I estimate that the ANE decline rate will accelerate to between 5%/year and 8%/year in the 2010 to 2020 time frame

“The actions by many OECD countries aimed at encouraging consumption in the face of declining available global net oil exports can be seen as the OECD 'Thelma & Louise' Race to the Edge of the Cliff.

I suppose that the ‘winner’ could be viewed as the first country that can no longer borrow enough money, at affordable rates, to maintain their current lifestyle. So, based on this metric, Greece would appear to be currently in the lead, with many other countries not far behind them.”

I suspect that we will see a continuation of this trend, as more countries are unable to borrow enough money, at least from non-central bank sources, to fully fund their deficit spending. As this trend continues, I have concluded that there may be a global shortage of calculators, because most of the world seems either unable or unwilling to subtract domestic oil consumption numbers from domestic production numbers in oil exporting countries, in order to derive net export numbers, which are calculated in terms of total petroleum liquids.

While it is true that the EIA shows that total liquids production worldwide, inclusive of low net energy biofuels, increased at 0.5%/year from 2005 to 2010, the use of a calculator shows that the global supply of net oil exports available to importers other than China and India (what I call Available Net Exports, or ANE) fell at 2.8%/year from 2005 to 2010.

I estimate that the ANE decline rate will accelerate to between 5%/year and 8%/year in the 2010 to 2020 time frame.”em>

Jeffrey J. Brown is the creator of the Export Land Model and a Member of ASPO-USA’s Board of Directors
http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2012-01-02/commentary-2012-predictions