Just in case there was any doubt about what this war was about.
I’ll note that Chevron’s refineries in California have exactly the right equipment to process Venezuelan crude (it’s heavy) and have been under threat of shutting down due to depletion of oil fields in California.
This post uses a gift link with a view count limit. When it runs out, there is an archived copy of the article
I heard that same number ~20 years ago and got a little curious now: it seems that we are still discovering (and “proving”) new oil reserves and unfortunately humanity won’t run out of oil anytime soon, esp. considering that the incentive for unlocking new reserves rises with oil prices.
It’s sad but also eye-opening wrt this US regime’s actions.
That’s true, but each new oil discovery is likely to be more expensive to extract than the last, and because it takes energy to extract oil, we have to consider the energy return on investment (EROI) of all future oil extraction. Once we get to the point where it requires a barrel of oil equivalent of energy to extract a barrel of oil out of the ground, the EROI drops to 1:1 and there’s no profit to be made, from an energy standpoint, regardless of price. Oil discovery in the US has decreased from an EROI of 1000:1 in 1919 to about 5:1 in the 2010s.
No matter how you look at it, the world has just got to stop using oil wherever physically possible.
I fully expect oil companies to convince governments to tax their citizens 150% to subsidize their new oil wells, just so they can continue looking for and opening new ones LONG after it ceases to be profitable.
It’s like conservatives and democracy. They’re okay with it as long as they can keep “winning” but when they can’t win anymore, they won’t change their behavior, they’ll stop using democracy.
I’d argue we already passed that point for both conservatives (in most major countries) AND oil company profits.
The cost of dealing with fossil fuels has been far outweighing the cost of using them, and has been for many many decades. If our species makes it that long, our grandchildren’s grandchildren’s great great great grandchildren will still be dealing with our mistakes.