The reason prices are so high is because the "massive" new sources come with massive new costs to extract. Oil Shale (kerogen) is a great case in point; it is essentially rock with heavy, like waxy heavy, hydrocarbons embedded in it. In theory there is a lot of it, in practice almost no one uses it, because the amount of energy and water needed to dig the rock, cook out the kerogen, crack it into a form usable by the current infrastructure, and transport it to a useful place are extremely high. Every other grand announcement you've been reading follows suit, as does the idea of mining methane hydrates. It is pretty basic math to calculate the amount of recoverable, usable energy from these sources, and you won't be running anything like a developed nation off of it. We will be continuing to move toward less energy use, and there will be nothing slow about it. Less a march than a free-fall.

I ain't never gonna do it without the fez on . . . please understand.

Those of you not familiar with the history, Al Jazeera was founded by the staff of the BBC's Arabic language channel when they went into retrenchment (shut down the channel they did). The Qatari's foot the bill, but the overarching philosophy and quality are Auntie Beeb's. They only got a bad rap from the Bush administration for reporting honestly during the Iraq invasion, but basically they are the straightest shooters in the Arabic world, and one of the best sources of world news period now that the U.S. desks have given up on maintaining foreign bureaus.

The costs of production will continue to drive up all oil products as the relatively easily extractable oil is sucked up and (mostly) burned, and increasingly desperate measures are taken to keep the inevitable collapses in production at bay. In the U.S., as in most countries of the world, consumption is still heavily subsidized for every step of the oil production and consumption cycle, but it is getting harder to rob from the future to pay for it; food importers (and market based food production is heavily oil dependent) are in for a much rougher time, and there really is no plan B.

- With apologies to the Sex Pistols, and you should still be grateful I can't sing, or I'd have dubbed it onto the original track

Can't you scream?

Also allow you to see through walls.

Just sayin'

Most complete and informative site in the business:

www.theoildrum.com

Warning: Reading the posts and commentary there will cause you to learn about the world's energy situation :p(

{

}