The Muslim News - Environment news

Issue 223, Friday 30 November 2007 - 19 Dhu al-Qa'dah 1428

Environment news

By Ala Abbas

ntransigence in the face of energy crisis warnings

Scientists, economists and oil industry-insiders have criticised governments and oil companies for denying the facts and figures that portend a potential world energy crisis.
Scientists at the London-based Oil Depletion Analysis Centre, say that global production of oil is set to peak in the next four years, what is called ‘peak oil’ theory, before entering a steep decline which will have massive consequences for the world economy and the way that we live our lives. If consumption begins to exceed production by any amount, the price of oil could soar above $100 a barrel and a global recession would follow.
Head of the Depletion Centre, Colin Campbell, said: “It’s quite a simple theory and one that any beer drinker understands. The glass starts full and ends empty and the faster you drink it the quicker it’s gone.”
Dr Campbell, a former chief geologist and vice-president at a string of oil majors including BP, Shell, Fina, Exxon and ChevronTexaco, explains that the peak of regular oil had already come and gone in 2005, and that even when you factor in the more difficult to extract heavy oil, deep sea reserves, polar regions and liquid taken from gas, the peak will come as soon as 2011.
BP’s Statistical Review of World Energy is the most widely used estimate of world oil reserves but Dr Campbell claims it is only a summary of highly political estimates supplied by governments and oil companies.
Chris Skrebowski, a former long-term planner for BP turned ‘peak oil’ theorist, who now edits the Petroleum Review, said, “I was extremely sceptical to start with,” but now admits, “We have enough capacity coming online for the next two-and-a-half years. After that the situation deteriorates.”
This scenario is flatly denied by BP chief economist, Peter Davies. However, even BP’s more optimistic Statistical Review forecasts reserves lasting for up to 40 years of consumption at current rates, without accounting for increased consumption over that period and without forecasting what the situation will be after 40 years.
BP’s review shows that world demand for oil has grown faster in the past five years than in the second half of the 1990s. Today, we consume an average of 85 million barrels daily. According to estimates from the International Energy Agency, that figure will rise to 113 million barrels by 2030.
Two-thirds of the world’s oil reserves lie in the Middle East. A survey of the four countries with the biggest reported reserves - Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq and Kuwait - reveals major concerns, with Iran, this year, becoming the first major oil producer to introduce oil rationing.
Alternatives to petroleum in the form of biofuels (ethanol distilled from corn and maize crops), have been widely condemned across the globe as a red herring.
The British Government is already supporting biofuels by means of fuel duty incentives and wants to offer further support to biofuels in order to deliver future targets through either fuel duty (as the Government uses presently), or through some form of regulatory mandate or obligation.
But Professor of Environmental Technology at Surrey University, Roland Clift, who sits on the Scientific Advisory Council of the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, (Defra) said: “Biodiesel is a complete scam, because in the tropics the growing demand is causing forests to be burnt to make way for palm oil and similar crops. We calculate that the land will need to grow biodiesel crops for 70-300 years to compensate for the CO2 emitted in forest destruction.”
The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) published research that shows that more than 70 per cent of Europe’s farmland would be required for biofuel crops to account for even ten percent of road transport fuel.

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