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Oil 101 (2009)

by Morgan Patrick Downey(Favorite Author)

4.24 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

0982039204 (ISBN13: 9780982039205)

languge

English

genre

Nonfiction

publisher

Wooden Table Press LLC

review 1: This book, along with Oil: A Beginner’s Guide by Vaclav Smil, are great reads for the uneducated & educated. It’s not too technical, & covers all aspects of the up-stream, mid-stream, & down-stream portions of the industry (geological, exploration, geophysical, chemical structure of oil, engineering, various extraction methods, production, refining, retail, trading oil futures, environmental impacts, pricing methods, etc.); along with the worldwide history of it, & worldwide politics of it. It gives a straightforward & objective analysis of the entire industry. While it doesn’t go into thorough detail on any one topic, it definitely gives enough detail on every topic; to ensure that one can easily use it as a valuable reference book. I just finished up reading it for... more a second time & found it just as enlightening as I did the first time I read it. While it is very informative, it's also a bit boring (it read's much like a college textbook would read.
review 2: Very useful comprehensive overview of oil and the oil industry written in a straight-forward no-nonsense style. The list of its chapters will give you a good feel for it (followed by my rating for each, 1-5 with 1 being weak, 3 adequate, and 5 excellent):o A brief history of oil - 3o A crude oil assay - 5o Components of oil liquids - 4o Chemistry of oil - 2 (since when has C been able to have 5 bonds... and H, 2?)o Industry overview - 4o Exploration and production - 5o Refining - 5o Standards - 3o Finished products - 5o Petrochemicals - 2 (not something he's really interested in it seems)o Transporting oil - 5o Storage - 5o Seasonality - 4o Reserves - 3 (see comments below).o Environmental regulations - 4o New engine technologies - 1 (superficial but unimportant in this context)o Oil prices - 3 (see comments below)o Forward oil markets -- futures and swaps - 4o Forward oil markets -- options - 4o Managing oil price risk -- 4The average of the above is probably over 4, but I'm only giving the book three stars because it's a subjective rating and while I found the book very interesting, oil isn't really a subject I'm wild about. It is, however, an extremely important subject, given the central role that oil plays in our world and the grave repercussions should global oil production peak and subsequently decline in the near future. So, I decided I should probably try to learn more, found this book, and am glad I did -- it is as good an overview as I could have hoped for.But it does have one unavoidable failing, and three irritating weaknesses for anyone interested in assessing the likelihood and timing of peak oil. The unavoidable failing is that it was written in early/mid 2008 and as such is already a little dated: for example, it gives no insight into the 08 price spike or its role in triggering the Great Recession. The irritating weaknesses are that it contains no projections as to future production or demand curves, no assessments of the true size of OPEC reserves, and no speculation or analysis of the interplay between oil prices, the global economy, and oil exploration and development. Why not? Probably because, as the title implies, Downey intended to write a sort of introductory textbook whose contents would be largely valid whatever happens, rather than a speculative work that could be rapidly overtaken by events. And that's OK... one can find the speculation and projections elsewhere; but it would still have been nice to hear what he thinks is going to happen.That being said, however, this is a book you should read if you want to understand the arguments around peak oil, and therefore to be able to judge it's likelihood, timing, and consequences. And unless you have no assets and no control over your life, or are totally fatalistic or terminally ill, then peak oil is a topic that you really should engage with. less

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