Oil; US, the new Saudi Arabia?

This is serious business, it´s about the future oil production in the US.
Read it, wherever you are - it´s a matter of deepest concern.

Aleklett´s Energy Mix is always updated and Prof Aleklett has, as a scientist at Uppsala University, studied Peak Oil for over ten years.

Please take part of Peter Coy´s article published a few days ago in Bloomberg Businessweek:

U.S. the New Saudi Arabia? Peak Oilers Scoff

November 13, 2012

Last night I got a call from Peter Coy, Economics Editor for Bloomberg Businessweek in New York and he wanted to ask some questions about the claim that the United States in the future would export oil. Our discussion is now published on Bloomberg BusinessWeek, Global Economics, Here is a copy of the article: (http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-11-12/u-dot-s-dot-the-new-saudi-arabia-peak-oilers-scoff#disqus_thread).

U.S. the New Saudi Arabia? Peak Oilers Scoff

By Peter Coy on November 12, 2012

The U.S. is set to increase oil production so much that it will overtake Saudi Arabia and become the world’s biggest producer by around 2017, the International Energy Agency said today.

The reaction from “peak oil” theorists? Not a chance. They continue to argue that the surge in U.S. production coming from shale oil and shale gas is a flash in the pan. Before long, they say, U.S. output will start falling again—as will global output. The price of oil will skyrocket and the industrial economy will be brought to its knees, they argue.

I first reached Kjell Aleklett in Sweden. He’s president of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil and a physics professor at Uppsala University. Aleklett acknowledged that peak oil theorists didn’t predict the U.S. output increase, but he said the jump doesn’t undermine their main case. “We were wrong that it was not possible for the U.S. [production] to swing back again. But we don’t know how high the swing will be,” Aleklett said.

“The shale production we are talking about now relies on thousands of wells drilled every year. If the drilling capacity should go down, or for some reason it becomes too expensive, then the production will go down very fast,” Aleklett said.

What’s more, he said, the U.S. success is not being duplicated in other countries. In densely populated Europe, Aleklett said, the best shale happens to be beneath the city of Paris, making it off-limits to production (unless the Eiffel Tower is converted into a production platform).

Aleklett also pointed out that the U.S. Energy Department’s own outlook contradicts that of the Paris-based International Energy Agency. In 2035, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, imports of crude oil, liquid fuels, and other petroleum, plus natural gas will still total about 24 quadrillion BTUs a year, nearly triple the level of exports.

Mark your calendar, by the way: Aleklett said the next meeting of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil is in Austin, Tex., on Nov. 30 and Dec. 1.