Why We Are Still Searching For Fossil Fuels, BBC
By Paul Homewood
The BBC want to know why the world is still exploring for oil, gas and coal:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001sr6f
It is just as well that we are still exploring, because if we don’t the world’s economy would soon collapse.
Given the fact that the world still gets 82% of its energy from fossil fuels, and that energy demand continues to increase year on year, there is simply no possibility that we could quickly switch to an all renewable economy.
And this ignores the fact that we will still continue to need fossil fuels for non-energy use.
BP Energy Review
The BBC seem to think that if we stop drilling now, it won’t affect us for decades; that we have “plenty of fossil fuels” already available to us which will last for years. But life is not like that.
Every year, new capacity comes on stream. But every year, older capacity is shut down, or its productivity rapidly diminished. Typically oil and gas fields have between 20 and 40 years of significant production, and as we have seen in the North Sea output has been tailing off for as few years. If no new capacity is brought on, we could potentially lose a quarter of the world’s supply within a decade or so.
According to the IEA, 5.9 mbd of net additional oil capacity is projected to come on line by 2028, but this will only be enough to meet demand. In other words, this is net of the loss of existing capacity. The gross capacity addition is probably double this number.
Annual oil consumption is 97 mbd, so if the BBC got its way the world would be facing a serious shortage of oil within a few short years. The economic and social consequences of this would be catastrophic.
Richard Bilton, who presented this Panorama in La La Land report, has absolutely no experience of or qualifications in energy or economics. According to his BBC resume, his background is mainly in social affairs.
Perhaps next time the BBC might get a journalist who actually understands the energy sector to present Panorama programmes on fossil fuels.
Comments are closed.
NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Is it possible for the BBC to get even more stupid?
I am sure they will try. They have got themselves in a complete mess over Israel and the anti-semitism that is rife within their ranks – and not just the arab section but the likes of Bowen, Guerin et al.
Just when you think they couldn’t get any stupider . . . . they prove us wrong.
Hey GC, the Guardian (even its US edition) has broken all BBC stupid records with this one.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/18/solar-power-oakland-california-low-income
Apparently in Guardianland Oakland (CA) has such an adverse climate that
“Joseph Wang and his wife have figured out a way to stay warm and efficient during northern California’s winter nights: layering.
“We bundle up during the day, and at night. We use two blankets,” said Wang, 87, in Mandarin, explaining how he and his wife, Meng Rou Lan, 84, dealt with trying to save money on their electricity bill last winter.”
Oakland has cold winters? Who knew.
Oh GOOD LORD YES!!!
What Richard Bilton and Justin Rowlatt lack in terms of scientific understanding, they make up for with hyperbole and stupidity. It isn’t a joke. Millions of children and young adults are deciding not to have children of their own, because they have been so scared by all the climate change nonsense. This is nothing short of child abuse, even worse than breaking their arms and legs.
Meanwhile, the uneducated masses in Africa and Asia will continue to breed apace. It would be a far better use of scarce resources to raise millions out of poverty across the world, rather than squander them on pointless wind turbines.
Getting rid of world poverty would reduce population growth and cut pollutants, a far more important goal than net zero.
Those who have any sense in the scientific world have a moral duty to fight this cancer of climate change lies and improve the whole world, rather than allowing the likes of Al Gore to cause mental child abuse while pocketing millions in carbon trading nonsense.
Helping Africa and Asia to prosper would stop all the illegal immigrants trying to overrun Europe but a major stumbling block is the inability of these countries to run a stable and non-corrupt government. Many, especially muslim countries, are still stuck in the Middle Ages in outlook – no surprise in the muslim calendar it is 1450.
Some of us scientists have been fighting the climate change scam for over 15 years. But…….
It is more than possible that the BBC can be even more stupid as are politicians and the media.
There is no hope for the sane…
2023 and power stations are still venting black steam. When will this lunacy stop?
BSM
What relevance does the British School of Motoring have to this topic?
FoS – Could it be Black Steam Matters? Just a thought!
10/10 😉
nevis52, Passfield. I hate you, you swots!
To DH … you state “2023 and power stations are still venting black steam.”
Steam is invisible to the human eye.
WTF is “black steam”?
He was being sarcastic. The media show shadows on steam from exhausts and claim its carbon.
to bobn “He – {maybe she/it etc} – was being sarcastic”
I’m not so sure. Perhaps he/she/it would like to clarify as it really is not certain.
I’m with bobn in the absence of confirmation.
This is typical of the BBC, dark emissions from cooling towers
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-62077711
See the picture at the top. Its not that hard to work out.
‘perhaps he/she would like to clarify…’
Well, Ray, it was a bit laconic. Here is the long version:
2023 and power stations are still [shown][in photographs] venting [‘]black steam[‘]. When will this lunacy stop? [Black steam has been a favourite propaganda image of the climate alarmists since the last century].
Hope that is clearer.
BTW steam is visible. It is water vapour that is not visible. Since these structures are usually condensing towers, what comes out is steam.
FOS sorry if I misunderstood, however I must correct you – steam is very, very definitely invisible. What you see coming out of the top of a cooling tower is condensed droplets (aerosol) of liquid water not steam.
I’ve always regarded water vapour as an invisible gas. Steam the mist formed when such gas or vapour condenses in the atmosphere.
Explained to me as a schoolboy as when a kettle is boiling there’s an inch or so from the spout where nothing is visible, after that a mist begins to form. The invisible inch is water vapour thereafter the mist is steam.
Mixing of the definitions in modern times by the BBC amongst others has led to a situation of confusion.
Ray – a.k.a. Warden Hodges: You may stamp your pedant’s foot all you want, but ‘steam’ in the common, everyday understanding, is visible.
Every relevant definition in the OED relates to something that one can see: steaming people, horses, marshes, cups of tea etc. Had all these steams been invisible, no one would have seen them to write about them. Centuries of usage say that steam is visible.
The OED allows a technical usage, citing the terms ‘dry steam’ and ‘wet steam’, but most of us are not steam turbine engineers. The etymology of the word ‘steam’ is unsure, but may be related to the root of the modern German word ‘staub’ (dust).
The entry for ‘steam’ in the The American Heritage Science Dictionary is: – ‘Water in its gaseous state, especially at a temperature above the boiling point of water (above 100°C, or 212°F, at sea level). … A mist of condensed water vapor’. The Germans have the same view of ‘Dampf’: ‘sichtbarer feuchter Dunst [der beim Erhitzen von Flüssigkeiten, besonders von Wasser, entsteht]’ (sichtbar = visible, Dunst = mist). The original etymology goes back to ‘Dunst, Nebel, Rauch’ (mist, fog, smoke).
The French don’t really care about such details: it’s all vapeur (d’eau) to them.
The final and most telling authority in this matter is the late lamented Tina Turner, who sang of ‘steamy windows’ [nix invisible/transparent!].
M’lud, I rest my case.
Ray – a.k.a. Warden Hodges: You may stamp your pedant’s foot all you want, but ‘steam’ in the common, everyday understanding, is visible.
Every relevant definition in the OED relates to something that one can see: steaming people, horses, marshes, cups of tea etc. Had all these steams been invisible, no one would have seen them to write about them. Centuries of usage say that steam is visible.
The OED allows a technical usage, citing the terms ‘dry steam’ and ‘wet steam’, but most of us are not steam turbine engineers. The etymology of the word ‘steam’ is unsure, but may be related to the root of the modern German word ‘staub’ (dust).
The entry for ‘steam’ in the The American Heritage Science Dictionary is: – ‘Water in its gaseous state, especially at a temperature above the boiling point of water (above 100°C, or 212°F, at sea level). … A mist of condensed water vapor’. The Germans have the same view of ‘Dampf’: ‘sichtbarer feuchter Dunst [der beim Erhitzen von Flüssigkeiten, besonders von Wasser, entsteht]’ (sichtbar = visible, Dunst = mist). The original etymology goes back to ‘Dunst, Nebel, Rauch’ (mist, fog, smoke).
The French don’t really care about such details: it’s all vapeur (d’eau) to them.
The final and most telling authority in this matter is the late lamented Tina Turner, who sang of ‘steamy windows’ [nix invisible/transparent!].
M’lud, I rest my case.
FoS – Steam is water above its boiling point at STP and is invisible. Not a pedant at all rather a very qualified engineer unlike you.
In which case, Ray, why don’t you engineers just call it water vapour? That is, water in its gaseous phase?
As far as I am concerned, you engineering types can mutter darkly amongst yourselves, but if you ask any normal person what that hot, white stuff that everyone can see coming out of a boiling kettle is called they will say ‘steam’.
Are you assuming that I am not an engineer (you know nothing about me really) just because I use things called dictionaries, sometimes even the sciencey ones : steam = ‘A mist of condensed water vapor’.
I live in a mountainous area and in these parts the water in my kettle boils at around 95°C, so you can stuff your pompous STP nonsense, too. If I remember correctly, STP is 20 °C at 1atm, so how something can be ‘above its boiling point at STP’ is a mystery perhaps only qualified engineers can solve.
This is my last contribution on this subject – it is getting very tedious.
FoS – A condensing cooling tower would basically be sweet FA good if it emitted H2O in its gas phase wouldn’t it? Good idea to stop contributing as you are making yourself look ever more daft.
Leave serious engineering and science to those who understand it.
‘As world leaders prepare for a landmark climate conference in Dubai’
Oh, yeah, this time it’s going to be different.
“Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”
The ‘World Leaders’ are none of them who we – or anyone – vote for.
I just wish it was not just we here who understood that.
In one way it is a ‘landmark’ COP. The first to be hosted and chaired by the Chief Executive of a large national oil company which is planning significant expansion of oil and natural gas production in coming years! 🙂
‘It is just as well that we are still exploring, because if we don’t the world’s economy would soon collapse.’
Which is the goal.
Peterson’s Dictum: “If you can’t figure out what someone is doing, or why, look at the outcome. And infer the motivation.”
The “we must stop oil & gas prospecting” is a policy point pushed out by Greenpeace et al.
When’s somebody going to disconnect them from the electricity grid and remove their fossil fueled vehicles? – bicycles only.
The BBC’s innumerate dimwits think they’re handing down stone tablets – it’s past time that bits of those started returning through the windows?
Even bicycles should not be allowed. Modern Carbon Fibre must be stuffed with FF produced materials, even a steel frame is produced using coal. Aluminium frame might be OK but there’s a lot of steel in the rest of it.
Walking using hand carved (using flint tools) wooden clogs as footwear is the only acceptable method of getting from A to B and perfectly suited to 15 minute cities.
indeed
– they’re hopefully going to be naked, cold and hungry – and they’ll roundly deserve it.
It’s the expectation that they can foist their cultish delusions on me and everybody else that truly irks…
CS Lewis got it right:
Also: “will torment us without end for” nothing they try will work, thus in their disappointment, they will continue trying ever more the harder, in vain hope their disappointment will end.
What rise in global warming? The natural recovery from the LIA, the lower pollution allowing more sunshine in or the greening of the Sahara?
A more serious question would be why is the BBC broadcasting this nonsense?
An equally serious question is “Where is the balanced scientific discussion”?
If they put out a programme questioning the climate drivel, an outcry from the believers would ensue.
Because inside the BBC numeracy and any vestige of technical knowledge, experience or ability to find out is deeply unfashionable and actively discouraged (persecuted more likely) – the condescension and imperiousness when they’re caught out is the tell…
Even the tellystruck regulars who really should know better very obviously go with scripts that have been cooked up by ignorant eejits – such is their venality and it’s toe-curling stuff – unwatchable and unlistenable here…
The BBC is run by dangerous Marxists. Everything they broadcast has a deep anti-British, anti-western undercurrent. It’s way beyond fixing.
” Everything they broadcast has a deep anti-British, ……”
Rather like this https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn0p6ll3jjgo
apparently we cannot have our own laws
What subject are these “experts” expert in exactly? We can explore, we can discover, then we can decide not to exploit. If we start exploring today, it will be years before we face a development decision. What sort of “expert” thinks we therefore must not explore? But of course when we are not told who these experts are and what their expertise is, we can be 100% certain they are Green activists and not experts at all. Yet more lies, yet more propaganda, yet more Green fanaticism from an organisation supposed to be neutral.
I suspect that most of them are experts in energy … policy, apparently they have professors (in fact a lot of them, following a google search), and are allowed to tap millions from the science and engineering research budgets. The word “policy” gives the game away, this is politics not engineering.
Richard Bilton doesn’t have a Wikipedia entry. However, elsewhere it says he “studied communications at Birmingham University”.
He comes from Leeds and apparently lives in Selby, N. Yorkshire. So at least he is not in the London bubble.
But no scientific background clearly.
I’m on the horns of a dilemma. I order to complain about this I’ll have to watch it. I really don’t feel up to watching an ignoramus for more than a minute or two at the most
The BBC’s introduction (see above) to Richard Bilton’s investigation says this: ‘Almost every country in the world has made a commitment to limit the rise in global warming to 1.5 degrees.‘
That’s incorrect: hardly any country has made that commitment.
I agree. Reading comprehension is a skill not possessed by members of the ClimateCult™.
I thought against, but decided to watch this edition of Panorama when first broadcast. (Yes, I do hold a TV license and some of the BBC’s output is still decent enough to make it worthwhile, and it’s cheaper than Sky Sports.)
I feared the worst from this programme, especially in the lead-up to COP when the BBC becomes especially tiresome.
My conclusion is that the BBC did not too bad a job with this programme.
I had to hold my nose to not be distracted by a couple of empty skulls wittering-on about climate emergency. Dull wittering is par for the course when BBC does anything on the environment.
But this programme does get to the nub of the issue: so long as there is demand for fossil fuels, there will be supply. It’s a demand-led question. There is no point in whining about supply of fossil fuels, when “the issue” is demand. (To be clear, I don’t accept there is an issue, but you have to accept this programme will see the question through the BBC’s own distorted lens.)
Setting aside the occasional pause for some wittering about emergency, the programme is a lot more mature about the questions than I had expected.
It’s distortion driven by ideology and wilful ignorance – it’s a cult – I’ve said it before and feel it’s quite a good fit.
Turning on the car radio is akin to answering a daytime door knock and getting a pair of earnest Jehovah’s Witnesses.
Random podcasts are often farbetter researched and indeed better presented than much BBC content – the presenters and producers “make product” and often only have vestigial knowledge of their topic for the day – when caught out they fall back often on “the best possible taste” and “highest production standards” it’a правда
The prescriptive nature of much content is at odds with my recollection of the corporation and the preciousness is just insufferable.
Any challenge is furiously resisted by the incumbents, where necessary they go on the offensive against heretics (smearing and misquoting) in the full knowledge that most people who challenge won’t follow through.
not a fan
Countryfile (BBC) just had an item about a farmer who spreads crushed Basalt rock on his fields because (he says) it absorbs CO2. Wow, say Adam Hanson! Is that something that will work? Well, says basalt farmer, we get paid for carbon offsets and it will take 20 plus years before we see any results (!!). By which time, of course, said farmer and family have made a fortune from the new SouthSea Bubble. What a load of nonsense.
I always thought that volcanis igneous rock was used as a fertiliser because it contained trace elements vital to plant growth. Unweathered basalt will still contain those elements and so when crushed will promote plant growth.
It’s a bit of a push to say that will remove CO2 from the atmosphere, but what’s not to like about being paid to fertilise your fields.
No it is correct. Basalt contains magnesium and calcium oxides which will combine with CO2 as the rock weathers. It also contains trace elements which improve the soil. Powdered basalt is marketed as a fertilizer and soil improver.
Basalt removes CO2 from the atmosphere, and will eventually cause the end of advanced lifeforms on Earth as photosynthesis becomes impossible.
That occurs in about 600 million years, but we can speed it up by grinding the rock into powder. All it takes to reverse the CO2 increase is a few billion tonnes powdered rock spread over the land area, so what are we worried about.
Meanwhile the Gerald Ford class of aircraft carrier sails for its lifetime using a small nuclear reactor. Why is industry trying to reinvent the wheel – dust off the plans for these reactors and mass-produce them. End of problem (if you think there might be one). And then along comes the anti-nuclear green blob…
Gross ignorance.
Why are we still searching for fossil fuels?
Some news for the Gullible:
Each MW of wind power ‘capacity’ requires 220 Tonnes of coal!
Carbon footprint of a typical wind turbine is a massive 241.85 tons of CO2.
EACH 3MW Wind Turbine Needs:
335 tons of steel; 4.7 tons of copper;
1,200 tons of concrete (cement and aggregates)
3 tons of aluminium; 2 tons of rare earth elements;
Aluminium; Zinc; Molybdenum. Zinc, Nickel,
Cobalt, Platinum, Aluminium, Rare Earth Elements,
and Nickel (new sources), are between 73 and 100% imported.
BLADES each weighing around 10,000 kilograms, the size of a jet fighter
contain multiple materials, resin, balsa wood,
aluminium, non-recyclable fibre, fibreglass,
hot ovens for curing, bolts, etc. Varnish, toxic Plastics. Etc etc
All drilled, mined, processed and transported, thousands of miles using fossil fuels, then dumped on our fragile upland ecosystems and pristine seas.
They last about 20 years and will require replacement time and time again!
And the bird slaughter continues with impunity, at the European average of 500 Birds per turbine per year.
Details for all to see at – Stop These Things
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2023/10/another-nail-in-the-global-warming-coffin.php
The BBC are either stupid, or malicious, likely both – how do the BBC think they’d even transmit without secure, reliable, affordable power? Renewables are none of that
Excuse me but how much of the seven per cent renewables is what these horrible people call ‘local biomass’? IE poverty stricken local woodland? Willis Eschenbach has said it’s three times wind and solar globally. So buck up
Yes, burning trees accounts for about a fifth of the renewable figure.
Willis makes the point that most of this “local biomass” is not even included in the official figures.
Most of the renewables figure is indeed biomass, i.e., the burning of wood and dung. Wind and solar combined make up 2% of world energy supply.
Quote from Richard Bilton “Diversity of staff enables diversity of opinion and allows issues felt by all in society to be examined, thus helping to “justify the licence fee” for the audience.”
Except you are NOT allowed to express anything at all against his propaganda.
Oh the irony…let’s defund the BBC
Other than the Civil Service, it’s difficult to think of a large organisation more single-opinioned than the BBC. What Bilton is expressing is the bizarre “lived experience” claim, not actual diversity of opinion.
Diversity of staff requires stupid ideas to be given equal time.
Why We Are Still Searching For Fossil Fuels? Why, BBC, because fossil fuels are the best thing to ever happen to mankind.
Why search for fossil fuels? Why not. In a few years the climate fad will be over and the BBC will join the real world again where fossil fuels are an essential part of life.
Hopefully not… I’d like to see them eventually as the sole content provider for the heir to Drakeford’s Welsh NHS hospital radio – and that’s it.
It is very simple why the question was raised in the first place. The BBC is increasingly behaving like a children’s kindergarten. From the setting of the programme up in the first place, in which there must have been a number of fairly senior managers engaged, through to its production and subsequent editorial review before screening must have had a cast of many people each providing views and advice so as to be inclusive. Children, we have children in the BBC ……. and in many other spheres in our nation that one had adults in charge.
Huh, Why are we searching for Gold, Opal, Diamond, etc …. Looking at those TV Channels and you see the “damage done” by these excavation’s in no-mans land – is the soil reinstated ? Tunnels a’ ower the place etc. just to stick the Finds around some few fingers ? or put into storage. and all that oil burnt – just for that ?
Well obviously it’s because the BBC is greatly concerned for Historic Britain! The nonsense really does know no bounds…
Oops forgot to add the link:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-67432755
Try transporting anything very far for very long without using fossil fuels to get anything significant done. Conventional vehicles are making the energy transition to renewables and EVs. There are no substitutes for those fuels. That’s why we need to search for more oil. It’s not complicated.
‘Why are we Still Searching for Fossil Fuels?’ – BBC
‘We,’ kemo sabe?
Is BBC royalty? What’s this ‘we’ stuff?
I watched the program and it was awful – not a single voice of question or disagreement. But my train of thought is, why worry about new oil (and gas)?Nature is solving the problem without help from these nutcases. It is already obvious that hydrocarbon resources are being exhausted, especially geographically. We may run short of gas as soon as this winter if it gets cold. There are no solutions in the offing, as Paul’s pie-chart makes clear. Nuclear is nowhere within reach, renewables are a bad joke. A first step would be to make better use of what we have availble. I would not use gas to gernerate electricity but rather adopt the Ireland Alternative Fuel Obligation and run our gas turbines on cheaper distillate fuels,. I would also take stronger measures to reduce our gasoline consumption by making VED much higher by engine size.
” We may run short of gas as soon as this winter if it gets cold. There are no solutions in the offing, as Paul’s pie-chart makes clear. Nuclear is nowhere within reach, renewables are a bad joke. A first step would be to make better use of what we have availble. I would not use gas to gernerate electricity”
Gibberish.
‘There are 6,923 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of proven gas reserves in the world as of 2017. The world has proven reserves equivalent to 52.3 times its annual consumption.’
And we don’t control any of it.
Gridwatch says 51% of your electricity is coming from gas. RIGHT NOW. So, if you “would not use gas to gernerate electricity,” how are you going to gernerate it?
Gamecock: Where do your figures come from? The IEA reports that in 2021 the proven reserves were 198 TCM (about fifty years at current usage). If you going to use words like gibberish, get your own facts right first. Most of the reserves are in Russia, USA and Qatar. There are also reports that deliveries from US Marcellus shale are reducing and Barnett shale is exhausted.
How am I going to generate electricity? I answered that in my post if you had troubled to read it befor firing off.
I’m impressed with your remarkable insights, Vern! Being able to differentiate between “The world has proven reserves equivalent to 52.3 times its annual consumption” and “(about fifty years at current usage).”
” I would also take stronger measures to reduce our gasoline consumption by making VED much higher by engine size.”
Really? So only the rich can drive them? They would love that – you plebs drive around in little micro cars while they lord it around in gas guzzlers they can afford.
Things are much more complex than just passing simple laws
Vern said the quiet part out loud.
” It is already obvious that hydrocarbon resources are being exhausted ” I doubt if there is accurate data ref total resource of hydrocarbon fuels. The UK sits on billions of tonnes of coal, possibly over a trillion tonnes; this needs to be exploited.
Micky R: Surely you are not suggesting we go back to a coal based economy? First, the coal was becoming more difficult to reach, very deep mines; by the 1970s when my son was the youngest Statutary Undermanager in the NCBs records it wasn’t much fun. Next – where do you visualise the miners comuing from? Force breed a new generation or import them as slaves? That’s without the politics of it.
” Surely you are not suggesting we go back to a coal based economy? ”
I want cheap, reliable energy (using proven technology) that doesn’t rely on fuel from overseas unless that fuel can be stockpiled in the UK, where stockpile = months / years of supply. Coal can be stockpiled for months, although it’s a long stretch to stockpile coal for power station use for over a year. Nuclear fuel can be stockpiled for years, but the increasing construction costs and drifting programme for Hinkley C are “concerning”.
Coal doesn’t have to be mined by hand to extract the energy e.g. the CEGB was looking at gasification in the 1960s.
Micky R: Yes, and Wikipedia is very informative on in-situ coal gasification. The potential (and the technology) is there but the environmental impacts are huge. It certainly won’t become a player during our lifetimes.
@ Vernon.
I recognise that R&D for gasification is required, but reliance on wikipedia to support your views re gasification is not a strong argument.
For me, fossil fuels = freedom. Other people will have different views.
Meanwhile…https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn0p6ll3jjgo
Minority rule?
The UN? The same UN that has singularly failed to condemn Hamas’s slaughter of the innocents? The UN can fuck. right. off.
“Perhaps next time the BBC might get a journalist who actually understands the energy sector to present Panorama programmes on fossil fuels.” I would recommend Euan Mearns!
Er…..because we need them to live
More ridiculously, Bilton himself needs them to live.
“The decadent attack that which keeps them alive.”