U.S. Surpasses 8 Million Barrels Per Day

I happened to look at the latest This Week In Petroleum (EIA). Here is what I saw.

4-week averages above. The latest is 7.958 million barrels per day. Production in the week ending November 22, 2013 was 8.019 million barrels per day.

Back in 2005-2006, when I first started writing about the world's oil supply, it didn't seem like there was any way in Hell this could happen. I was pretty worried back then.

But there it is, the EIA data do not lie.

There are still lots of Doomers out there sticking with the "oil collapse" story because, let's face it, that's what humans do, they stick to their story. It's a social thing, mainly, because shared beliefs create and maintain group coherence. It simply doesn't matter if those beliefs bear only a very tenuous relationship with Reality. Does not matter!

All human groups (political, religious, whatever) work exactly the same way. That's the Human Condition. And the lesson learned?

First and foremost, humans are social animals. Never, ever underestimate the power of social instincts as a guide to human behavior.

These instincts reside entirely in the unconscious.

Do you see all those young people with their heads buried in smart phones, texting and tweeting like there's no tomorrow?

But I digress. How long will this crude oil boom last? I don't know, but...

I seriously doubt the production rate can increase at this pace for much longer. Last year, during the week ending November 23, 2012, production was 6.729 million barrels per day. That's a 19% increase in only one year!

Obviously, that can not go on and therefore it will not go on. Production will plateau, eventually. Sometime thereafter production will begin to decline. It always does.

Still, the current shale oil boom is mighty impressive, I've got to admit.

Despite this production boom, if you absolutely insist on letting your crude oil angst get the better of you, remember that one day in the far-flung future all the recoverable oil will be gone, used up, just a memory.

Or, as John Maynard Keynes said, and it is a great comfort to me—

In the long run, we are all dead.

My advice, as always, is make hay while the sun shines.

Comments

[Marc Pascal]

The U.S. production of oil (crude, shale, etc.) is only understood by also citing other facts, i.e. 1. how much it really costs in money and energy to extract this oil; 2. how much oil the U.S. uses in its economy on a daily/monthly/yearly; and 3. global production and usage over the same time periods - plus noting changes up or down depending upon economic, social and political uses. Oil is fungible and traded globally - moving to refineries that can process it and then to those who have purchased it (domestically or internationally). You have done a great job for so many years explaining things, please don't get bogged down on just one useless figure. You still have to understand MMT better as well.