- Oil Peak
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IEA whistleblower: Key oil figures distorted by US pressure
The world is much closer to running out of oil than official estimates admit, according to a whistleblower at the International Energy Agency who claims it has been deliberately underplaying a looming shortage for fear of triggering panic buying.
The senior official claims the US has played an influential role in
encouraging the watchdog to underplay the rate of decline from existing
oil fields while overplaying the chances of finding new reserves.
The allegations raise serious questions about the accuracy of the
organisation's latest World Energy Outlook on oil demand and supply to
be published tomorrow – which is used by the British and many other
governments to help guide their wider energy and climate change
policies.
In particular they question the prediction in the last
World Economic Outlook, believed to be repeated again this year, that
oil production can be raised from its current level of 83m barrels a
day to 105m barrels. External critics have frequently argued that this
cannot be substantiated by firm evidence and say the world has already
passed its peak in oil production.
Now the "peak oil" theory is gaining support at the heart of the global energy establishment. "The
IEA in 2005 was predicting oil supplies could rise as high as 120m
barrels a day by 2030 although it was forced to reduce this gradually
to 116m and then 105m last year," said the IEA source, who was
unwilling to be identified for fear of reprisals inside the industry.
"The 120m figure always was nonsense but even today's number is much
higher than can be justified and the IEA knows this.
"Many inside the organisation believe that maintaining oil supplies at even 90m to
95m barrels a day would be impossible but there are fears that panic
could spread on the financial markets if the figures were brought down
further. And the Americans fear the end of oil supremacy because it
would threaten their power over access to oil resources," he added.
A second senior IEA source, who has now left but was also unwilling to
give his name, said a key rule at the organisation was that it was
"imperative not to anger the Americans" but the fact was that there was
not as much oil in the world as had been admitted. "We have [already]
entered the 'peak oil' zone. I think that the situation is really bad,"
he added.
The IEA acknowledges the importance of its own figures, boasting on its website: "The IEA governments and industry from all
across the globe have come to rely on the World Energy Outlook to
provide a consistent basis on which they can formulate policies and
design business plans."
The British government, among others, always uses the IEA statistics rather than any of its own to argue that
there is little threat to long-term oil supplies.
The IEA said tonight that peak oil critics had often wrongly questioned the accuracy
of its figures. A spokesman said it was unable to comment ahead of the
2009 report being released tomorrow.
John Hemming, the MP who chairs the all-party parliamentary group on peak oil and gas, said the revelations confirmed his suspicions that the IEA underplayed how
quickly the world was running out and this had profound implications
for British government energy policy.
He said he had also been contacted by some IEA officials unhappy with its lack of independent
scepticism over predictions. "Reliance on IEA reports has been used to
justify claims that oil and gas supplies will not peak before 2030. It
is clear now that this will not be the case and the IEA figures cannot
be relied on," said Hemming.
"This all gives an importance to the
Copenhagen [climate change] talks and an urgent need for the UK to move
faster towards a more sustainable [lower carbon] economy if it is to
avoid severe economic dislocation," he added.
The IEA was
established in 1974 after the oil crisis in an attempt to try to
safeguard energy supplies to the west. The World Energy Outlook is
produced annually under the control of the IEA's chief economist, Fatih
Birol, who has defended the projections from earlier outside attack.
Peak oil critics have often questioned the IEA figures.
But now IEA sources who have contacted the Guardian say that Birol has
increasingly been facing questions about the figures inside the
organisation.
Matt Simmons, a respected oil industry expert, has long questioned the decline rates and oil statistics provided by Saudi
Arabia on its own fields. He has raised questions about whether peak
oil is much closer than many have accepted.
A report by the UK Energy Research Council (UKERC) last month said worldwide production of
conventionally extracted oil could "peak" and go into terminal decline
before 2020 – but that the government was not facing up to the risk.
Steve Sorrell, chief author of the report, said forecasts suggesting
oil production will not peak before 2030 were "at best optimistic and
at worst implausible".
But as far back as 2004 there have been people making similar warnings. Colin Campbell, a former executive with
Total of France told a conference: "If the real [oil reserve] figures
were to come out there would be panic on the stock markets … in the end
that would suit no one."
(c) The Guardian