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I have been reading about the pending helium shortage for the last 10 years (for example: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.08/helium.html http://www.wired.c
by JunkDNA 17y ago
I have been reading about the pending helium shortage for the last 10 years (for example: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.08/helium.html http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.08/helium.html). That WIRED article gave us 10 - 25 years. The Seed article gives us 10 - 15 from today.
I never know what to think of these things, given that we have been "running out of oil" since the late 1970's. I suspect, just as with oil, that there is no economic incentive for anyone to go looking for new supply while the price is so low. Once it gets high enough, someone is going to figure out some crazy way to extract it.
- cwan 17y agoFWIW we've been running out of oil for even longer than that: "In 1919 United States Geological Survey (USGS) head George Otis Smith even predicted that the nation would be out of oil in nine years." http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/05/0520_040520_oil.html http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/05/0520_040520_...
- jamesbritt 17y agoWow. I can see the party banners: "Peak Oil: Celebrating 100 Years!"
- machrider 17y ago"We" the USA did pass the peak of oil production in the 1970's. "We" the world are almost certainly at the peak of oil production today.
- dschobel 17y ago[citation needed]
- edj 17y agoUS peak was in 1971[1]. The timing of global peak is still a hotly contested issue. [1]: Energy Information Administration, part of the US Department of Energy. http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MCRFPUS1&f=M http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PE...
- dschobel 17y agoThanks! But how can they determine the peak if they don't know how much remains unfound in offshore reserves?
- edj 17y agoThat's continental US production; doesn't include offshore (i.e. the Gulf of Mexico) or, I think, Alaska. Here's a graph of proven reserves for US offshore oil: http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=RCRR01R48F_1&f=A http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PE... And here's one for US total proven reserves: http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=RCRR01NUS_1&f=A http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PE... It looks like US reserve growth is declining even when accounting for all the offshore stuff discovered in the last 30 years. So we're not finding as much as we used to. Edit: Sorry, I misread your question at first. "Peak oil" refers to peak production. We know we passed this in the continental US in 1971. That's only knowable after the fact, of course. From what I've read about the peak oil phenomenon, it seems like sort of a coincidence that peak production happens around the same time half the oil in an oil well (or oil field, or oil producing region) is exhausted. So that's how people try to predict future peak oil events. The problem is that proven reserves are a moving target. (Though we know the growth of reserves is trending down for the US.) And it's harder still to know much about the rest of the world's reserves since oil reserves are regarded by many nations as state secrets.
- endtime 17y ago> That WIRED article gave us 10 - 25 years. The Seed article gives us 10 - 15 from today. Unless I'm missing something, those estimates are consistent, both ending in 2025.