Less is more: Spectres of scarcity and the politics of resource access in the upstream oil sector

Our objective in this paper is to understand the significance of the peak oil claim for the large, publicly-traded oil companies to whom the tasks of finding oil, extracting it and delivering it to market have been allocated. On the face of it, peak oil would appear to offer the ultimate solution to a problem that has plagued the international oil industry for the last one hundred years: how to organise scarcity in the face of prodigious abundance. We examine how publicly-traded oil firms (‘Big Oil’) are engaging with the discourse and science of peak oil, and find that peak oil positions firms like Exxon, BP and Shell in a number of different and quite complex ways: as a beneficiary (of a higher price regime), but also as a victim (of shrinking reserves) and a suspect (for under-investing in exploration or exploiting reserves too rapidly). We find a surprising lack of consensus among Big Oil about the significance of peak oil’s core claim for an imminent, permanent decline in the production of conventional grades of crude, and we conclude that peak oil is not regarded as strategic priority for oil producers (the contrast here with climate change is instructive). To understand why this is the case we turn from the physical science-based account of peak oil to political economy, and examine the contradictory character of Big Oil’s current position. We show how the strong financial returns to Big Oil in the last few years mask a precarious structural position when it comes to reserves access and reserves replacement. Critically the origins of this squeeze originate primarily above-ground: in the ownership of reserves, the politics of resource access and the changing structure of the international oil industry, and not below-ground in geological limits. Accordingly, we reject the simple assumption that increasing geological scarcity explains/justifies high returns, and argue that the relative marginalisation of peak oil within Big Oil’s strategic concerns reflects the way it misdiagnoses the cause of oil companies’ woes when it comes to finding and replacing reserves. We conclude that peak oil’s claim of physically-induced scarcity obfuscates rather than illuminates when it comes to understanding the opportunities for - and constraints on - accumulation in the upstream oil sector.     

Geodynamic significance of ultramafic xenoliths from Eastern Serbia: Relics of sub-arc oceanic mantle?

A suite of highly depleted peridotite xenoliths in East Serbian Palaeogene basanites represents the lithospheric mantle beneath the Balkan Peninsula. The xenoliths are harzburgites, clinopyroxene-poor lherzolites and rare dunites. They contain mostly <5 vol.% of modal clinopyroxene and are characterized by high Mg# in silicates (>91), high Cr# in spinel (mostly 0.5–0.7), and by distinctively low Al₂O₃ contents in orthopyroxene (mostly 1–2 wt.%). They have experienced some mantle metasomatism which has slightly obscured their original composition. Nevertheless, the general characteristics of the xenoliths imply a composition which is significantly more depleted than most non-cratonic sub-continental mantle xenolith suites, as well as orogenic peridotites and abyssal peridotites. Geological and compositional evidence suggests that the xenoliths do not represent Archean mantle. The existence of Proterozoic mantle cannot be entirely excluded, although it is in disagreement with geological evidence. On the other hand, the studied xenoliths are compositionally very similar to peridotites of modern oceanic sub-arc settings. The existence of such a depleted lithospheric mantle segment is also inferred from the presence of rare orthopyroxene-rich xenoliths in the same suite. These are interpreted to have originated as lithospheric precipitates of high-Mg, SiO₂-saturated magmas that require a highly depleted mantle source. Such source is typically required by boninitic-like magmas of intraoceanic suprasubduction settings. A proposed geodynamic model to explain these observations involves accretion or underplating of the lower parts of the Tethyan oceanic lithosphere during the Upper Jurassic closure of the eastern branch of the Vardar ocean.     

强对流(冰雹)云中水凝物的积累和云水的消耗

在冰雹云中过冷水的累积对冰雹增长起重要作用。文中回顾了水凝物累积和过冷水消耗机制中的不确定性 ,利用三维Euler强对流云模式和三维Lagrange粒子群运行增长模式 ,重新研究了对流云中水凝物粒子的累积机制和过冷水的消耗图像 ,得出以下结果 :(1)强对流 (冰雹 )云具有翻滚式对流流场 ,流场的性质决定云中存在着一个动力吸引区 ,它处于主上升气流区旁侧水平气流近于零的区域 ,粒子在增长运行中向这里集中 ,造成水凝物的累积 ;(2 )这种粒子的集中和水凝物的累积 ,是流场动力特征和粒子增长行为相互作用的表现 ;(3)粒子的集中和水凝物的累积是动态循环式的 ,而不是静态平衡式的 ,粒子可以进入吸引区 ,也可以吹离吸引区 ,在进入和吹离的循环中动态地形成了集中和累积 ,累积可以发生在主上升气流上方 ,也可以延伸到其下方 ;(4)粒子的集中和水凝物的累积是受流场和粒子运动的动力过程控制的 ,而累积粒子是液相雨滴 ,或是固相霰粒、雪团和冰雹是受降水发展过程属液相或固相占优势来决定的 ;(5 )云水场中云水量 ,只在大粒子的集中区才被显著消耗 ;而在区外的云水量消耗不显著 ;(6 )对于云水含量高达 6 g/kg的云水场 ,播撒粒子浓度达到 10 0个 /m3 时 ,在考虑消耗时 ,已不能增长成直径大于 1cm的冰雹。     

基于GIS重庆市土壤养分贫瘠化研究

以重庆市为例,在GIS技术支持下,利用模糊数学和多元数理统计方法对研究区土壤养分贫瘠化现状进行了综合评价。根据评价结果,采用地理信息系统软件ARCVIEW绘制了重庆土壤养分贫瘠化状况的等级图。结果表明,这一地区土壤养分大多处于中度贫瘠化水平,土壤养分处于轻度、中度和严重贫瘠化的面积比例分别为17.42％、47.75％和34.83％。其中,水田土壤的养分贫瘠化程度相对较林旱地土壤要重。     

Depletion and recharge of soil water in two stands of norway spruce (picea abies (l.) karst)

Depletion and recharge dynamics of soil water were studied at two forest sites in Northern and Southern Sweden during three growing seasons. At each site, having a stand of Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) Karst), soil water potential was measured with 90 gypsum blocks in 30 profiles at depths of 6, 20, and 50 cm from the soil surface. The size of the rectangular plots was 250 m². The large variation in soil water potential during desiccation periods extended throughout the measuring range of the gypsum blocks. The soil water potentials, at different times and depths, were log-normally distributed during only parts of the desiccation periods. Due to the large variation and skewed distribution of soil water potentials the nonparametric Spearman rank correlation statistics was used to analyse the pattern of desiccation and rewetting of the soil. In the beginning of a dry period the topsoil was more efficiently desiccated than the subsoil at both sites. This difference lasted throughout all droughts at the southern site and was explained by a higher root density in the topsoil. At the northern site, however, there was no difference in the degree of desiccation at different soil depths during an extended desiccation period. While certain microsites tended to be more depleted than others during desiccation periods, this did not prove to be significantly correlated to the rewetting of the soil after the different droughts. There was a vertical relationship in soil water desiccation in which an accentuated water depletion at the 6 cm soil depth was followed by a similar strong depletion 14 cm lower in the same observation profile. Strongly desiccated observation profiles were not necessarily situated close to each other but seemed randomly spread over the site. There was no relationship between extracted water at any of the three soil depths in the different observation profiles and proximity to trees or tree size.     

Heating experiments relevant to the depletion of Na,K and Mn in the Earth and other planetary bodies

We have studied the evaporation of Na, K and Mn from Al-Na-K- and Mn-rich silicates at various conditions. Total alkali oxide contents ranged from 5 to 20%. The evaporation rate of Na increases with temperature and decreasing oxygen fugacity and decreases with duration of heating. The loss of K is in all cases less pronounced than for Na. Heating in an evacuated vacuum furnace is more effective in removing Na and K from melt droplets than in furnaces with one atm gas flow of air or gas mixtures controlling the oxygen fugacity. The strong pumping required to keep the vacuum removes Na and K atoms very effectively. In all experiments, the rate of evaporation is determined by quasi-equilibrium between a thin layer of Na and K rich gas above the molten silicates. The results of the experiments are in agreement with several other studies.In experiments with more than one sample in the furnace, equilibration of Na- and K-rich samples with Na- and K-poor samples occurred rapidly, mediated by the ambient gas phase.The results of experiments with Mn in starting compositions showed much stronger losses of Na than Mn under a variety of conditions.Thus the nearly chondritic Mn/Na ratios in the Earth cannot be the result of evaporation of Na and Mn in Earth-making materials, as the Mn/Na ratios in evaporation residues would be much higher than chondritic ratios. Such evaporation processes may have occurred in the parent material of Moon, Vesta and Mars.The data suggest, in agreement with earlier hypotheses, that the high and variable contents of Na and K in chondrules require a gas phase high in Na and K equilibrating with chondrule melts. The volume of nebular gas parental to a certain type of chondrites was heated and Na and K were lost from the chondrule precursors to the gas phase. Subsequently the nebular parcel was compressed leading to higher partial pressures of Na and K. Flash heating then produced chondrule melts which incorporated some of the gaseous Na and K and then cooled rapidly. The large range of Na and K contents in chondrule melts reflects very local enrichments of Na and K in the gas phase. Despite these variations bulk chondritic meteorites have well defined bulk Na and K contents, implying a closed system during formation of chondrules and matrix.