations report on climate change say the debate is over and the time has come to act. But some prominent climate scientists are objecting to that, claiming that the debate has yet to even begin. VOA's Greg Flakus recently spoke to one of them and filed this report from Fort Collins, Colorado.


The biofuel myths

The term "biofuels" suggests renewable abundance: clean, green, sustainable assurance about technology and progress. This pure image allows industry, politicians, the World Bank, the United Nations and even the International Panel on Climate Change to present fuels made from corn, sugarcane, soy and other crops as the next step in a smooth transition from peak oil to a yet-to-be-defined renewable fuel economy.


Kuwait and IEA Show Declining Oil Production Future

Crude oil prices could reach levels of US$100 per barrel or more if some of the latest production factors in the news become reality.

Not only has the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA), the energy watchdog of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, warned in its latest medium-term oil market report that a market crunch is looming over around 2012, but some OPEC producers are breaking even more negative news. After a short analysis hype in the beginning of 2006, analysts have been forgetting to cover OPEC countries currently battling reserve issues.


Peak Oil Now?

Demand for oil is continuing to grow, and threatens to burn up excess oil capacity by 2012, according to a new report released today by the International Energy Agency.

Excess capacity in OPEC is forecast to drop by 2 million gallons per day by 2009, and to virtually zero out by 2012. It won’t take until 2012 — or 2009 for that matter — for the cost of that tight supply to ripple through the economy straight down to the American homeowner and car driver.

Peak Oil Linkfest - 07/08/07

Around the Markets: Biofuel demand gives lift to commodities

Sugar, corn, wheat and cotton may be among the best commodity investments in the next one to three years, driven by biofuel demand and rising incomes in China and India, according to UBS, the world's largest money manager.

"Investors can expect to see a 6 to 10 percent plus return per year on those investments," Stuart Fox, UBS's head of commodities in Asia Pacific, said by phone from Hong Kong. His energy and commodities traders and sales team in Asia has more than tripled to 16 people in the past 12 months.


Green facade: Why the state's eco-friendly cars aren't doing the job

During the past two years, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's administration sunk more than $17 million into a state fleet of cars and trucks designed to be environmentally friendly.

So far, the 1,138 "flex-fuel" vehicles have traveled a collective 10 million miles and burned more than 413,202 gallons of gas.


Real Alternative Energy Sources

If Congress is going to subsidize energy to free us from dependence on foreign oil, it should — at the very least — spend our hard-earned taxpayer dollars on something that will work.

The unfortunate truth is that neither ethanol nor any other so-called renewable alternative energy now being discussed on Capitol Hill is likely to make any significant contribution to our energy needs.


Marchetti's Curves

This is a brief account of the Energy Susbstitution Model developed by Cesare Marchetti in the 1970s at IIASA. Using data from the latest BP Statistical Review the evolution of the energy market is compared with the model to understand why the Hubbert Peak of fossils fuels represents a problem today.


World 'building up risks over energy supplies'

The world is not running out of crude oil and natural gas but there are 'accumulating risks' to securing global supplies through 2030, a high-level board of US oil company executives found in a report.Those risks include "political hurdles, infrastructure requirements and availability of trained workforce," according to the study by the US National Petroleum Council, conducted at the behest of US Energy Secretary Sam Bodman.

The NPC, whose members include executives of big oil companies like ExxonMobil and Chevron, will present the study at its July 18 meeting.


Oil hits 10-month high near $75 on Nigeria, demand

Oil surged over 2 percent to nearly $75 a barrel on Thursday on strong demand and as fresh violence in Nigeria spurred supply concerns.

London crude rebounded after slipping from earlier highs on U.S. government data that showed crude supplies rising and refiners ramping up gasoline output to meet summer holiday driving demand.


Is Fear About Climate Change Causing a Nuclear Renaissance?

Some prominent environmentalists are urging that we reconsider nuclear power. But they have been met with resistance from many who believe nuclear power never will be a solution to global warming.

Sitting in the belly of the beast -- Dominion's 2,000-megawatt Millstone nuclear power plant in Waterford, Connecticut -- the company's chief nuclear officer, Dave Christian, seems an unlikely environmentalist. But he says concern about climate change is what got him involved in the peaceful pursuit of the atom in the first place.


IAEA: Iran Slowing Expansion of Nuclear Enrichment Capabilities

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency says Iran has slowed the expansion of its nuclear enrichment capabilities.

In Vienna Monday, Mohamed ElBaradei said IAEA inspectors have seen a slowing in the installation of centrifuges that enrich uranium at Iran's Natanz nuclear facility.


Opec has little power to ease oil price – Algeria

Algeria’s Energy and Mines Minister Chakib Khelil said yesterday there was “not much” Opec could do to bring down high oil prices as global crude stocks were already sufficient.

“There is plenty of stocks. It’s a problem with capacity and refining,” Khelil said ahead of a gas pipeline conference in Brussels. “Even if it (Opec) increases production, it’s just going to increase stocks and not have any effect because prices are drawn by petroleum product prices.”


World facing oil ‘supply crunch’ as demand soars, agency warns

The world faces an energy squeeze as soaring demand for fuel exceeds the rate of growth in the supply of crude oil, the West’s leading energy forecaster has predicted.

In a gloomy appraisal of the global oil balance, the International Energy Agency yesterday predicted a world of increasing market tightness beyond 2010. The world faces a “supply crunch” by 2012, according to the agency’s Medium-Term Oil Market Report, with weak increases in oil output from nonOpec countries colliding with strong demand and diminished spare capacity within the cartel of oil producers.


Exploding a fair few wordy myths

AFTER recent comments from Defence Minister Brendan Nelson, debate is raging over whether America and Australia went to war in Iraq because of oil.

This is absurd. Nobody was more surprised to discover that Iraq had oil than the Allies. Goodness, with all that fuel around, it was just as well that those weapons of mass destruction were only prevented from exploding by the fact that they didn't exist. Otherwise, the whole country could have gone up in flames. Oh, wait a minute … Anyway, here are some ideas that should probably be blown up.


Iran's oil output to fall without investment - report

Iran's oil production capacity will fall by five percent a year without new investment, a senior oil official was quoted on Sunday as saying by the Iran's student news agency ISNA.

Iranian officials have previously put production capacity at a little more than 4 million barrels per day (bpd), with actual output -- limited to a quota set by the oil cartel OPEC -- running at a little below 4 million bpd.


Corn ethanol could be a dead end

As the nation fights to lower its dependence on foreign oil and Colorado works toward a new energy economy, the buzz word in energy circles is “ethanol,” and using it to power cars, trucks and electricity has become a hot topic.

But as the conversation continues, ethanol experts and politicians are beginning to agree that corn-based ethanol may not be the magic energy solution many have come to see it as.


Can I diet my way to a lighter eco footprint?

Lose weight and save the planet. It has all the hallmarks of a zeitgeist diet book and perhaps a TV series in which I will travel around putting punters on scales, measuring out their porridge for the day, and perhaps changing their light bulbs. But there is some validity to the idea that you can simultaneously shrink your waistline and your carbon footprint.

An extra 100lb of weight carried in your car, for example, reduces fuel economy by around 2 per cent. Even Richard Branson recently signed up to losing a stone before he takes an inaugural flight on one of the superlight carbon-fibre Boeing jets he has bought in order to save an extra 36lb of CO2. Given that his fleet allegedly produces 7.4m tonnes of CO2 a year, that's not a hugely rewarding diet


Will the coming oil crisis be the end of suburbia?

Three years ago, when I started to teach Introduction to Sociology for Lamar Community College, my brother sent me the DVD, “The End of Suburbia: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of the American Dream,” concerning the “coming oil crisis."

I showed it to my class to help the students better understand “social change” and what would happen to society during such a crisis. They hadn’t even heard that we were going to face such a crisis. It’s no surprise, most Americans hadn’t heard of it either; that was three years ago.


Peak Oil Passnotes: $80 Oil Beckons

The price of a barrel Brent crude is working its way back up to its records of $78.64 set last August 7. A steady and sure combination of factors has pushed it over $75 per barrel.

But when it pushes up against levels of $78 per barrel, which way is it going to go then?


Academic challenges global warming theory

An Australian academic has spoken out against the popular view that global warming is caused by greenhouse gas emissions. He believes that global warming and climate change are caused by cycles in the sun's electro-magnetic radiation. He says scientists are taking a narrow view and politicians are making policy with the wrong information.

Emeritus Professor Lance Endersbee AO is a former Dean of Engineering and Pro-Vice Chancellor of Monash University. He told Tom Harwood, ABC Western Queensland's Morning Program producer that the world has been warming naturally due to increased magnetic radiation from the sun.


Ethanol, Corn, Milk, Prices Increase

It appears that oil and gasoline aren't the only things that are going up in price these days. Milk, everyones favorite beverage, has gone up in price once again.From $3.80 to almost $5.00 a gallon. But milk however, isn't the only thing that will be on the rise. Other dairy products such as butter, cheese, yogurt, and ice cream will too.


Sugar, Grains, Cotton May Be Best Commodity Buys, UBS Forecasts

Sugar, corn, wheat and cotton may be among the best commodity investments in the next one to three years driven by biofuel demand and rising incomes in China and India, according to UBS AG, the world's largest money manager.

``Investors can expect to see a 6 to 10 percent plus return per year on those investments,'' Stuart Fox, UBS's head of commodities in Asia Pacific, said by phone from Hong Kong. His energy and commodities traders and sales team in Asia has more than tripled to 16 people in the past 12 months.


North Sea is running too dry to meet target

The energy industry warned yesterday that government targets of keeping Britain's oil and gas production at 3m barrels a day by 2010 look like being missed. North Sea competitiveness is falling and financial backers are losing confidence in the wake of tax increases introduced 18 months ago.

Civil servants have been working with oil companies to find ways to boost output offshore, but the 2007 Economic Report issued by the industry organisation Oil & Gas UK says the goal looks like being missed after five years of rising hopes.

Peak Oil Linkfest - 07/04/07

Bill Boyne: Oil reserves are drying up rapidly

A worldwide oil shortage is due in four years -- not 40 years.

That is the prediction of the Oil Depletion Analysis Centre in London, an organization of scientists and oil industry experts. It was reported by The Independent newspaper in England.


Canadian Spot Natural Gas Declines on Weather, U.S. Holiday

Natural gas at Canada's largest trading point fell as moderate weather is forecast for the country's largest cities and a U.S. holiday lessens demand.

The weather in Toronto is predicted to stay within a normal range until at least July 6, according to a forecast from the government's Environment Canada. Temperatures in Montreal, the country's second-biggest city after Toronto, may reach 24 degrees Celsius (75 degrees Fahrenheit) tomorrow, about 7.7 percent below its range.


Lake in Chile disappears; climate change blamed

Scientists on Tuesday blamed global warming for the disappearance of a glacial lake in remote southern Chile that faded away in just two months, leaving just a crater behind.
The disappearance of the lake in Bernardo O'Higgins National Park was discovered in late May by park rangers, who were stunned to find a 130-foot deep crater where a large lake had been.


Why the U.S.' Oil Dependence is Bad for the U.S. Economy

Energy policy -- or more specifically U.S. oil dependence -- comes and goes in media focus. Its prominence usually increases in direct proportion to the current price of oil or gas. In addition, there has been a growing movement called the "peak oil" movement, which argues world supplies are actually at or near their highest and will continually decline from here on out. While I can't comment on the veracity of peak oil's claims, I can state without a doubt that the U.S.' national energy policy -- and specifically our oil dependence -- is economically disadvantageous.


Iran's First Nuclear Power Plant to Go Online Soon

Russian news agencies are reporting that Iran will put its first nuclear power plant online shortly after the Russian-built facility is completed in September.

The news agencies Itar-Tass and Interfax quoted Iranian officials Tuesday as saying that the nuclear facility in Bushehr will be completed in two months.


Özyürek: World will see a uranium crisis

If the CHP forms the government, Özyürek will definitely become the energy and natural resources minister. Özyürek does not like nuclear energy. He argues that Turkey should abandon its nuclear energy plans. Instead, renewable energy resources should be given priority. He cautions the world about a uranium crisis similar to the infamous oil crisis. Therefore, existing and future nuclear power stations will become idle, he says. Özyürek notes that Turkey’s plans to become an energy corridor are about to be disrupted by Russia. Özyürek elaborated on his ideas about energy policies in an interview with Today’s Zaman.


Revenues from North Sea shrink as costs soar

Britain is earning less from the North Sea as soaring costs, a weak gas price and dwindling output erode company margins and crimp government tax receipts from oil industry profits.

UK Oil & Gas (UKOG), which represents Britain’s offshore oil industry, predicts that revenues will fall well short of Treasury forecasts. The lobby group said that weaker profit margins and higher taxes would drive investment overseas and cause a more rapid fall-off in UK oil and gas production.


'Peak oil' is coming soon say BP critics

Last month, the oil company BP, reported that there were sufficient oil reserves to meet current demands for another 40 years. It said there was no need to be concerned about global scarcity, despite cutting its estimates for proven reserves for the first time in 16 years. These claims have since been hotly disputed.


Crisis, what energy crisis?

The energy gap left by declining fossil Solar fuels may be filled by alternative sources of energy. In short, the Earth has ample supplies of energy to sustain human population and economic growth. Discuss....


Mexico President Calderon: Oil Exports Will Fall Further

Mexican President Felipe Calderon said Friday he expected the country's crude oil exports to slip further this year and next, continuing a decline seen in 2006.
"Starting in 2006, the volume of our oil exports has been falling at an alarming rate and from what we have observed up until now, this year and the next will be no exception," Calderon told a banking event.


North Sea output continues to drop despite record investment

The decline in oil and gas production in the UK North Sea continued in April, despite record investment in 2006, in what economists at Royal Bank of Scotland said was another sign that the province is maturing rapidly.

The latest oil and gas index from Royal Bank shows that combined average daily oil and gas production for the UK Continental Shelf stood at 2,823,141 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boe/d) in April. This was about 2.3% lower than in March, ending a run of six consecutive monthly increases. The underlying rate of production continued on a firmly downward trend, falling 7.8% compared with April last year.


The Rising and Falling Power of Hydrocarbon States

The global economy runs on oil. Unequal distribution of oil throughout the world bestows power on the few states with ample supplies. Venezuela is one example of a nation that uses oil as leverage in foreign affairs: Besides consolidating his popular base at home, President Hugo Chavez has helped debt-ridden countries in that region, openly mocks the US and signed an arms-procurement deal with Russia. Chavez also fosters ties with China, just in case the US decides to stop importing Venezuelan oil. Steady demand allows oil-rich nations to act without regard to the international opinion. The US cannot complain. The one-time leading producer of oil used its own supplies to manipulate foreign policy throughout the 1900s. But as the US has learned, the supply of oil is limited; nations and companies can conserve and seek alternatives. Author Dilip Hiro warns that the power derived from oil is only temporary. – YaleGlobal


A Nuclear Phoenix?

Sitting in the belly of the beast—Dominion’s 2,000-megawatt Millstone nuclear power plant in Waterford, Connecticut—the company’s chief nuclear officer, Dave Christian, seems an unlikely environmentalist. But he says concern about climate change is what got him involved in the peaceful pursuit of the atom in the first place.

“I started studying climate science in the 1970s after reading a book [published in 1974] entitled Technology, Society and Man by Richard C. Dorf,” Christian says. “It was a very thoughtful study of the feedback mechanisms that go into global warming.”


Business View: Why not pay them not to pump their oil?

Here's an idea. There are billions of barrels of oil left in the ground, much of it belonging to the world's poorer countries. And money from rich countries is pouring into carbon-offsetting projects, many of them of questionable science. So why not just pay countries to keep their oil in the ground and avoid the emissions in the first place?


Biofuels: The Five Myths of the Agro-fuels Transition

Biofuels. The term invokes a life-giving image of renewability and abundance—a clean, green, sustainable assurance in technology and the power of progress. This image allows industry, politicians, the World Bank, the United Nations, and even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change to present fuels made from corn, sugarcane, soy and other crops as the next step in a smooth transition from peak oil to a yet-to-be-defined renewable fuel economy. Drawing its power from a cluster of simple cornucopian myths, “biofuels” directs our attention away from the powerful economic interests that benefit from this transition. It avoids discussion of the growing North-South food and energy imbalance. More fundamentally, it obscures the political-economic relationships between land, people, resources and food. By showing us only one side, “biofuels” fails to help us understand the profound consequences of the industrial transformation of our food and fuel systems—The Agro-fuels Transition.

Economist Bjorn Lomborg: Global warming is not a priority

The Great Global Warming Swindle

Will Global Warming cause Florida to become Submerged by 2015?

Hysteria surrounding Global Warming continues to grow. Scientific theories project a severe rise in ocean water engulfing the East Coast of the U.S. as well as other regions around the world as the polar ice caps continue to melt.

Average air temperature near Earth's surface rose 0.74 ± 0.18 °C (1.3 ± 0.32 °F) during the last century. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concludes, "most of the observed increase in globally averaged temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations," which leads to warming of the surface and lower atmosphere by increasing the greenhouse effect.

Some Charts Removed From U.N. Report On Global Warming Some Nations Objected

Over the objections of some scientists at the United Nation's Working Group on global warming, some charts showing the effects of climate change were removed from the final report. The nations of the United States, China and Saudi Arabia had raised the most objections.

The changes left some scientists so frustrated that they vowed to never participate again, USA Today reported Friday.

Al Gore does 'disservice' by stirring alarm over global warming, scientist says

The United States' leading hurricane forecaster on Friday called Al Gore "a gross alarmist" for making the Oscar-winning documentary about global warming.

"He's one of these guys that preaches the end-of-the-world type of things. I think he's doing a great disservice and he doesn't know what he's talking about," Dr. William Gray said in an interview with The Associated Press at the National Hurricane Conference, where he delivered the closing speech.

End of oil heralds climate pain

Many people think that running out of oil, or "peak oil", would be good for the climate. In his new book The Last Oil Shock, David Strahan begs to differ; he suggests it may bring catastrophe.

It is becoming increasingly clear that global oil production will soon go into terminal decline, with potentially devastating economic consequences.

Mars Heats Up, Fuels Global Warming Debate

Skeptics over global warming have jumped on news that Mars is heating up to back their skepticism that humans are causing global warming on Earth.

The research, coming from U.S. planetary scientists, suggests that Mars warmed by about 0.65C from the 1970s to the 1990s. This is similar to Earth's 0.6C average temperature rise during the 20th century.

Oil, climate change threaten food supply: B.C. report

Climate change and rising oil prices are a threat to B.C.'s ability to feed itself in the future, scientists and planners say.

B.C. farmers produce only 48 per cent of the meat, dairy, fruit and vegetables that we consume, according to a report prepared by the B.C. Ministry of Agriculture. The report, titled B.C.'s Food Self-Reliance, says that the area of farmland with access to irrigation in B.C. would have to increase by nearly 50 per cent by 2025 to provide a healthy diet for all British Columbians.

Will Peak Oil make Pollution and Climate Change worse?

An author has released a book where he has analyzed the realities of peak oil and made some projections. One of them is that with the switch to alternative fuels to replace ever more expensive petroleum, that more carbon will be released, because of the huge areas that will be cleared for growing new fuel crops. Typically in most nations now that is done by burning, and what is needed is measured in thousands of square miles annually to be added to the fuel growing areas. He also points out that as oil declines and becomes vastly more expensive in terms of money and energy used to get it, inevitably coal will be used more, as global demand for energy will keep going up, regardless. In short, we won't be making any less extra CO2, just more, no matter what we do.

Climate change ‘could create 200m refugees’

EQUATORIAL lands that are home to hundreds of millions of people will become uninhabitable as food and water run out due to climate change, scientists will warn this week.

A report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), to be published on Friday, will warn that the temperature rises of 2-3C predicted by 2050 spell global disaster for both humanity and the environment.

Carbon Trade Swindle Behind Gore Hoax

Look behind—if you dare—Al Gore and his science hoax, and you find the very same London-centered oligarchical financial crew that drove the 2003-2006 oil and commodity price increase, amidst the bubbles and hyperinflation that characterize the breakdown-phase of the financial system. The centerpiece of the U.S. emerging market for carbon emissions trading, is the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX), created in 2003 as a "voluntary," or pilot agency, part of a London-based network positioned to reproduce the oil bubble on a scale orders of magnitude greater and more dangerous, while at the same time, destroying what's left of the physical economy.

In small town America, some say Ethanol boom will hurt more than help the environment

This tiny western Kansas town, with its single-story frame homes that sidle up to neatly plowed fields, looks like just the place for one of the new ethanol plants that have been turning up across the Midwest.

Many of the 400 people around here certainly could use the jobs and money the plant would bring in. But others are worried about how much water would be needed to run the plant and grow the corn that is the base for most U.S. ethanol and requires more water than many other crops.

Gore: Climate change "a planetary crisis"

Former Vice President Al Gore brought his global-warming message to Congress on Wednesday, using his newfound star status to push for aggressive and far-reaching policy changes.

"What we're facing now is a crisis that's the most serious we've ever faced," Gore told lawmakers on a House panel. "We do not have time to play around with this anymore."

The Convenient Truth

In October, British Prime Minister Tony Blair called for "radical international measures" to curtail greenhouse-gas emissions, and fast. "We can't wait the five years it took to negotiate Kyoto," he said. Apparently, 2012 is too late. In hopes of taking stronger steps, however, many U.S. environmentalists want to defer any legislation until President Bush is out of office. Apparently 2007 and 2008 are too early. That gives us precisely three years -- 2009, 2010, and 2011 -- to save the planet.