Peak Oil Has Already Happened

U.S. crude oil production peaked in 1970

by Mark Miller

Smart Nation

Recent analysis by Smart Nation of the rate of U.S. crude oil production confirms that production of oil on American soil topped out 38 years ago – in 1970.

The most recent oil production numbers published by the United States Energy Information Administration indicate that the U.S. is currently pumping oil out of the ground and out of offshore wells at a rate of 5,097 thousand barrels per day (March 2008). This is only 52% of what the U.S. was pumping out on average in its peak oil production year – 1970 – at 9,637 thousand barrels per day.

For the last two decades, U.S. crude oil production has declined consistently by more than 2% each year and 20% every ten years. “Production” is defined as the rate at which oil is pumped out of underground reservoirs. Two of the leading research scientists who have championed the call to alarm about the climax and decline of oil production rates are emeritus Princeton geosciences professor Kenneth Deffeyes and former Shell Labs scientist M. King Hubbert. In the 1950s Hubbert accurately predicted – using statistical methods – that U.S. oil production (lower 48 states) would peak in the early 1970s. Smart Nation confirms this aspect of their research, inasmuch as U.S. EIA estimates are accurate and reliable.

Can there be any serious doubt that regional and even worldwide oil production can be in danger of declining even as demand rises?

The data used by Smart Nation for this analysis is published by the U.S. EIA and can be downloaded as a pdf here.