[AdamB]

I sure have no intention of stopping in a world of increasing prices, every additional dollar saved is a dollar earned.

Actually every dollar saved becomes worth less next year, and does not "earn" anything.

Peace

Oh please. If you don't understand allegory then what good are you! If I had tried saying that money saved is an increase in discretionary dollars available, it would have just read...flat.

[Pops]

Supply and demand will always balance at a price, but so many intangibles influence supply and demand that multitudes of talking heads are employed to read the daily entrails for signs.

General condition of the economy and popular confidence. Easy credit or tight influences everything from investment to the "wealth effect". Who is in power influences people's attitudes — correctly or mistakenly. Perceptions of current and future growth likewise. In no little part the concrete actions of central banks—and guesses about future actions. And on and on.

[Revi]

Supply and demand will always balance at a price, but so many intangibles influence supply and demand that multitudes of talking heads are employed to read the daily entrails for signs.

General condition of the economy and popular confidence. Easy credit or tight influences everything from investment to the "wealth effect". Who is in power influences people's attitudes — correctly or mistakenly. Perceptions of current and future growth likewise. In no little part the concrete actions of central banks—and guesses about future actions. And on and on.

I think the whole economy is based on the price of oil, so the price is like a float valve and it's there to keep a regular supply of oil flowing to us "consumers". It's just a system and it has no way of telling how much is left in supply, so it's going to keep doling out the gas and oil until it can't anymore. Then it all falls apart. Just a theory...

[AdamB]

I think the whole economy is based on the price of oil, so the price is like a float valve and it's there to keep a regular supply of oil flowing to us "consumers". It's just a system and it has no way of telling how much is left in supply, so it's going to keep doling out the gas and oil until it can't anymore. Then it all falls apart. Just a theory...

Those who do oil and gas reserves for a living are quite comfortable with the supply stored in the ground at any given moment. Those who have done research on the resources that those reserves come from within are pretty comfortable with that amount of potentially avaialable supply as well. The basics of these relationships are well explained for those not familiar with them.

You figure that the public that doesn't pay for this information, like you don't even know it exists, few can understand the nuance, calculations or statistics of, somehow deserves access to it?

[theluckycountry]

Supply and demand will always balance at a price, but so many intangibles influence supply and demand that multitudes of talking heads are employed to read the daily entrails for signs...

The media is like a government bureaucracy, hoards of people inventing pointless crap just to justify their own paychecks. I don't own a TV but used to scan the mainstream media for things relevant to my area. That was before covid, now I'll take my chances on missing a story rather than wade through endless fearmongering tripe. 50% or better of all media stories here are still covid/vaxx/passport ones. Everyone is sick of it too, but it's cheap media, no investigative work necessary.

[Doly]

Those who do oil and gas reserves for a living are quite comfortable with the supply stored in the ground at any given moment. Those who have done research on the resources that those reserves come from within are pretty comfortable with that amount of potentially avaialable supply as well. The basics of these relationships are well explained for those not familiar with them.

You figure that the public that doesn't pay for this information, like you don't even know it exists, few can understand the nuance, calculations or statistics of, somehow deserves access to it?

We are in the peak oil forums, so of course we think we deserve access to information about oil reserves. Why else would we be hanging around here? You can't very well attempt to figure out when peak oil will happen if you don't have an estimate for reserves.

Back in the good days of these forums, there was plenty of discussion about the precise meaning of terms like "economically recoverable resources", and whether the information available was being honest enough. There was plenty of argument that things weren't being described accurately.

Under the assumption that central banks are aiming to keep oil prices stable, oil price no longer is any sort of signal, so there is a valid question of what, if anything, would give a warning that peak oil is near. I think the warning in that case would be wages not keeping up with inflation, even if inflation was being kept moderate. You can keep oil price roughly constant but the prices of everything else would move relative to oil in a similar way that they moved relative to oil in the oil crisis in the 70s. So, something like stagflation, but without high inflation. Which is not terribly different from the economic picture we are seeing right now.

[AdamB]

We are in the peak oil forums, so of course we think we deserve access to information about oil reserves. Why else would we be hanging around here?

Folks always think they should have what they want, and reserve information is state secrets to some countries. The US government can think it deserves access to Russian missile numbers and locations as well, but, you know, bummer. The latter question is best answered because peak oil is a great doom trigger, and for many it is about McDoomsters needing triggers for their scenarios, and peak oil is a good one. This all tended to wind down after a couple of claimed peak oils came and went, and some turned to climate change, but it just doesn't have the kick.

You can't very well attempt to figure out when peak oil will happen if you don't have an estimate for reserves.

True. But, knowing you can't get those best estimates from countries where they are state secrets, no peak oiler just gives up, right? You come up with a way of making an etimate. Like the US with its intelligience agencies, trying to figure how to count Russian missiles and nukes by clues and whatnot, and making a best call.

Under the assumption that central banks are aiming to keep oil prices stable, oil price no longer is any sort of signal, so there is a valid question of what, if anything, would give a warning that peak oil is near.

Pops has a good one with global storage. It happens to be the one with a relationship to price outside of whatever central banks are doing and it is in the world of the physicals, not financials. And folks have already claimed that peak oil is near, or even past, using all sorts of signs beyond price.

I think the warning in that case would be wages not keeping up with inflation, even if inflation was being kept moderate. You can keep oil price roughly constant but the prices of everything else would move relative to oil in a similar way that they moved relative to oil in the oil crisis in the 70s. So, something like stagflation, but without high inflation. Which is not terribly different from the economic picture we are seeing right now.

Or the stagflation we saw during the last real energy crisis in the 1970's, and a global peak oil in 1979 along with price spikes, etc etc. But as we know, that was THE peak for only about 15 years or so. So, maybe the conditions you describe, similar to those 40+ years ago, will cause a demand reshuffling just as that global peak did? And a peak oil even? With just as much a chance of NOT being THE peak oil as the last time it happened.

[Pops]

Under the assumption that central banks are aiming to keep oil prices stable, oil price no longer is any sort of signal...

Price and rising or falling storage are the only signals that matter I think.

Central banks may wish they could surgically affect oil price but their tools are too blunt. All they can do is influence the overall economy to heat up or slow down and perhaps reduce oil demand but it is only indirect, it's wagging the dog to move the tail.

Gasoline price is a third higher this year and inflation is more stubborn than expected so from all accounts the Fed is likely to raise rates this year, one of their few tools.

But, a higher cost of borrowing won't increase oil production and lower oil prices, on the contrary, increasing production requires other people's money so higher cost for that money will reduce production in the future.

That is if demand were constant but the whole point of raising interest rates is to do the the entire economy what it does to oil production and slow everything down. The central banks will be hoping to slow growth of the entire economy just enough to get inflation down to "target" of 2%. Again, the tendency of higher rates is to reduce production so only by slowing the overall economy can the effect oil price — hopefully more than they reduce future production.

But... Don't forget that oil is the master commodity. High oil price is already a large if not largest factor of inflation. High oil price itself is a drag on the economy, a counterweight to inflation. Because oil is central to the economy, a higher oil price slows growth as much or more than higher interest rates.

So central banks attempting to cool the economy combine with oils "natural" ability to moderate excessively fast growth can actually combine to cause recession. Pretty sure you can look and find that both oil price and discount rates rise before most recessions. Maybe that just happens accidentally but probably not.

Here is a pretty good article that is probably more lucid than me this morning.

The direction of travel for global interest rates seems clear: they are about to rise - perhaps significantly, if some market pricing is to be believed - as nervous central banks try to put the inflation genie back in the bottle.

There's a strong case to be made, however, that if oil prices fall or even just plateau at current levels, policymakers' hawkish turn may prove to be mistimed at best, or a catastrophic, growth-choking policy error at worst.

[Pops]

what, if anything, would give a warning that peak oil is near. I think the warning in that case would be wages not keeping up with inflation, even if inflation was being kept moderate. You can keep oil price roughly constant but the prices of everything else would move relative to oil in a similar way that they moved relative to oil in the oil crisis in the 70s. So, something like stagflation, but without high inflation. Which is not terribly different from the economic picture we are seeing right now.

Very few people left here at PO.com and fewer still who pay any attention to PO because it isn't on the republican agenda. Go to www.peakoilbarrel.com for better info. There are more knowledgable posters there on both sides and they provide better analysis and info. Dennis there is the resident corny (relatively speaking) who tries to model future production based on many real-world factors. His estimates are generally way more conservative (later peak) than the doomers but by admission even he usually shoots too low. His is the straight economist view that if there is shortage that price will rise until production catches up, at least to the point of whatever the various institutions guess is the ultimate recoverable resource. Hard to account for increasing difficulty of production and marginal resources remaining.

POBs best feature is attempting to interpret various reports of production numbers., converting charts to graphics that my head absorbs better. (The worst feature is the format, IMHO) But again, most reports on oil production have significant delay, inconsistencies and flat out fabrication, not all but most. As we know, even long term trends are not conclusive. LTO is mostly a boondoggle but has altered the charts for a few years.

Even at today's oil price, energy is a very small portion of total expenditures.

LINK

Back in the late 70s, early 80s oil as a line item was 8% of expenditures. That doesn't include the indirect costs imposed on everything. We are much less energy intensive now because industry (what's left) switched from oil but we do import more stuff and I'd argue we make less and less close to wherever home is, eeeeverything comes from somewhere else. Surprisingly, Jeavon's Paradox proved itself and consumers now use more gasoline than ever in total.

Along with price and storage, short term, that percentage should probably be the main indicator. I think Charles Hall wrote about this, I'll look it up later. As long as that percentage remains low, certainly less than 5 but likely under 10% we can manage —as long as the rest of the economy is functioning.

[Doly]

Thanks for pointing me to POB, I didn't know about them. I'm not really one to go into the nerdy questions of geology, I leave that for geologists and serious energy investors. I'm more about thinking about the Big Questions surrounding peak oil.

As long as that percentage remains low, certainly less than 5 but likely under 10% we can manage —as long as the rest of the economy is functioning.

That's the issue, you see. I think the oil price is being kept stable. Under that assumption, it's unclear whether the percentage that goes directly into buying oil products would go higher. It could well be that the cost is transferred to stuff that has high transportation costs, so you wouldn't see that percentage rise. However, if that's how it works, the economy would certainly suffer.

[Pops]

LOL, I''ve spent waaay to much of my life watching oil, it's a shame.

[AdamB]

Thanks for pointing me to POB, I didn't know about them. I'm not really one to go into the nerdy questions of geology, I leave that for geologists and serious energy investors. I'm more about thinking about the Big Questions surrounding peak oil.

POB doesn't do geology any more than peak oilers ever did. They do endless graphs based on assumptions of reserves and rates, they seem to watch EIA products pretty closely, OPEC volumes, that kind of stuff. Dennis might be the only one who has tried to incorporate the needed components to make even a theoretically possible guess, but he is handicapped with his independent research in the same way that you are.