Fracking Shale Pummels Peak Oil Against the Ropes w/ Punishing Body Blows

Not so long ago, it was possible to talk about peak oil with a straight face at cocktail parties. But lately, rapid developments in petroleum production technology has knocked peak oil from the speaking circuit to the circular jerkular echo choir set.

Of all developments most concerning to peak oil devotees, is the possibility that China (and India) may be able to supply most of their own energy and fuel from domestic sources. Discoveries of large shale petroleum resources, plus the discovery of "another Saudi Arabia" off China's shores, suggest that China's petroleum future may be secure for a few decades. If you add China's rapid build-up of nuclear power plants, China may not need to buy so much oil from OPEC after all.

Even South American nations such as Argentina and Colombia are discovering large new shale petroleum resources.

“What is very clear is that there’s a new frontier” for oil production, Brufau told reporters today in Doha, Qatar. “There’s a new place that will deliver a lot of long-term production of hydrocarbons.” The company expects to spend “about $30” for each barrel of oil it develops in an initial segment of the deposit it’s exploring there, he said.

Repsol, Spain’s biggest oil company, is exploring in the Vaca Muerta shale site in Argentina, the largest discovery in the company’s history. The first section of the reservoir the company has tested contains 927 million barrels of recoverable resources of oil equivalent and non-conventional hydrocarbons, Brufau said at the World Petroleum Congress in Qatar’s capital. _Bloomberg

Similar discoveries from France to Poland to Israel to Southeast Asia are causing honest energy analysts to rethink many of their pessimistic predictions from just a few years back.

The debate over whether the world's reserves of hydrocarbons have now peaked and are in decline has lost relevance over recent years as new technology allows oil companies to find and exploit new hydrocarbon sources, the CEO of Repsol Antonio Brufau said Tuesday.

Brufau said progress made in exploring and developing ultra-deepwater areas, unconventional oil and gas sources and the move into remote areas such as the Arctic, have been key to growing global reserves of oil and gas.

"The speed at which technology changes and its consequences have taken us largely by surprise. The peak oil debate, for example, has lost a great deal of its relevance in the past three years," Brufau told the World Petroleum Congress in Doha.

"The possibility that usable resources under commercially viable terms will run out is no longer a concern in the short or medium term," he said. _Platts

Across the broad range of fossil energy resources -- oil sands, coal, offshore oil, kerogens, heavy oils, shale locked petroleum, gas hydrates, etc -- the technology is still ramping up to exploit them economically.

But conventional oil is being held at artificially inflated prices by corrupt and decrepit oil states who are unwilling and incapable of keeping up with the technology and the demand. These inflated prices are causing high food prices and are otherwise contributing to an ongoing demand destruction across both developed and undeveloped worlds. As the new technologies move the focus from conventional petroleum to unconventional fossil fuels, a great deal of international disruption of order is anticipated.

Update 7 Dec 2011: China's shale gas boom could be larger than even that of the US and Argentina