Dr. Robert Habiger, who has worked in the oil and gas industry for 30 years.
Dr. Habiger led us through the world’s oil status quo, a large task. He made us think hard along the way – about our dependency upon oil, its part in the building up of today’s first-world nations, the understandable demand that comes from all those nations that wish to follow this path, and the consequences of mishandling this resource. (See below to add your knowledge and questions on this subject)
We can choose!
Either we prepare as a global community for "peak oil" - that time when maximum rate of global petroleum production is reached, after which the rate of production enters decline. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_oil
Or we compete for a natural resource that becomes more and more stretched by growing world demand.
What are the facts? How serious is the situation? Can we do anything about it? We discussed, amongst other things:
- oil consumption versus world oil reserves
- oil as a percentage of total energy supply
- potential for environmental accidents and how private companies have realized that it is good business to promote sound environmental practices
- most of the world's oil reserves are held by national, rather than by private companies: what are the implications?
Dr. Habiger passed along the following link to Roel Sneider's home page. This gives you background information on Roel and his work on global warming and a comprehensive PowerPoint, 'The Global Energy Challenge'. Visit http://www.mines.edu/~rsnieder/
The site is in the public domain, and you will find there the conditions for linking to and/or using the information to be found on this site.
Call to Action
We cannot recap the entire presentation, nor can we summarize our discussions. Instead we invite you to post to this blog to add your ideas and questions on this subject. Together we can increase awareness and create a vision, if only for ourselves, about what must be done.
- If you were at the presentation – please post here the information which most surprised you or which you think others should know.
- If you were not at this presentation – please join us on this blog and share with us your insights.
