Stories tagged with "norway"

Floating Offshore Wind Power

Posted by Big Gav on December 9, 2008 - 9:33am in The Oil Drum: Australia/New Zealand
Topic: Alternative energy
Tags: blue h technologies, floating offshore wind power, matthew simmons, norway, offshore wind power, statoilhydro, sway, wind power [list all tags]

Matthew Simmons has received quite a bit of press in the past week, after his Ocean Energy Institute floated a proposal to build a $25 billion, 5 GW wind farm in the Gulf of Maine.

Offshore wind farms have a number of advantages over their land based equivalents - they are less hazardous to wildlife, have fewer objections raised on NIMBY concerns and winds are generally stronger over the oceans than they are over land.

Ideally, offshore wind farms will be far enough away from land to avoid being seen from the shoreline, eliminating any residual objections from local residents. Current offshore projects tend to site turbines in waters less than 20 metres deep - going further offshore would mean locating them at depths of 50 meters or more, which is too deep to build supporting towers or trusses down to the sea floor at an affordable cost.

A solution to this problem is floating platforms - one of the key elements of the Ocean Energy Institute proposal. In this post I'll look at some of the work being done to develop floating offshore wind power platforms in order to enable these sorts of schemes to become a reality.

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The European Gas Market

Posted by Euan Mearns on August 1, 2008 - 8:50am in The Oil Drum: Europe
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: algeria, baltic pipeline, egypt, energy security, europe, exports, gas, imports, libya, nigeria, norway, original, qatar, russia, the netherlands, united kingdom [list all tags]

[With Centrica and EDF announcing hefty retail gas price increases in the UK this week, I thought it was worth reposting this story that was first published in December 2007. The follow on story Daddy will the lights be on at Christmas?, is perhaps more pertinent this year than last.]

OECD European gas production looks set to peak in 2008. After that, falling production combined with rising demand will see OECD European gas imports wanting to rise from current 197 BCM per annum to 442 BCM per annum by 2020. Where will this gas come from and how will rising European imports affect N America and the rest of the world?


Figure 1 OECD Europe gas production and conceptual forecast. Click all charts to enlarge

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Why oil costs over $130 per barrel: the decline of North Sea Oil

Posted by Euan Mearns on June 9, 2008 - 9:00am in The Oil Drum: Europe
Topic: Economics/Finance
Tags: $130 oil, brent, declines, decommissioning, economists, exports, m. king hubbert, north sea oil, norway, peak oil, united kingdom [list all tags]




Rising North Sea oil production was a significant factor in keeping oil prices under control in the 1970s, 80s and 90s. Production peaked at 6.4 million barrels per day in 2000 and since then, declining North Sea Oil production is one significant reason that oil prices are now rising exponentially.

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European Gas Security: The Future of Natural Gas

Posted by Euan Mearns on May 13, 2008 - 9:00am in The Oil Drum: Europe
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: aspo, berr, european gas security, gas markets, italy, lng, nord-stream, norway, russia gas exports [list all tags]


This is the talk I was honored to deliver to ASPO Italy on 3rd May 2008 at their annual conference in Turin. 24 slides below the fold plus narrative of what I said on the day. The narrative boxes are below the slides.

An Italian translation of this post is available here. Thanks to Maurizio Moretto for the translation. Thanks are also due to Jean Laherrere of ASPO France for providing his interpretations of Russian and North African gas supplies.

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Arctic Oil and Gas Ultimates

Posted by Luis de Sousa on March 11, 2008 - 10:00am in The Oil Drum: Europe
Topic: Geology/Exploration
Tags: anwr, arctic gas, arctic oil, mackenzie delta, north america, north slope, norway, npra, russia, usgs [list all tags]

This is a guest post by Jean Laherrere.


World Arctic cumulative discovery.
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The European Gas Market

Posted by Euan Mearns on December 11, 2007 - 10:00am in The Oil Drum: Europe
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: algeria, baltic pipeline, egypt, energy security, europe, exports, gas, imports, libya, nigeria, norway, qatar, russia, the netherlands, united kingdom [list all tags]

OECD European gas production looks set to peak in 2008. After that, falling production combined with rising demand will see OECD European gas imports wanting to rise from current 197 BCM per annum to 442 BCM per annum by 2020. Where will this gas come from and how will rising European imports affect N America and the rest of the world?


Figure 1 OECD Europe gas production and conceptual forecast. Click all charts to enlarge

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The Amazing Power of King Hubbert(...?)

Posted by Euan Mearns on September 12, 2007 - 9:30am in The Oil Drum: Europe
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: built capacity, hubbert linearization, m. king hubbert, norway [list all tags]

This post examines the impact of delaying oil field developments and producing at below capacity upon reserves estimates made using Hubbert Linearisation. Robert Rapier had a similar post some months back using synthetic data. This post uses real data from Norway and three different story lines are described and analysed.

  1. Norway
  2. Fjordland – same as Norway but with 4 fields allowed to lie fallow and 20% of production withheld from 1981 to the present day
  3. Fjelland – same as Fjordland but with the 4 fallow fields developed in 2001-2004 and full production reinstated from 2002.

The significance for predicting national and global oil reserves and peak oil are discussed.

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A Debate on the Substance and Timing of the Peak of Oil Production and Consumption, Part I

Posted by Prof. Goose on December 4, 2006 - 10:56am
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: hubbert linearization, logistic, norway, peak oil, russia, saudi arabia, urr [list all tags]

This is a guest post by westexas.

Resolved: World Net Oil Export Capacity is Now Declining Because of Involuntary Reductions in Production and/or Because of Increases in Domestic Consumption in Major Oil Exporting Countries

Robert Rapier suggested that we debate this topic, and I agreed. In reality, there are only shades of gray difference between us regarding the timing of Peak Oil and Peak Exports. I believe that the crisis has hit, while Robert believes that the worst won't be upon us until some time shortly after 2010. Robert will file his rejoinder about a week from today.

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Lies, Damned Lies and Government Oil Production Forecasts?

Posted by Euan Mearns on October 17, 2006 - 9:31am in The Oil Drum: Europe
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: eu, norway, oil, oil prices, peak oil, united kingdom [list all tags]

The UK Department of Trade and Industry (Oil and Gas) and the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate have both published production forecasts showing increased oil production in the years 2007 and 2008. Oil production in the UK and Norway has been falling steadily in recent years following peak production in 1999 and 2001 respectively.

These forecasts have a significant impact upon forecast trade balance, particularly in the UK which has just turned net oil importer. So lets see how the UK and Norway are going to pull off this gravity defying, Hubbert denying stunt.

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World Oil Exports: A Comprehensive Projection

Posted by Prof. Goose on October 10, 2006 - 9:13am
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: algeria, argentina, azerbaijan, canada, colin campbell, colombia, denmark, ecuador, egypt, eu, exports, iran, kazakhstan, kuwait, malaysia, mexico, norway, oil exports, oil prices, peak oil, qatar, russia, united arab emirates, united kingdom, venezuela [list all tags]

[editor's note, by Prof. Goose] This is a guest post by lads.

This article is a first simplistic (but comprehensive) assessment of World Oil Exports, here defined has the total amount of liquid hydrocarbons that are surpluses in producing countries. This assessment is made by projecting in to the future fixed change rates that reflect current trends in liquids production and consumption in countries where presently the difference between the two is positive. The outcome of this assessment is worrisome.

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