What this presentation will cover. • What “Global Peak Oil” means to you. • What shale oil is and how heat is used to melt it free. • Why our oil companies can’t pump our 1.5 TRILLION barrels of Colorado shale oil. • Using thorium as nuclear heat. • The thorium-fueled molten salt reactor. • Where do we go from here?
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What Global Peak Oil means to you.
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Oil comes in 3 general forms: • 1. Pumpable Oil • 2. Tight Oil – Shale Oil, Oil Sands, Oil Sludge (Very Heavy Oil) • 3. Synthesized Oil – From Coal, Natural Gas, Plant Cellulose, Garbage, Sewage 7
Oil is by far the world’s most popular energy. US Energy Consumption by Source 1775 to 2009
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Pumpable oil has begun its decline. • The United States had its “Peak Oil” moment in 1970. Its been all downhill since. • Planet Earth had its “Peak Oil” moment about 2006.
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The USA was “Top Dog” in oil production before we had our “Peak Oil” moment.
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USA’s Peak Oil This picture was taken several years before USA’s “Peak Oil”
The situation now
Will you be able to take this picture ten years after Planet Earth’s “Peak Oil”?
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At the end of World War II, the United States was the world’s largest exporter of oil. We supplied 5 out of every 6 barrels of oil used to defeat the Axis countries. In 1956 (dashed red line), Shell geologist M. King Hubbert predicted the United States’ oil production would first “Peak” and then begin declining about 1970. The blue line is Hubbert’s prediction, the black dots are the US Energy Information Agency’s records of what actually happened.
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Peak Oil + Imported Oil Our oil production decline began in 1970, We lost our oil independence. This contributed to the erosion of our per capita wealth. The USA could no longer go it alone and oil security became “Job #1.�
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Now, we are facing a second, more serious, “Peak Oil”
Global Peak Oil 14
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Now, in 2012, The United States is burning 243 barrels of oil
every second. And we are depending on others for about half of that oil. We have become very vulnerable. 17
Now, in 2012, Planet Earth is burning 1007 barrels of oil
every second. And China and India have begun pulling into the gas station. We are just one more customer. 18
Many oil experts predicted Planet Earth would hit its “Peak Oil” production before 2010.
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Kurt Cobb brought these two pages to the author’s attention in an article he wrote for the French Journal “Scitizen.” (The data was compiled by the US Energy Information Agency.)
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Non-pumpable oil is beginning to step in.
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PUMPED OIL SHORTFALL - Fracking “Fracking” shale is producing some new oil. Getting big press. Fracked tight oil may replace up to 1/4 of our current imported oil but fracking recovers only a tiny percentage of the available oil.
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PUMPED OIL SHORTFALL – Oil Sands “Oil Sands” (bitumen) by melting and upgrading tar sands with natural gas. Currently about 10% of our imported oil is Canadian oil sands. It is bottom quality oil.
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PUMPED OIL SHORTFALL – Synthetic Oil “Synthetic oil” made by refining coal or gas into synthetic oil (CTL, GTL). China, South Africa, and Shell have large synthetic oil refineries.
Shell’s “Pearl” Gas-to-Liquids (GTL) 320,000 barrels oil equivalent/day of gas resulting in: - 140,000 boe/d of gas-to-liquids products (2 trains) - 120,000 boe/d of natural gas liquids and ethane
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A global re-run of United States’ “Peak Oil” experience is likely. Increasing demand despite decreasing production. Another 10-fold increase in price is possible. The automobile population alone will almost double in 15 years.
Car population growth - ->
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The danger is that Planet Earth’s peak production of oil is happening at the same moment 2/3 of the world just decided it wants to burn oil like the other 1/3 has been burning oil for over 150 years. 70,000 oil fields with 4.7 million oil wells can’t meet today’s global oil demand, 54 of the world’s 65 oil producing countries have already peaked. Most experts agree there is at least as much pumpable oil left as we have already pumped. It does mean the spigot is wide open and we have failed to pump any faster for 6 years straight – despite ever tightening oil markets. It looks like pumped oil is about to become terribly expensive. 26
Where is Planet Earth Going to Import Its Oil From?
Former Shell CEO John Hofmeister has predicted that the rapid run-up in demand for oil over the next two to three years—primarily in China and India, and by as much as 10 million barrels per day—may well outstrip supply and raise the price of oil to more than $200 a barrel. 27
The US can’t occupy every piece of land in the world that has a producing oil well on it.
Planet Earth’s Energy Resources Sources: IPCC, (Thorium, nonconventional oils added by author).
This is almost all the dispatchable energy mankind has available
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Moving beyond conventional oil.
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Planet Earth’s oil reserves. Pumped Oil
Pumped Oil + Unconventional (tight) Oil
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USA has the world’s largest shale oil reserves
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Countries active in tight oil extraction • • • • • •
Canada – Oil sands China – Shale oil Estonia – Shale oil (80% of all shale oil) Venezuela – Heavy oil Brazil – Shale oil Germany – Shale oil
Past or Planning Israel, Romania, Russia, Jordan, Egypt
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The Green River Basin oil shale formation. The world’s largest OIL SHALE formation – 1.5 T bbl
Left, Alaska North Slope Oil. Right, Colorado oil shale.
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The “Mother of all oil” Oil Shale is an American MEGA-Oil source. There is more oil in the Green River basin than all the oil mankind has pumped since the beginning of oil. Shale oil – called “Kerogen” - is “immature” oil, tightly bound to shale rock. With additional long-term heating, shale oil “matures,” frees up, and becomes excellent pump-able crude oil for gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel. 35
Why our oil companies can’t pump our 1.5 TRILLION barrels of Colorado shale oil. Economics and environmentalism’s increasingly specious legal challenges. 36
Explaining “IN SITU” and “EX SITU” extraction. Oil, pumped “in situ,” has a tiny footprint.
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Shale oil, like tar sands, has been “ex situ� - mined (extracted) either surface or underground. Historically, ex situ extraction and retorting of shale oil has been uneconomic.
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Oil shale has to be heated to melt the oil free from the shale rock. This process is called “Retorting.�
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This is the 200’ long “Alberta Retort” for melting shale oil free. The shale rock (shale flow is right to left) is progressively heated so the shale oil is evaporated and goes out the vapor tube (left). Air is then added to combust the shale rock (red) to produce the necessary heat. Massive Global Warming CO2 and mountains of charred shale rock.
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“In situ� retorting is being explored to provide a way to pump the oil.
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Shell is using electricity to heat their in situ system. Oil well rocking beams are marked.
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American Shale Oil Company’s in situ heating system.
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The Green River is a Colorado River Tributary. In some areas, Green River oil shale is under an aquifer. This aquifer is non-negotiable. Can’t be contaminated.
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Shell has developed an “ice wall� barrier system to isolate the aquifer.
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Shale oil extraction is extremely energy-intensive. It is obvious massive amounts of energy will be needed to extract shale oil.
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How energy-expensive is shale oil?
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You can’t spend a barrel of oil extracting a barrel of oil
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"For nearly a century, the oil shale in the western United States has been considered as a substitute source for conventional crude oil. But the economics of shale oil production have persistently remained behind conventional oil.
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When crude oil prices were about $3 per barrel in the 1960s and early 1970s, estimates of the required selling price needed to make oil shale economic were about $6 per barrel. By the late 1970s, world crude oil prices had increased to about $15 per barrel, but estimates of the required selling price for oil shale had also sharply increased, ranging from a low of $20 per barrel to a high of $26 per barrel (Merrow, 1978). Crude oil prices jumped again in the winter of 1979–1980 in response to the Iranian crisis, and so did estimates of the required selling price of shale oil, which were reported at more than $45 per barrel in 1980 (OTA, Volume I, 1980).
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Once again, the United States is in a period during which crude oil prices have risen sharply. As in the past, concerns are being raised regarding the ability of world oil supplies to meet growing demands, especially from the developing economies of Asia. Once again, oil shale is being examined as a possible solution." - RAND M414 49
The U.S. Energy Policy Act of 2005 requires the Department of Interior to promote research and development of oil shale resources and to establish a commercial leasing program.
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The Bureau of Land Management recently received ten applications (by eight companies) for a pilot program to develop Colorado’s shale reserves. The program allows the companies access to public lands for the purpose of testing shale-extraction technologies. You see below an interesting mix of large, publicly traded oil giants and small, privately held innovators.
Natural Soda, Inc. of Rifle, Colorado. EGL Resources Inc. of Midland, Texas. Salt Lake City-based Kennecott Exploration Company. Independent Energy Partners of Denver, Colorado Denver-based Phoenix Wyoming, Inc. Chevron Shale Oil Company. Exxon Mobil Corporation. Shell Frontier Oil and Gas Inc It is known that Shell returned to their test plot 5 times and ran experiments over more than a 10 year period. 51
Using nuclear heat to sidestep the high economic and environmental cost of using fossil fuels to extract fossil fuels.
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The cost of 1 million BTU of heat. (In the United States, February 2012.)
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Oil
$18 per million BTU (5.8 million BTU per barrel at $104 per barrel)
• Natural Gas • Coal
$7 per million BTU (1 million BTU at $7 per 1,000 std ft^3)
$2 per million BTU (30.8 million BTU per ton at $68 per ton)
• Uranium
$0.92 per million BTU (Includes enrichment, fuel rod assembly)
• Thorium*
$0.0000081 per million BTU (3.5x10^12 BTU/lb at $28 per lb)
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*Estimated
- - - 1 BTU (British Thermal Unit) is about the heat from 1 wood match.
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We can use our cheapest, cleanest energy -
THORIUM
to extract and purify our most prized energy -
OIL
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“Ball park” heat vs. oil yield guesstimate Using a thorium-fueled molten salt reactor. A $100 barrel (bbl) of oil is 5.8 x 106 BTU, One EBASCO MSR thorium reactor produces 8.5 x 109 BTU/hr Shell’s EROI is 3.5 or .29 bbl oil heat in produces 3.5 barrels oil out 8.5 x 109 BTU/hr / .29 [1/3.5] = 29 x 109 BTU/hr oil 29 x 109 BTU/hr oil / 5.8 x 106 BTU per barrel of oil = 5,000 bbl/hr 5,000 bbl/hr x 24 hr/day = 120,000 bbl/day
or $12,000,000 per day
Shell is currently claiming they can make a profit any time pumped oil is over $30 per barrel. Ignoring all other costs, using “almost free” thorium heat instead of oil or gas for input heat could increase their profits by as much as $3,600,000/day or $1.3 billion/yr. Sufficient margin to weather any oil price collapse. Plus, NO GLOBAL WARMING CO2.
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How Nuclear Heat “In Situ” Shale Oil Extraction would work.
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Using thorium to make nuclear heat.
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Hazardous nuclear waste comparison
“Denatured� (Anti-proliferation and terrorism) fuel is available.
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About the 1,300°F Thorium-Fueled Molten Salt Reactor
This is NOT your grandfather’s reactor. 61
Reactor buyer’s guide
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The United States military decided to have both nuclear powered Submarines and nuclear powered Bomber Airplanes. The nuclear powered Bomber Airplane was soon made obsolete by the Intercontinental Missile.
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Molten Salt Nuclear Reactor Will run on: Thorium, Nuclear Waste, Uranium, Plutonium
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• • • • • • • • • •
Only reactor that fails to cold. 1,300°F instead of 550°F. Hot enough to replace coal, gas, or oil. Unpressurized instead of 3,000 psi steam so it can’t explode. If it leaks, the salt cools into a solid lump. Can’t spread into the environment. Naturally load following, (cruise control) doesn’t have to have control rods. Has no fuel rods, runs 30 years between salt cleanings. Makes 1% the nuclear waste, 87% is safe in 10 years, all safe in 300 years. Thorium, a rare-earth mine tailing, is 4 times as common as uranium. Thorium does not need expensive enrichment, has no weapons value. A pot, a pump, and pipe. Easy, simple, and cheap to make. 66
Molten Salt Reactors run red-hot (1,300°F). The zig-zag device is the molten salt filled radiator of the “Molten Salt Reactor Experiment” reactor (it ran 1965 to 1970) at Oak Ridge National Laboratories. Two large fans blew air through it to remove the reactor’s heat.
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Experimental Molten Salt Reactor on display at Oak Ridge National Laboratories
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Family Pictures
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Why did the Molten Salt reactor fade away? Cold war decision. You can’t make plutonium bombs from thorium. Bombs fizzle. President Nixon strongly favored the plutonium breeding potential of another type of reactor, the “Liquid Metal Fast Breeder Reactor (LMFBR)”.
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How do we get our hands on a thorium-fueled molten salt reactor? The Chinese have a formal thorium MSR program at the Chinese Academy of Sciences University (their equivalent to MIT). China’s program is headed by Dr. Jiang Mianheng, son of the former Chinese president Jiang Zemin. A vice president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the younger Jiang holds a Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Drexel University. A Chinese delegation headed by Jiang revealed the thorium plans to Oak Ridge scientists during a visit to the national lab fall of 2010.
Hire Dr. D. L. as consultant, K. S. as engineer. Consider the author’s “Fast-tracking MSR development on a slow boat to China” plan. Show up at CAS with a barge full of cash and a pad of Purchase Orders.
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Where do we go from here?
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Since the beginning of the twentieth century, petroleum has been entwined with the security, power and position of nations.
RAND Corporation Report M414 (Ch 4), “The
Strategic Significance of Shale Oil”
3 million barrels per day of shale oil would: • • • •
“Secure” US military and industrial fuel supply. Reduce world oil prices by about 10%. Enhance national economic stability. Create 100,000 high paying skilled trade jobs 74
We are at a most dangerous impasse. Heat from coal, oil, or gas is too expensive, environmentally dirty, and becoming too scarce to use. Heat from conventional reactors is not hot enough and nuclear is unacceptable to the environmentalists. Heat from thorium-fueled molten salt reactors is unavailable and nuclear is unacceptable to the environmentalists. Now that both US Peak Oil (1970) and Global Peak Oil (2005) have passed, delay is no longer an option. Further delay in opening the world’s massive tight oil reserves means running the very real risk of endless wars for control over ever dwindling reserves of pumpable oil. 75
Some Fears About Oil.
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(Opinion) Support the International Atomic Energy Agency, not United States’ local Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The NRC has become an obsolete political football for the environmentalists and obsolete entrenched US industry. Recognize the US has not been a global leader in nuclear energy technology for several decades. Russia has more reactors both in construction and on order than the rest of the world combined.
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In Canada, natural gas is used to free up tar sand’s bitumen. Natural gas is also used as the source of hydrogen for upgrading the bitumen (tar) to bottom-quality crude oil. This makes an expensive oil, large amounts of CO2. In the USA, thorium heat could be used to free up shale oil. Thorium heat is almost hot enough split water as the source of hydrogen to upgrade (light) shale oil to light sweet crude. This would make a cheap oil, zero CO2. 78
The Economics Make It Compelling • • • • •
Oil $18 per million BTU (5.8 million BTU per barrel at $104 per barrel) Natural Gas $5 per million BTU (1 million BTU at $5 per 1,000 BTU std ft^3) Coal $2 per million BTU (30.8 million BTU per ton at $68 per ton) Uranium $0.92 per million BTU (Includes enrichment, fuel rod assembly) Thorium* $0.0000081 per million BTU (3.5x10^12 BTU/lb at $28 per lb)
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The cost of vehicle fuel has become a terrible burden for all of civilization.
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We should make our vehicle fuels from thorium nuclear shale oil.
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We should make our electricity with thorium nuclear power plants.
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Altona Energy (UK) believes it can supply vehicle-ready diesel at $53 a barrel ($1.26 per gallon) from coal, by burning carbon captured coal, at Arckaringa, Australia.
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With an MSR reactor, even little island countries with nothing could make synthetic vehicle fuel from water and sewage, not have to import costly oil. 79
New technologies make it possible • Carbon Capture and Sequestration. • 10,000°F Plasma Torches, air- lock gasifiers. • FLiBe heat transfer salt. • Molten Salt Reactors (MSRs) • Thorium instead of uranium nuclear fuel. • Sulfur - Iodine water - hydrogen process. • Hi-Rez 3D Echo Imaging Guiding Directional Drills. • Zero-Emission Stirling Air Turbine generators.
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It is vitally important that every country develop their non-conventional oil resources as rapidly and as fully as possible. Wars to control access to oil are ineffective. Reining in environmentalists is essential.
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An oil-abundant world would be a happier world.
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Thank you for your interest. 83
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New Ideas • • • • • • • •
Thorium Molten Salt Reactor Peak Oil Synthetic Oil Unconventional Oil Sources Plasma Torches Water Splitting Black Swan 86