National Geographic On Peak Coal

[Graeme]

Study Concludes “Peak Coal” Will Occur Close to 2011

A multi-Hubbert analysis of coal production by Tadeusz Patzek at The University of Texas at Austin and Gregory Croft at the University of California, Berkeley concludes that the global peak of coal production from existing coalfields will occur close to the year 2011. The HHV of global production is likely to peak in 2011 at 160 EJ/y, and the peak carbon emissions from coal burning will also peak in 2011 at 4.0 Gt C (15 Gt CO2) per year, according to the study.

After 2011, the production rates of coal and CO2 decline, reaching 1990 levels by the year 2037, and reaching 50% of the peak value in the year 2047. It is unlikely that future mines will reverse the trend predicted in this business-as-usual (BAU) scenario, according to the study, which was published in the journal Energy. (The accompanying online supporting materials provide the analysis of production by country.)

The most important conclusion of this paper is that the peak of global coal production from the existing coalfields is imminent, and coal production from these areas will fall by 50% in the next 40 years. The CO2 emissions from burning this coal will also decline by 50%. Thus, current focus on carbon capture and geological sequestration may be misplaced. Instead, the global community should be devoting its attention to conservation and increasing efficiency of electrical power generation from coal.

greencarcongress

[Sixstrings]

After 2011, the production rates of coal and CO2 decline, reaching 1990 levels by the year 2037, and reaching 50% of the peak value in the year 2047.

Peak coal this soon? Wow, I thought a peak on coal was farther off. Anyway, will be good for the environment to start going backwards on emissions (even if it's because we're running out of carbon to burn).

[Pops]

Ol' Ted is still greasin the way for good old petroleum - ethanol is an energy loser, now a good excuse to not worry about climate change.

BP says 119 years R/P for coal

[Tanada]

Like Pops I have an exceedingly hard time believing PC will take place next year, we have way to much of the stuff laying around. Unlike Petroleum that comes mostly from wells and only allows you to get a modest percentage from the source rock all of the coal less than say 500 feet down can be strip mined and much of it will be. Just because at today's very low prices much of this is left alone it does not follow that a doubling of prices will not increase the desirability of all the shallow coal. Add in that the folks using THAI to produce Bitumen Sands and Very Heavy oil formations are also looking at variations to combust deep thin strata of coal in situ to produce H2 and CO gas which the will then burn in gas turbine power plants after cleaning out the SO2 and similar contaminants. Doing it the THAI way would provide a very cheap way to produce deep coal, which in turn would lead to much more of it being consumed.

[Expatriot]

A. we have way to much of the stuff laying around.

B. all of the coal less than say 500 feet down can be strip mined

C. a doubling of prices will not increase the desirability of all the shallow coal.

D. Doing it the THAI way would provide a very cheap way to produce deep coal

All, to the core, utterly irrelevant to the point being made. If you superimposed PO, you'd have these points.

A. there are 4 Saudi Arabias in the Bakken formation.

B. oil sands can be used 100%, unlike conventional oil.

C. when oil goes over 100 it will be economical to produce more off shore wells.

D. improved technologies will allow horizontal drilling, which will allow greater production.

As it is, you're sitting in Oil Finder II's seat on this one Tanada!

By the way - I have no opinion on PC, I'm just saying that the arguments you are making are the same arguments the cornutrolls make regarding PO.

[eastbay]

I have no problem at all believing this.

The model demonstrates that despite enormous coal deposits globally, coal production rates will decline because the deposits show increasing inaccessibility and decreasing coal seam thickness, according to the research.

They took just about every consideration into play in this study, it appears. Dismissing peak coal is much like dismissing peak oil because of tar sands and shale of which there is combined no doubt enough to power humanity several additional decades into the future... but the trick will be getting it into the gas tanks.

[hillsidedigger]

It's sounds plausible to me that coal production will not ever exceed the expected production of next year.

[Expatriot]

I have no problem at all believing this.
Dismissing peak coal is much like dismissing peak oil because of tar sands and shale of which there is combined no doubt enough to power humanity several additional decades into the future... but the trick will be getting it into the gas tanks.

Quoting Johnny Depp as Willy Wonka -
"Hey, that was my idea."

[dolanbaker]

I think we'll just see a greater divergance in the use of fuel, Oil mainly for road transport & petrochemicals, coal for power generation & gas for heating. Any ideas of using coal as an oil replacement will be quietly dropped.

I didn't expect coal to peak so soon, but then again it's extraction rate has recently increased very rapidly as well.

[Pops]

I wouldn't be too surprised if coal peaks over the next decade or two, there are other predictions in that area, I just wouldn't put too much faith in this guy (Patzek) when he says "Keep driving your ICE and don't worry about global warming because coal is peaking." The coal peak isn't his point, he is saying don't worry about climate change.

From the report: "Governments worldwide are basing their policy decisions (wrt carbon) on the uninterrupted increase of coal and oil production worldwide," says Patzek. "These policy decisions will be inherently in error, and will lead to expensive and false technological solutions."

I am not saying he has an agenda, he is just always on the side of BAU, and as it turns out, burning oil. Here is what he said about the BP Leak:

BP Spill May Be Less Than Doomsayers Think: Tadeusz W. Patzek
"The combined effect of rock and well erosion might have increased oil flow from about 20,000 to 30,000 barrels a day."
Bloomberg

Here is the word from .gov today:
"The well was gushing about 62,000 barrels a day when it started leaking and about 53,000 barrels when it was capped on July 15, according to an e-mailed statement from the U.S. government’s joint information center."
Bloomberg again

...
Another instance of falling on the side of BAU was Patek's and Pimentel's Ethanol EROEI study. I think ethanol is a bad, bad idea (along with most biofuels) but he was way off the mark when compared to other reports, showing a loss when most or all others showed a modest gain. (I haven't read about this in a while so stand to be corrected)


So anyway, I have nothing against this guy, he just always seems on the side of burning them fossil fuels.

[eastbay]

The study suggests worldwide coal production is peaking now. This prediction should be easy to verify by simply watching monthly coal production figures. Anyone have a good, reliable source for worldwide coal production data? We could check it each month and see how the numbers add up. Simple.

[XOVERX]

A current article appearing on a blog sponsored by the University of Texas at Austin sets forth a date of 2011 for the "peaking" of coal production. The article is located here: http://www.utexas.edu/news/2010/07/26/engineering_patzek_coal/comment-page-1/#comment-3513

While the main thrust of the article argues for tweaking climate modeling computers, the reason the climate modeling computers should be tweaked is that coal production will "peak" in 2011, according to research published by Professor Tad Patzek, Chair of the Petroleum and Geosystems Engineering Department at UT at Austin:

Based on widely accepted studies predicting coal production will peak and decline after 2011, Patzek warns climate change predictions should be revised to account for this inevitable peak and decline. His research appears in the internationally peer-reviewed journal, Energy, The International Journal.
...
Credible forecasts of coal production, by contrast, predict a 50 percent reduction over the next 50 years.

Professor Patzek will never be accused of being a champion of current IPCC climate models, claiming they are based on "the common myth of 200-400 years of coal supply." The Professor and his associate go on to say that IPCC "policy considerations . . . appear to be unconstrained by geophysics."

What these Professors seem to fail to grasp is the magnitude of coal peaking in 2011 viz-a-viz the energy needs of an exponentially growing worldwide population, and the energy growth required to fuel market capitalism. Insufficient energy inputs into the economy mean inevitable economic decline, perhaps collapse, and the world's population will necessarily suffer painful dislocations.

Intending the following comments toward climate modelers, I ask the reader, instead, to consider the ramifications of the comments with respect to future energy production models:

"Governments worldwide are basing their policy decisions on the uninterrupted increase of coal and oil production worldwide," says Patzek. "These policy decisions will be inherently in error, and will lead to expensive and false technological solutions."

The problem with "peak oil" is exactly the problem with "peak coal" -- The "easy" coal is gone:

The paper provides a physical model of historical and future production of coal worldwide. The model demonstrates that despite enormous coal deposits globally, coal production rates will decline because the deposits show increasing inaccessibility and decreasing coal seam thickness, according to the research.

For me at least, the idea of coal "peaking" in 2011 is quite startling. I don't think I've ever seen a date so close for coal. I've always thought coal would peak sometime between 2035-2050.

If Professor Patzek is correct about "peak coal," then if humans are going to invent a way out of the oncoming energy crisis, I'm thinking we better get started pretty doggone soon now.

But like climate deniers, energy deniers will block intensive efforts to develop alternative energy sources into the foreseeable future. On this, I hope I am incorrect.

[The_Virginian]

WorldWIDE supply may peak, the US has more coal ( even in less energy dense forms) than any one.

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/052504_coal_peak.html

So 2030 or so for the US of A.

Others will deplete the uranium instead.

[eastbay]

EIA has excellent charts and data about worldwide coal production.

Coal, like oil, is a fungible commodity. When the net production of all producer nations combined peaks, we've reached peak coal for all. The only way for a single nation to avoid the wrath of global peaking is to anger the others by prohibiting or at least greatly limiting export.

[Xenophobe]

WorldWIDE supply may peak, the US has more coal ( even in less energy dense forms) than any one.

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/052504_coal_peak.html

So 2030 or so for the US of A.

Others will deplete the uranium instead.

The first sentence of that reference.

"As many people with even a casual interest in energy now know, natural gas supplies in the United States are very tight and will most likely become worse due to mature gas reservoirs no longer being able to meet demand."

With the above referenced statement in mind, and the 6 years of historical record which have taken place since it was written, it would seem that a more credible source is necessary to make the point.

[dolanbaker]

EIA has excellent charts and data about worldwide coal production.

Coal, like oil, is a fungible commodity. When the net production of all producer nations combined peaks, we've reached peak coal for all. The only way for a single nation to avoid the wrath of global peaking is to anger the others by prohibiting or at least greatly limiting export.

Limiting export would be the easiest route as all a country needs to do is not expand mining beyond what is needed for domestic consumption. By doing so, they can't be accussed of "hoarding", they could risk invasion if a stronger neighbour demands a share.

[The_Virginian]

" Using the recoverable reserves as an estimate of what is realistically available for production will yield a coal output of around 1400 Mt by 2030 through the rest of the century. This would require a massive development of the coal reserves in Montana, as they are the largest undeveloped reserves remaining for future exploitation. Unless this happens, US coal production could reach a peak around 2030."

http://www.tsl.uu.se/uhdsg/Publications/USA_Coal.pdf

Mikael Höök, Kjell Aleklett...are they credible enough?

Keep in mind the 2030 view for US coal peaking is the PESSIMISTIC view that production will not be ramped up in some states due to political and property issues.


"Montana already exports around 40% of all electricity produced locally from coal and there are challenges with increasing the amount of new coal-fired power plants (Montana Department of Environmental Quality, 2008). To summarize, expansion of coal production in Montana is, at this time, not very likely. The recoverable reserves are large enough to keep coal production from the Appalachian Basin virtually constant until 2050, when decline will occur. Increased production from the Interior area, chiefly Illinois, will be able to diminish, but not fully compensate, declining production of the Appalachian Basin. The western area contains huge reserves of subbituminous coal and will account for the largest part of future U.S. coal production (Figure 15)."


Ten years from now I see much more serious concerns from nations feeding their own, than I do whether they will be willing to "tick off" others by NOT EXPORTING energy.

Heck how much energy does the US export in any case?

Answer?

45.667 million short tons in 2008.

http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/country/country_energy_data.cfm?fips=US

In contrast Australia exported 277.991 million short tons.

I think the US will be left alone if it decides to end exports of coal.

[Xenophobe]

http://www.tsl.uu.se/uhdsg/Publications/USA_Coal.pdf

Mikael Höök, Kjell Aleklett...are they credible enough?

Well, it depends on how we judge credibility. Hook and Aleklett write quite a few papers on oil production and rates, usually limiting themselves to a fraction of the oilfields available in the publicly available databases, and certainly don't have any experience in the practical aspects of oil, gas or coal work that I can determine. One is a student. One is his professor who happens to run ASPO. You wouldn't happen to know if prior to teaching, Aleklett did anything of note related to oil, gas or coal exploration, development or assessment would you? IMHO their work appears to be designed in part to create policy points rather than a scientific investigation of the issues. I've noticed that whenever something done by CERA shows up in the literature, the rebuttal position is often presented by Aleklett.

An obvious comment which strikes me immediately is that they use the databases of Melici (USGS) but I did not see a corresponding reference to the actual resource sizes provided by the same organization? For example, they reference the entire recoverable estimates for the US as some 290,000 (Mt?), whereas the coal resource estimated by the coal experts referenced here:

http://pubs.usgs.gov/bul/b2189/

show a resource base twice as large as that for the Rockies alone (Table 4, Page 11).

I didn't have time to completely investigate the Hook/Aleklett report, but I saw no mention of the conversion between these two categories. Considering the sheer size of this conversion through time, any work which wants to speculate on production rates, availability or shortages, must consider this type of conversion to be considered credible. IMHO of course.

Perhaps I am being too severe in my examination of the basics of their report? Certainly it is well referenced and much better than your previous reference, but it must be viewed in light of its authors, both in terms of their experience, intent, past writings and any methodology flaws which distract from answering the critical question at hand.

Keep in mind the 2030 view for US coal peaking is the PESSIMISTIC view that production will not be ramped up in some states due to political and property issues.

I don't know if peaking is the appropriate term for any limited resource anymore in light of what has happened with oil in the past 5 years. The question now appears to revolve more around how long a plateau can be sustained, if the same rules of production even apply to coal like they do to oil, which is not itself a given.

[eastbay]

Interestingly, we now have two equally credible and reputable sources telling us quite different anticipated outcomes regarding when peak coal will occur. Either way it's finite and the end is very near, so to speak. Like in our kids lifetimes 'near'.

[The_Virginian]

Eastbay, Xenophobe,


My intent is to show that the USA is in the best position regarding coal reserves.

The date of peak energy form coal may have already passed us in 1998. But the date of total peak in terms of volume wont likely be until at least 2030 or so.

Maybe later.

YES, coal is finite, in human terms. And it will likely reach it's useful limits in our lifetimes.