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| The End of Oil: On the Edge of a Perilous New World | 
| Author: Paul Roberts
Publisher: Mariner Books
Category: Book
List Price: $14.95
Buy Used: $4.99
You Save: $9.96 (67%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  83 reviews
Sales Rank: 8243
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 416
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.2 x 5.3 x 1.1
ISBN: 0618562117
Dewey Decimal Number: 333.79
EAN: 9780618562114
ASIN: 0618562117
Publication Date: April 5, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Expedited Shipping Available. May contain highlighting/writing.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Still an excellent primer on the economics of hydrocarbons and alternatives August 31, 2008
This book was published about four years ago, and it is interesting to compare some of its future projections with the current reality. The worse case scenario envisioned in the last chapter has oil going to $50 a barrel, a far cry from the habitual $100 or more for a barrel now, not to mention a high of almost $150. The United States has arrived at the point of sending on the order of 700 billion dollars a year overseas to mostly unstable governments. Yet, despite what in the context of this book would be a horrifying emergency situation, the winds of change have been very slow to make much of a difference. The entrenched oil interests, which the author does not underestimate, have kicked into gear; the Bush Administration has battened down the hatches and basically all they have to say is "drill! drill! drill!". Oil industry influence continues to do its work putting the breaks on renewables: tax credits have not been extended by Congress.
A case made here is that almost all of the easy oil has been exploited. Oil is only produced in Nature under special circumstances. Organic material has to be buried and then cooked in a narrow temperature range (100-135 degrees C). Then, it has to to be confined by rock formations so that it does not leak away into nothing. Worldwide, there is estimated to be 600 geological systems where oil can be extracted for commercial uses. Of that, about 400 have been explored and the remaining lie in hard-to-reach areas such as the Arctic and continental shelves. OPEC has clearly emerged the winner in the battle for easy oil, and has left the big oil companies and most of the non-OPEC world desperately scrambling to find new supplies. The likelihood that enough oil can be extracted from costly out-of-the-way places to compete with the power that OPEC can exert in the marketplace is not great, to say the least. In other words, drilling in costly, remote places will not make a dent anytime soon in the 700 billion dollars that the U.S. pays every year for its oil import bill.
Time is not on our side and the subject is much larger than just finding oil and dealing with OPEC. It concerns not only the use of oil but the use of all hydrocarbons. Just how much carbon dioxide can the atmosphere tolerate before serious disruptions occur to life on planet earth? The author cites experts who maintain that 550ppm might be a tipping point and that we are speeding toward that state. Of particular concern is the developing world - China and India - and the breakneck pace in which dirty fuels, namely coal, are being burned in order to grow emerging economies. The author asserts that the developing world will never take a leadership role in developing alternative energies. They cannot afford to invest except in the quickest and dirtiest. The rich countries, particularly the United States, will have to take the lead.
The author reviews the positives and negatives of alternative energy: hydrogen, wind and solar. Wind and solar offer growth opportunities in the near term, but are problematic as dependable sources because of their intermittency. Hydrogen may work as a substitute for oil sometime in the future but not in the near future. A very important factor in reducing hydrocarbon use is efficiency and conservation. In the 1980s energy efficiency was a significant factor in quelling OPEC's power to raise prices, but energy efficiency was a victim of its own success and Ronald Reagan moved to shutdown such efforts because of the free market meddling.
The big question concerns the role of government - particularly the United States and the rich countries - in instituting a price on carbon and encouraging the development of alternative fuels and "bridging" solutions. Will the world act proactively with a plan to move away from hydrocarbons or will it only react after disasters? If free market supply siders have their way and carbon is never recognized as having an economic cost, there will not be an economic incentive not to use cheap hydrocarbons; and if government does not step in and aid research and development for alternatives, it's less likely that in the near future the private sector will find enough economic incentives to make energy breakthroughs. Then, China and India will have no alternative but to continue to burn dirty fossil fuels.
In enshrining the free markets and the economics of supply, the U.S. will most likely be involved in more overseas conflicts and wars, particularly in the Middle East. Despite the way politicians downplay the matter, the two wars the U.S. has fought in Iraq have both been about opening up the supply of oil. If oil continues to be the life blood of the economy, then the forces that protect that oil will become more militant in protecting that crucial supply especially from the Middle East. If the Saudi royal family loses control to fundamentalists, the stage will be set for another war.
the oil end July 25, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
this is a very intertesting book for me because present a high perfomance for the our future
Makes analysis of the contemporary energy order accessible. July 10, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
When I decided to read this book, I did so with the expectation of learning something only after wading through a great degree of partisan political rhetoric. It did not take me long to realize that Mr. Roberts' book is not what I had expected.
He makes this complex issue accessible to the layman looking to familiarize himself with not only oil, but the energy economy. Rather choose a side and engage in partisan sniping, he tells the good, the bad, and the ugly of the policies advocated by every party involved in the energy debate. Not only does he analyze our present situation, but he also studies our several possible ways forward into a new energy economy.
If I were pressed to make a complaint, it would be that I read the original hardcover edition of the book. A lot of the speculation regarding "worst case" scenarios involve $50 a barrel oil. Now that we are nearly $100 past that worst case, the educated speculation portrayed in the book should be coming to pass in the market. I would like to see either a completely updated 2008 edition or at least one with an updated preface.
 The Title should have been " We are running out of low to medium priced oil " June 29, 2008
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
Overall,the author has done a good job of demonstrating the seriousness of the oil price increase problem.However,he needed to emphasize that the problem is not one of running out of oil per se ,but of running out of the low to medium priced oil that,for instance,the world's agricultural farm businesses are based on and accustomed to.The author needed to emphasize the impeccable nature of the mathematical and statistical modeling done by M K Hubbert in his original 1969 paper( Deffeyes's minor correction of 2005 is well within the 1 to 5 % error allowed in science )and the relative accuracy of his predictions.For instance,he predicted that peak American oil production occurred in 1969.Hubbert was "wrong".It occurred in 1970.The fundamental point is that PEAK world production has been obtained.Hubbert's original paper never stated that the world would run out of oil in 2000.The world will essentially be out of oil around 2125-2150.
I have deducted one star because of the misleading title of the book.The title should be changed to " The End of Low to Medium Priced Oil:On the Edge of a World of $200 a Barrel Oil ".
Why isn't the mainstream media covering this story? June 23, 2008
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
Good book, though quickly becoming outdated as we slide down the post-peak oil decline. I wish Roberts had cut about 50 pages, though; he starts to repeat himself in the second half of the book, as he revisits ideas he detailed in the first half. By page 276, I don't need to be reminded what comprises the hydrocarbon economy yet again.
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