America #1 oil producer for the first time since 1973

https://money.cnn.com/2018/09/12/investing/us-oil-production-russia-saudi-arabia/index.html

For the first time since 1973, the United States is the world's largest producer of crude oil, according to preliminary estimates published on Wednesday by the Energy Department.

The feat demonstrates how the US shale oil boom has reshaped the global energy landscape. American oil output has more than doubled over the past decade.

"It's an historic milestone and a reminder: Never bet against the US oil industry," said Bob McNally, president of Rapidan Energy Group, a consulting firm.

Texas is the epicenter of the shale boom. Production in the Permian Basin of West Texas has grown so much that in February the United States vaulted above Saudi Arabia for the first time in more than two decades, according to the US Energy Information Administration.

US output kept climbing in June and August, reaching nearly 11 million barrels per day. That nudged the United States ahead of Russia for the first time since February 1999, the EIA estimates.

The United States isn't expected to cede its crown any time soon. The EIA expects US oil production to stay ahead of Russia and Saudi Arabia through 2019.

God bless. We've been #1 in energy for several years, mainly because of fracking.

Texas is a baller when it comes to energy. Not only are they going to outpace Iran in oil extraction by 2019, but they also have more wind turbines than any other state by a significant margin, and it's the only state with a completely independent power grid.

Is oil one thing were someone wants to be the biggest producer? I guess with oil prices above 70$ it's plenty of money to make with it...

Hopefully humanity will need oil less and less going forward...

We should be seeing the top within 10 years or so. Though it really depends on the sources if you look it up. Some claim it can come in the early 2020's, some say between 2025 and 2030, others say it won't reach peak before well into 2040's.

I don't know how much oil the transport section (and of that mainly cars and trucks) use, however at least in Norway, electric cars are becoming rather normal. Would be even more normal if any producer of electric cars could produce enough to meet demands. Some models are not sold anymore due to waiting lists being over 2 years long. Also a lot of testing with short range electric trucks, as well replacing the engine in buses with a hybrid system and bio gas.

No it's not.

This is not what I call an honor.

I want less oil.

Well, not sure how I feel about it.

One on hand, it's nice to produce all that and sell it.

On the other hand, I imagine we are probably using a lot of it. That's not so good.

Yeah, same.

I'm not so worried about cars and plastics as we have renewable alternatives to power and create both; I'm more worried about jet fuel and things of that nature, the stuff that might be more difficult to replace.

That's nice, but what happens when it runs out?

This is a good thing, doesnt mean we stop looking into other energy sources and expanding those. Reality is oil powers the majority of everything right now.

And yet gas and diesel prices keep going up. It would greatly benefit Americans and the world/planet if Big Oil were shut down and the oil industry was socialized for all citizens. But the American capitalist regime might have an issue with that. And all the conservative nutjobs would believe that alternative energy sources are coming to take their lives away.

@speedfreak48t5p: I dunno. What happens when we run out of cobalt and lithium for electric car batteries?

Nobody has any real idea when peak oil is going to happen. 60 years ago they said it was going to happen by year 2000. That wasn't true. In 2009 the head of the EPA said it would happen before 2020. That doesn't seem to be true either. The thing is we keep finding new tech

That's exactly what I said...

Will the USA invade themselves?

@vl4d_l3nin: Good thing we'll consume less of it in the future.

@horgen: No it's not. You said we were going to see the top in 10 years and other people claim it may be later. I'm saying that we have no idea whatsoever due to technology and demands constantly changing, and people who are claiming they do know are only fooling themselves and other people, as proven in the past. It's actually quite different than what you said.

@plageus900: Possibly. No guarantees, but we can hope. In the meantime, North America has a massive appetite for it.

Sure thing I said we should be seeing the top within the next 10 years or so. But I follow that up with that the estimates varies greatly. If that doesn't translate to "we have no fucking idea when oil consumption will actually peak" then I don't know what I said....

Most of the world is going into renewable energy. Even China is rapidly making that move. In about 10 years, economy's dependent on oil will be in a bit of turmoil.

It will be interesting to see just what damage is done to the American water systems within a couple of decades.

It was socialized in Venezuela and look what happened there. Every time government takes over an industry the tax payers have to subside it.

You want to live without oil. There are no other options. Of course we could go back to huts and log cabins and work when the sun is out and go to bed when the sun stets, as there will be no electricity and walk every where we want to go. Don'.t think about horses at one point in history London was predicting they would be buried in ten feet of horse crap.

But the US isn't lead by a dictatorship (at least not yet). And there are enough people in the industry to prevent the same kind of economic crash (which, from what I understand wasn't directly related to their oil/gas industry). Those kinds of crashes come directly from the government printing too much money to make up for a lack of incoming revenue from trade.

And they could very easily give US citizens a heavily discounted price, while selling any surplus at an increased price and putting that money into healthcare.

Nowadays I just think of oil as the earths diarrhea.

We kill people for oil.

Oil created by death.

Lots of death in middle east.

Makes sense.

Nobody ever doubted America was one of the largest oil producers, the only problem is that no matter how much America tries because of it's stratospheric consumption it will continue to import oil from wherever it can.

And a lot of idiot right wing people think that venezuala is in the state it is because of socialism, because they think the US couldn't possibly be interfering with there economy with all the oil that america has. It's like....are you really THAT naive?

from what i understand about things like shale oil or oil sands is they require oil prices to be high for the mining and processing of them to be profitable. harder to obtain vs. just sticking a straw into the ground.

iirc when oil prices plummeted a few years back that had a drastically bad effect on US productions because it was no longer profitable.

i guess w/ expensive oil back again we can start producing more again. curious if more production will again drive prices back down.

praising this as a good thing is also indirectly praising that oil prices are high again

Fossil fuels are one of the essential underlying foundations of the high standard of living we all enjoy today.

The history of mankind's use of fossil fuels is a story of increasing efficiency, increasing safety, and decreasing pollution, in how we harvest, process, transport and use these fuels.

The world must have oil, and other fossil fuels, or standard of living and life expectancy will decline. I'd much prefer the USA, a democratically founded, secularly governed nation, be in possession of a large percentage of the world's reserves. Much more so than a bunch of nations ruled by religious zealots or socialist despots.

@vl4d_l3nin

what they DONT tell you is that the reason has more to do with decline of output elsewhere then it does increase of output by the US.

both are happening, but decline elsewhere is happening more then our increase

We're number 1 in oil. This mean we are going to invade ourselves then rebuild?

Now if only we could stop sharting in Wally World we could get somewhere.

Yes it is; as we continue to use oil, you want to be in the driver seat of the market. One, it provides jobs that build communities. Two it provides a great deal of these companies with capital to invest in the R&D of renewable energy sources.

Win win.

lol...

here is what those reports DONT say.

The old major producers are producing LESS oil faster then we are producing more.

can you figure out what that means?

i agree moves are being made into alternatives and long term that is a good thing. realistically though we have not large scale replacement for oil now nor will we have much in ten years ( in my opinion ).

i think people tend to underestimate how fucking incredible oil is at storing energy and how easy it is to get, store, transport, etc...

take the simplified example of a gallon of gasoline for your car that cost let's say $3 for you.

to get that gallon oil was removed from the ground

shipped to a refinery

refined

shipped to a distributor or to a station and pumped into your car

once in your car, it is burned where right off the bat at least 75% of the energy in the fuel is completely wasted to heat and other inefficiencies of your car's engine

THEN the energy that's left in that gallon is still enough to move you 20+ miles down the road with MOST of that energy just being used to actually move the mass of your 2+ ton car rather than moving you yourself.

for $3

It also pollutes the nearby environment. At one point you have to ask if the cost to the environment isn't to large.

Agreed. Fortunately (while being unfortunate), because of the incidents in the last decade and a half, that conversation has become a realized part of the process. That balance also has be looked at for renewable (I don't really like using this term when talking about energy, because oil is a renewable resources, but it conveys the message) energy source; practice, while it doesn't always make perfect, it usually leads to better.

Where do you get this lie from? An article from 2014? There is no truth to it whatsoever in current years.

Oil still remains the world’s leading fuel by far, accounting for a third of global energy consumption. Oil gained global market share for the second year in a row, following 15 years of declines from 1999 to 2014. BP reports that the global oil consumption growth averaged 1.8% or an equivalent of 1.7 million barrels per day (b/d) in 2017, above its 10-year average of 1.2% for the third consecutive year. China (500,000 b/d) and the US (190,000 b/d) were the single largest contributors to growth. Due to the strong domestic demand, ample oil reserves, as well as the primary oil export requirement, the top 10 largest oil producing countries in the world are expected to remain unchanged in the near future, with the USA, Saudi Arabia, and Russia in an absolute dominance.

https://www.bizvibe.com/blog/top-oil-producing-countries/

Despite their declines, they're still the biggest producers by far

which lies are you talking about? because your rebuttal seems to support what I am saying.

I am not sure I understand what you are saying.

what I am saying is that Saudi oil production has been decreasing, thus its easier for other to make the top of the list.

get it?

@tryit: You claimed their declines are bigger than out gains. The entire middle east has declined about 250,000 bpd last year. Our gains have been 820,000. Individual declines are nowhere near our gains

interesting, I would have to look into those numbers to validate them.

because it it 250,000 decline over the past 10 years vs 820,000 increase in one year ? or what? I would need to inspect the details

Renewal in the million years timeline yes. Not in our lifetime really.

I'm not sure we really know how much oil the earth is producing every day. I'm not talking about how much we harvest every day, I mean how much new oil the earth is currently making. I don't think we really know if the earth is making new oil faster than we are harvesting, or not.

One thing I do know; I'm in my mid 50s and I've been hearing the doomsayers predicting the exhaustion of oil reserves my entire life. And so far, not a single one of those predictions has panned out. In fact, those predictions get destroyed by the discovery of previously unknown reserves, or the invention of new technology that enables mankind to extract previously inaccessible reserves.

Like I said in my previous post, the story of mankind's use of fossil fuels is a story of ever increasing efficiency, ever increasing safety, and ever decreasing pollution, in the way we harvest, process, transport and use them. Our ability to use fossil fuels has been one the most important factors in bringing about the high standard of living and long life expectancy enjoyed by the developed world.

If it makes you feel better, just remember that the ultimate source of the energy contained in fossil fuels is solar and geothermal. All the energy we get from them originated in the sun and/or the earth's core. So, when you use fossil fuels, you are using stored solar and geothermal energy, and you can feel good that you are being "green" :)

Yes oil has been vital for us to achieve the lifestyle we have today. But calling it green? I wouldn't say that. That carbon has been out of the loop for so long, and we return it mostly by CO2 emissions or plastic waste.

Granted your view on green power would make almost everything green.

I admit my stance that fossil fuels are stored "green" energy is a bit tongue-in-cheek.

But I do get frustrated with the attitude, especially from the younger generation, that fossil fuels are no longer necessary. I don't think the vast majority of folks that hold that view have the slightest clue how much more difficult, short and miserable life would be without them.

I am not assigning such attitudes to you personally. I just try to take opportunities as I find them to point out that fossil fuels have made, and continue to make all of our lives better, not worse.

They probably do not know to which extent oil is used today. Can't say I blame them, it is, in my experience, not commonly taught in school. And would we have mined/drilled so extensively for oil and other fossil fuels if we had been aware of the possible consequences from the beginning?

We are seeing a shift in cars. In 10 years we will probably have very good replacement for ICE in every category of vehicles for common folks.

@horgen: Electric cars may be alright for your country, where it's almost 100% hydroelectric. Not everyone is that geographically blessed. In places that use fossil fuels for electricity, they are can be far worse, especially when you factor in battery waste.

Still less CO2 emissions than ICE cars.

@vl4d_l3nin: Becareful what you wish for!!! The fracking boom in the US is highly likely going to be seen as a mistake 20-30 years from now.

Fracking for oil and gas is a hazardous exercise. Oil and gas producers are literally pouring poison into the earth, it contaminates the water supply for generations if not forever.

Each area that is fracked has a short lifespan. It does not compare with traditional vertical oil wells which can last several decades.

Therefore it damages more surface area.

Fracking can also cause earth quakes. When it was trialed in the UK, near a coastal city called Blackpool tremors were recorded.

The oil company, Shell found the largest reserves (at the time) of gas in Sichuan, China. But it has not been exploited as there are fears of affecting the tectonic plates, which could cause earth quakes.

The oil from fracking, is called tight-oil, it is actually a light-sweet crude oil which is actually good quality due to its low sulphur content.

However, every country really needs a mixture of light and heavy crude oil, so it cannot exactly make the US completely oil independent.

The worst thing about the fracking revolution is that it will postpone the clean energy revolution and clean energy innovation.

If crude oil is cheap, then gasoline/petrol will also be cheap and the incentive to buy electric cars or hydrogen cars will be reduced. This, in the long term will cause more pollution for the environment.

Another thing, think about the big oil producing countries. Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Nigeria, Algeria, Venezuela and Syria. They are usually politically corrupt, where the energy companies can influence the government for their own desires rather than for the people. They also suffer from significant domestic upheavals and civil war.

The only exception to the rule is really Norway, which has managed its oil industry well.

@kadin_kai:Like I said multiple times, we don't know what or when the end point of oil energy will be. The concept of "peak oil" used to be a mainstream talking point for the left. Not so much anymore because they've been continuously embarrassing themselves for decades with their predictions.

I think the end point of oil will not be critical shortages or widespread environmental impact, but rather oil simply falling out of favor as renewable energy becomes cheaper. This will no doubt cause some hiccups in the economy, but nothing that wont correct itself, similar to when economies go from industrial to post-industrial.

When it comes to troubles with water supplies, state mismanagement is a much bigger issue. Just look at Flint, or even in California where mismanagement is more to blame than the natural conditions of the drought.

Oil production does not stand in the way of renewable energy in any significant way. As you pointed out, we're still dependent on foreign oil, despite our production. If fracking were to disappear tomorrow, it would hardly accelerate our production of renewable energy. It would vastly increase our dependence on foreign oil. That's exactly what happened when our oil production began to drop in the 80's. Our renewable energy remained fairly stagnant until George W. Bush gave tax cuts to energy providers who got a certain amount of their energy from a renewable source.

take a look at this chart.

When 'Peak Oil' became popular in the public lexicon was around 2004 at which point oil prices where around $50 generously speaking. They have been higher on average ever sense.

true to form however, a lot less (in prices) then predicted 100% because of fracking which is also limited in that it depends on the price being higher to justify the extra cost.

So peak oil has always been less about 'running out of oil' and more about 'running out of CHEAP oil'.

With technological improvements this can be mitigated, but believing in some man in the clouds is about as silly as believing that technology will always without exception magically save you at the last moment.

https://www.macrotrends.net/1369/crude-oil-price-history-chart