November 6, 2008 - The IEA World Energy Outlook Annual Report

On November 12, 2008 the IEA (the International Energy Agency) will release its annual World Energy Outlook report. In it, the IEA will detail prospects and estimates for global energy production and consumption over the next 15 to 20 years. About a two weeks earlier, a supposed copy of the report was "leaked" to the press and was widely reported in the media for about 6 hours or so. The most significant, and most-quoted information in the leaked report was the estimated 9% decline in global oil production in the post-peak-oil environment of 2010 onward. If true, this is a shocking, and indeed frightening figure, because it indicates that the impending end of the easy availability of petroleum may well be much closer than we think.

The IEA was quick to disavow the report, saying that the figure was inaccurate, and derived from a very early (and erroneous) estimate. However even if the actual figure is half this value, it is still significant in terms of how quickly we must plan and prepare for a post-carbon world. A 9% decline would mean that by the year 2015 global petroleum output would be close to half what it is now. A 4.5% decline would simply mean that that point would be reached in 2020. But the impact of oil shortages would make themselves felt long before that point is reached.

The magazine Canadian Business recently published an "Energy Special" issue, in which it predicted that the post-peak decline will make itself felt in three waves. The first would be in or around 2012, when oil prices would reach the psychological threshold of $200 a barrel, provoking steep increases at the pumps for both gasoline and diesel fuel, increases which would trickle down into other sectors of the economy, triggering a steep inflationary bubble and possibly initiating a cascade collapse within the auto industry. The second wave would be in 2015 or 2016, when a second steep increase in the price of oil would initiate another surge of inflation. The final wave would be in 2020 by which time, optimistically, we would have transitioned to other forms of energy production and distribution and greatly reduced our dependence on oil.

Still, 10 years is a very short time-frame in which to intiate, act on, and complete, a transition away from that magic black elixer that has fueled virtually every aspect of our current technological society for the past 150 years. If this "transition" is going to take place, there is much to do, and the first step is to vastly increase public awareness of the current situation, and its ramifications for our immediate future. Considering that peak-oil is likely to be the single most defining element of our collective future, it is shocking how few people have even heard the term before, let alone know what it means, and understand its far-reaching implications for our society.

But it looks like any initiative toward transition, and public awareness, is going to have to come from the bottom up. Governments seem to have (with a few exceptions) embarked on a virtual conspiracy of silence around peak oil and its implications. Furthermore, they appear to be acting to increase, rather than decrease, our dependence on non-renewable energy in general and oil in particular. The U.S. government has recently lifted the ban on offshore drilling, the Canadian government is investing heavily in the Athabasca Tar Sands project (an ecological disaster of biblical proportions, and a false promise of continued oil availability anyway), and the McGuinty Liberals here in Ontario are putting all their eggs in the nuclear basket, while simultaneously reducing funding for sustainable energy research (an act of near-terminal stupidity, given the inherent problems of nuclear, and the fact that uranium, like any non-renewable resource, will have its own peak and decline at some point in the near future.)

So the bottom line? Spread the word. If we are going to transition successfully to a post-carbon future that avoids the worst-case scenarios postulated on some of the peak oil websites, we need to act, act together, act decisively, and act NOW.

It's in our hands. Spread the word!