Podcast: Peak Oil Crisis with Chandramouli Mahadevan

12 Responses for "Podcast: Peak Oil Crisis with Chandramouli Mahadevan"

1. Global Warming » Podcast: Peak Oil Crisis with Chandramouli Mahadevan April 20th, 2008 at 8:38 pm 1

   […] Coffee With Sundar wrote an interesting post today on Podcast: Peak Oil Crisis with Chandramouli MahadevanHere’s a quick excerptGlobal Warming vs Peak Oil Crisis vs Combination of both?… […]

2. AM April 20th, 2008 at 10:26 pm 2

   A suggestion: keen to show your interest in the speaker, you seem to interrupt the speaker; if you note interviews on tv/radio, you will note that the interviewer does not ’speak’ at all during the interview, apart from asking the questions.. To become a better interviewer, I feel, you can show your approval by nodding rather than speaking when the other person is speaking.

3. My takes - Peak Oil Crisis and the Energy policy » NITTians.com April 20th, 2008 at 11:41 pm 3

   […] was listening to a talk on the Peak Oil Crisis, there are a few points I must share too. These are not points I have come […]

4. Sundar Rajan G S April 21st, 2008 at 4:57 am 4

   Sure AM, thanks for the feedback!

5. balaji April 21st, 2008 at 6:58 am 5

   Nice post on peak oil, but can you put something on “Hair Oil Crisis”, like why people prefer Brylcreem to Parachute oil or why Dabur Amla hair oil has no money to show ads, or why hair oil industry in India is in slippery slope (no pun intended).

6. Aditya Kulkarni April 21st, 2008 at 7:01 am 6

   You know, that’s a great discussion! I have two comments on it though…

   Firstly, what we are running out of is called Light Sweet Crude. Its the cheapest form for Crude Oil from which we can extract Petrol and Diesel, but by no means the only one. There are large deposits of whats called “Shale Oil” around the world (the 500B barrels in the US that you mentioned in your interview is this type of oil). The problem with this type is that it costs a lot to extract, about $70 a barrel. But if the price of oil is sustained at > $100 a barrel, it now becomes profitable to extract and refine and sell this. And as expected, drilling for shale oil has already started in a big way in the US (see footnote below), and you can certainly expect the supply of oil to increase over the coming years compensating for the fall of light sweet crude.

   There other ways of extracting oil too - The world has a very very large supply of natural gas, and this gas can be liquefied to diesel and petrol, but will cost about $130 a barrel. Plastic can be liquefied to crude oil at about $200. Organic waste can be used to recreate oil in a complex biological process using algae that is expected to cost about $260 a barrel.

   The other issue is that the rising price of oil is not a bad thing. As the cost of energy increases on one hand, it creates stronger incentives (read: more profits) for alternative fuel sources . Now what are these fuel sources? There are many candidates (solar, wind, geothermal, nuclear, algae etc…). True, the cost of extraction of energy for these today is higher than the cost of the energy produced, but an increasing price of energy means it suddenly becomes viable at some point. Lots of people are putting good money into research and investments of these alternative fuels to reduce the cost of extraction and eventually make it profitable.

   But all this is just theory. Is there any way we can verify that this claim is really true? Fortunately for us, there is! Oil Futures! These are securities that are traded in the international markets that indicate what the selling price of a barrel of oil will be in the future. Oil futures for the year 2012, the farthest available today, are still trading at around $100 a barrel, not much different from what the price is today.

   What does that mean? It means that it the market (and that means the people who are putting money where their mouth is) thinks that the price of oil is unlikely to raise dramatically in the next 5 years for whatever reason - Maybe the world will cut consumption, maybe lots of new oil will become economical to be extracted and sold, maybe all the cars will move to electricity. But there’s really no reason to worry. You’ll still be able to get your $100-a-barrel oil in 2012!

   The NYMEX Crude Oil Futures: http://futures.tradingcharts.com/marketquotes/index.php3?market=CL
   The CNN Money article about alternative oils: http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/newstex/IBD-0001-24494336.htm
   NyTimes article about increased drilling for Shale Oil: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/11/us/11oil.html?em&ex=1208059200&en=070c095a22369c8d&ei=5087%0A

7. Gerard April 21st, 2008 at 7:27 am 7

   I think this is great, especially for people like me who are lazy to read :-). Its a very interesting topic too, it would be really nice if you could get a video interview next time :).

8. Varun S April 21st, 2008 at 9:02 am 8

   Hi,
   if you are planning to do something similar to a video interview with transcript, Google video has a way by which you can embed transcript into video (will appear as sub-titles in the video). That would be awesome! you can paste that same transcript here in the blog and thats all you need. I m sure transcripts should also be available for Youtube and other services.

   Thanks
   Varun

9. Prashant April 22nd, 2008 at 2:42 pm 9

   Good one Sundar.
   Provides good insights about Peak Oil Crisis and is indeed a useful reference… Kudos to CM for sharing his knowledge

10. CAT 2008 Aspirants - Page 145 - PaGaLGuY.com - The Everything of MBA, CAT 2008, GMAT, XAT, IIM April 22nd, 2008 at 3:35 pm 10

    […] recent happenings as a part of CAT prep, this detail will be very helpful for you guys (I think!) Podcast: Peak Oil Crisis with Chandramouli Mahadevan ? Coffee With Sundar I hope this discussion will help in enchancing your general awareness! I didnt have such a […]

11. Varun S April 23rd, 2008 at 5:05 pm 11

    Some minor comments: your mp3 audio is low, at-least for me. Use software like audacity and increase the volume (amplitude).

    Reduce the page turning noises, consider using laptop to have questions instead of paper, if that can reduce your noise, you can go greener

    Write the transcript (you already told me it became big). In that case, upload the text and give link. People like me who have interest in the subject will read it surely sometime.

    Regards
    Varun

12. Sundar Rajan G S April 24th, 2008 at 4:59 am 12

    Varun,

    Thanks a lot for the suggestions. I am working on it! I really appreciate your feedback.