December 2008 Aircraft Finance Conference Conventional Oil Fields Are Facing Peak Production Due to "Depletion" Existing oil fields are over 20 years old on average, and as they have become depleted their production rates are declining by approx. 4+ MM bpd annually. In spite of new technology, conventional field discoveries in recent years have not
kept pace with the combination of production declines and incremental demand. Supply shortfall has been met through “stopgap” measures including tapping of OPEC surplus production capacity, corn‐based ethanol & oil sands.
Demand for oil from emerging economies grew steadily from 1998‐07 even though prices grew by approx. 450% over this period.
Oil prices have retreated in tandem with the broad U.S. equity market during 2H08.
Possible Outcome of Next Economic Upturn: "Digital" Price Recovery for Oil Fears of unsustainable
demand for oil are likely to
re‐emerge.
Appendix: Sources Used for Chart Data Oil supply and demand data is sourced from the following reports supplied by
the Energy Information Administration: Short‐Term Energy Outlook ‐ July 2008. Supply includes production of crude oil (including lease condensates), natural gas, plant liquids, other liquids, and refinery processing gains. Oil prices computed based on all countries’ spot price FOB weighted by estimated export volume (dollars per barrel) ‐ July 2008. Population data is supplied by the United States Census Bureau. Click Here To Download This Article In PDF Format
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