When do you think Oil will become scare and when will it run out?

[ulsterman88]

My old geography teahcer is adament it wont last more than 40 years but i think that is rubbish and there's probably 100+ years worth left.

 

[Abaddon]

Of course 'people' cannot renew it....but the process, measured in geologic time, most assuredly is continuing today as it did millions of years ago. That was my point. Oil is only 'renewable' if one views it on a geologic time scale.

No, its not. Oil was made in a relativly small timeband in earths history when the conditions were considerably different than today. You need a tropical climate to make oil, tropical nearly world wide that is. Earth isn't like that any more.

 

[MobBoss]

No, its not. Oil was made in a relativly small timeband in earths history when the conditions were considerably different than today. You need a tropical climate to make oil, tropical nearly world wide that is. Earth isn't like that any more.

Well, the wiki would disagree with you.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crude_oil

If an oil well were to run dry and be capped, it would likely fill back to its original supply eventually. There is considerable question about how long this would take. Some formations appear to have a regeneration time of decades. Majority opinion is that oil is being formed at less than 1% of the current consumption rate

Also:

Most geologists view crude oil and natural gas as the product of compression and heating of ancient organic materials over geological time. According to this theory, oil is formed from the preserved remains of prehistoric zooplankton and algae which have been settled to the sea bottom in large quantities under anoxic conditions. Terrestrial plants, on the other hand, tend to form coal. Over geological time this organic matter, mixed with mud, is buried under heavy layers of sediment.

So, please note that its not tropical rainforests that form oil, but sediment rich areas of seawater like the Mississippi river delta that forms oil. The process that initiated oil production millenia ago, still goes on today in our oceans and such. The algae and plankton that die off in various seas of today will probably create oil millions of years from now in those locations if left undisturbed.

 

[Abaddon]

To quote wiki then:

At current consumption levels, world oil supply would be gone in about 32 years, around 2039.

 

[Kozmos]

Majority opinion is that oil is being formed at less than 1% of the current consumption rate

Hooray we're screwed.

 

[MobBoss]

To quote wiki then:

I read that too, but again, I dont agree with it for reasons I have already stated. I think 'when' we will run out of oil entirely debatable, but the question 'is the process of oil formation still ongoing" not.

 

[ainwood]

Of course 'people' cannot renew it....but the process, measured in geologic time, most assuredly is continuing today as it did millions of years ago. That was my point. Oil is only 'renewable' if one views it on a geologic time scale.

So 'technically' you are correct, but the point is rather moot. There is no way that the oil being produced by natural processes is at a rate fast enough to be sustainable. It will have practically zero impact on when the 'oil runs out'.

That is more in line of what I was referring to. Example: using sea water pumped into the substrata under the oil in order to force the oil up and out of the field. A simple, but effective way to get more oil out of a well that previously wasnt done.

35-40% IS with miscible or water flooding. The problems are that the oil has an affinity with the sands - basically it sticks to it, and you can't break those bonds; or the water channels and bypasses (strands) the oil. When you're water cut is exceeding 99%, then you pretty-much can't get any more out.

 

[Norton II]

I voted "other" because I don't have a clue, and neither does anyone else. To know, or even to estimate with reasonable accuracy, when the world's oil will run out, we'd have to know how much there is to begin with, and nobody knows that. Hopefully it won't happen before we've got some other fuel that's just as good or better.

 

[TheDervish]

This summer.