Talk:Oil shale

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Archives

Archive 1

Contents 1 Reliability of information from BUSTAN 2 Energy independence 3 North America 4 Canada 5 Reserves vs. Resources

[edit] Reliability of information from BUSTAN

Some editors have been very active advertising BUSTAN adding links from its website and activists. Unfortunately, this information has poor quality. Just some examples:

• John Laherrere - should be Jean Laherrère. And, if we have his original paper available, why to link BUSTAN?
• Oil Shale Journal editor Anto Raukus - quick check to this journal says that the name is Anto Raukas. And if you cite him, please provide the link to the Oil Shale Journal to the see context, not to BUSTAN website. This is, of course, interesting information, but one could also ask, what is the industry structure in Estonia. I don't believe rhere are any other significant heavy industry beside of oil shale industry in Estonia. It doesn't mean that same percentage of pollution from oil shale will be in the United States or Israel.
• "oil shale processing requires 3 gallons of water per barrel for conventional processing" - this is interesting, because given reference says nothing about this. As already said in thie next paragraph, "above-ground retorting uses between one and five barrels of water per barrel of produced shale oil". I don't say that the statement "3 gallons of water per barrel for conventional processing" is completely wrong, but it needs better explanation what it exactly means (consumed water or recycled water etc).
• "91% of Estonia’s abundant water resources were consumed by the power industry" - actually Anto Raukas wrote, that "In 2002, 91% (more than a billion cu m) of the water consumed in Estonia was used in the power industry".[1] It is a big difference.
• Jesper Jørgensen - the name seems to be Danish, not Estonia. Putting into google search together "Jesper Jørgensen" and "oil shale", the only result links to the BUSTAN website. Paper in BUSTAN website refers to the readers letter at the Danish College of Journalists, so it can't be considered as very reliable source.

I am sure, that all these edits are made in good faith, but unfortunately it looks like blatant promotion of BUSTAN environmental group. Probably we need little bit more NPOV and quality. Also, it is not a good idea to use Wikipedia for fighting against oil shale industry of Negev desert.Beagel (talk) 19:53, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Some good points. Thanks for explaining. However I personally believe that rather than entirely remove facts that may be a bit rough or hint at an agenda, it's best to polish them and balance them. Aside from the spelling issue the facts themselves were mostly highly relevant, no? I understand the hesitation in trusting activist research, however, the sources cited were all industry sources. Would you prefer I go in and cite them directly? For instance, the translation of Jean into John notwithstanding, I think this point remains relevant:

"Coal is much cheaper than oil shale, is no more polluting, and offers more oil when processed than oil shale. According to John Laherrere, formerly of the Society of Petroleum Engineers/World Petroleum Congress, 'As Petrole Informations noticed in 1972: One ton of coal can give 650 liters of oil while one ton of oil shale can give only 150 liters of shale oil. Production of oil shale should start only after that coal is completely depleted.'"

Also, I don't really see an emphasis on the Negev in the article - it's mentioned along with the US desert and water issues. But otherwise, points taken.LamaLoLeshLa (talk) 01:31, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

I've looked more closely at your edits and I see that you did integrate the information though I think in a way that buried it. I guess you could put the info about the bust of the oil shale industry in the Western Mountain states under history, but I do think it also belongs under economics. Overall though your fact-checking has been useful, thanks. I might try to tweak some of my old edits a bit in a way that pleases you, we'll see. LamaLoLeshLa (talk) 02:54, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

I think we can't overload this article with all environmental details as it is a general article about oil shale. It should give an overview about all major environmental impacts in general and the current summary lists all major impacts—water usage, land management; air pollution and emissions. Details should be added into the Environmental impact of oil shale industry. Unfortunately this article is not so well developed yet as I think it has to be, so any assistance to develop that article is welcome.

About other points. I don't think I removed any fact. The citation of Jesper Jørgensen was removed, but the problem with this source was already explained. Also, citation like "It is a very poor fuel that creates as much emissions as energy" is a trivia. Is it poor fuel or not is a question of economic feasibility, not so much environment. Also, the geology section describing composition of oil shale makes clear that oil shale is poorer fuel than coal. And the Petrole Informations of 1972 gives estimates how much oil consists in one ton of coal and how much in oil shale. So, there is actually no new information in this sentence. What we could do is to give a figures how many CO₂ emits combustion of different fossil fuels. The ascending list is natural gas, oil, hard coal, lignite and oil shale, but I don't have exact figure and sources.

I don't have anything against the sources of environmental groups (we have several in this article including one from Greenpeace) and I have removed also information from the industry sources if there were problems with WP:V. The sources should be high quality and to be in accordance with WP:V. As Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, also details should be reliable. It even spelling of person's name is not correct, it is natural to have doubts about reliability of the contest.

Petrole Informations of 1972—this is an opinion 36 years old. I agree that the first sentence of this opinion is relevant and this informaton is still in the Economy section. However, the second sentence contradicted reality even in this as as there were shale oil industries in the Soviet Union and China. Well, there was no market economy in these countries this time, but as of today there are oil shale industries in Estonia, China and Brazil, so the production of oil shale definitely started before complete depletion of coal. I believe (can't check as I don't have an access to this journal), this statement was made in the context of the United States, but we have to have global approach.

Neglev Desert. Actually I think it was very good to add Neglev example to the sentence about water. No problem with this. The problem actually is that oil shale articles of BUSTAN (or Rebecca Manski's articles in other media issues) makes clear that BUSTAN is an anti-oil shale group fighting against expansion of Israeli oil shale industry in Negev. At the same time, most of links you or your fellow editors added referred to BUSTAN. I believe this wasn't intentional, but one could see this as using Wikipedia for political agenda. Once more, I personally don't believe this is a case, but it potentially may compromise the NPOV.Beagel (talk) 18:56, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

"Black Sunday" is a important event in the history of oil shale industry. However, I don't think it says anything about a feasibility of todays shale oil industry, because the oil prices in 1982 and in 2008 are absolutely different. The article says: "the various attempts to develop oil shale deposits have been successful only when the cost of shale oil production in a given region was less than the price of crude oil or its other substitutes". It is clear that in 1982 because of cheap crude oil made oil shale industries in the United States to collapse. In 2008, we have absolutely different oil prices and different feasibility of the industry. Actually, the first oil shale industry collapse happened in the United States already in 1860-61 because of the crude oil discovery in Pennsylvania.Beagel (talk) 19:09, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Hi, just want to add my voice to the equation since I'm the one who introduced that one Bustan article to the site. I assume the others saw the link and got to to the other articles that way. I use the Bustan website as a sort of information source for a range of different issues related to Israel. Yes, Bustan is against oil shale development, and the objective of their research is definitely to discourage oil shale development in Israel. However, I don't think that discredits all of their research. Much of what you say if fine, Beagel, except that I think you're glossing over the economics - the fact that oil shale has never proved itself an economic fuel is nowhere in sight. And I'll be quite frank, I do have anti-oil shale views. As someone who is willing to admit to an opinion here, and willing to admit that it has influenced what I want to see represented, I must make clear: I am very happy to see all the other pro-oil shale views represented. But I think somewhere in the article it needs to say: The oil shale industry has thusfar bankrupted investors consistently, in this, that, and the other situation. Because this is a fact. But I'll refrain from editing this page, now that I've admitted what my stance is.Refcahman (talk) 04:25, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

You don't need to refrain from editing this article because of your point of view. While I don't think the article is glossing over the economics, maybe it needs some more mention of why some countries do operate this industry or are planning to. Estonia and Jordan have few other domestic energy resources; in the case of Brazil and China, there may be distribution or trade imbalance considerations. In the case of the US, there are political issues with our oil suppliers. It's probably possible to find reliable citations to various countries' rationales for their OS industries, just not immediately. I'll look.

I suppose what we are coming to is perhaps an agreement that although the article is very good on the technical side, it needs filling in in terms of on-the-ground applications. The Bustan backgrounder on oil shale is the only comprehensive online source on oil shale in Israel that I have come across and I think I haven't seen much more info in academic print. At the moment due to this discussion I feel timid about citing the backgrounder itself, but maybe I will go in and check the sources it brings together, which are all industry and government sources. However, I think that, so that the inclusion of this info on Israel does not stand alone, I will try to wait until others have added some info on Estonia, the US, etc.,Whynot25 (talk) 19:10, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

As this article deals with complex issues (starting with geology and ending with economics and environmental issues, it uses summaries of more detailed specific articles. More detailed information about the oil shale industry is provided in the Oil shale industry. It would be excellent to have more information about Israeli oil shale industry there. Right now only information about the (former) PAMA power plant is included. I would like also ask if you have any pictures about Israeli industry (e.g. oil shale-fired power plant, mines, oil shale crops etc).Beagel (talk) 19:31, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I'll think about adding it there, then. Pictures? Maybe from the PAMA site? When I get a chance to work on this I'll see if I can find any useful ones.Whynot25 (talk) 22:23, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

PAMA website could be problematic because of WP:COPYRIGHT. The GNU Free Documentation License is needed.Beagel (talk) 06:53, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

I just want to add that I checked out your issue, Beagel, that we should not overload this article with environmental details. I looked back into the history asn saw that no environmental details had been added, just small bolded headings had been inserted to organize the info.Whynot25 (talk) 05:41, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

Environmental impact of oil shale industry has all these headings.Beagel (talk) 06:53, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Energy independence

Energy independence is mentioned in the lead; maybe a wikilink to energy policy or energy security, in connection with this, would be useful, after supporting material is added. Novickas (talk) 13:20, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

There is no clear definition of energy independence, but the energy dependence is defined by Eurostat as net energy import ratio to total energy consumption. There is the article about energy dependence, but in general this is a link to the Energy security. Maybe energy security link then?Beagel (talk) 19:23, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Draft proposed addition: Despite the industry's variable history, it remains a component of several national energy policies focusing on energy security. The United States government sees its development as part of a strategy for ensuring a diverse and secure portfolio of liquid fuels; [2] the European Parliament declared in 2006 that all possible sources of energy, including oil shale, must be considered.[3] China [4] and Jordan [5] see the industry as a way to reduce their dependence on imported crude oil.

(Nothing found on Brazil yet) Novickas (talk) 14:27, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] North America

With so much being decovered in Canada and the USA, the could there be a seperate sub-page dealing with thier own oil shale industry/reserves sepratly?--Peter dan davis (talk) 17:30, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

[6]--Peter dan davis (talk) 17:32, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

If you look to the talk page archive, you see that proposal to create an article about the United States oil shale industry and reserves had been made last summer. This time the decision was to concentrate on articles about different aspects of oil shale. However, I think that US oil shale industry and reserves is worth to have its own article after developing recent article on the oil shale series. Beagel (talk) 18:15, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Canada

Where's Canada? It seems that's all geologists talked about for the past few years the rich New Brunswick (Albert Formation?) oil shales of Canada. Yet nothing in here. Are the Canadian oil shales really so whimpy? So outsmoked by those to the south? --Blechnic (talk) 04:13, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

15 Billion barrels of oil in place in canada vs 2.2 trillion in the US. fraid they are a little wimpy compared to the states this time. there is a little bit on the Oil Shale reserves section which links to this article for more info. But at least you've got world class oil sands still. Dexcel (talk) 15:16, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Oh, so it's an international whose is bigger contest. Sorry, I don't got one to compare. You have a source for your statistic? --Blechnic (talk) 15:21, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Oh, I see, it lists the reserves of 2 of the 19 discovered and explored oil shale sources in Canada and you take this to mean that this is the total reserves of Canada and this number makes it too small, compared to the US, to include in the article. Interesting research. I can see where this is going. Not geology, which leaves me out. Or accuracy. --Blechnic (talk) 15:29, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

According to the World Energy Council, Canada has 11th size of resources in the world, which is around 1% of global oil shale resources. As the Oil shale article deals with all aspects of oil shale, this is not he place to describe all countries with oil shale resources. At the same time, the Oil shale reserves article needs to be expanded, so you are welcome to assist to develop this article and to put any available information about Canadian reserves there. Beagel (talk) 18:09, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reserves vs. Resources

Good article! Congratulations to the editors who worked on it.

I have a comment on this:

A 2005 estimate set the total world resources of oil shale at 411 gigatons — enough to yield 2.8 to 3.3 trillion barrels of shale oil.[2][3][4][5] This is more than world's proven conventional oil reserves, estimated to be 1.317 trillion barrels (209.4×109 m3), as of 1 January 2007.

I think you should compare like things. Compare oil shale resurces to conventional oil resources, compare oil shale reserves to conventional oil reserves. Can you find numbers for total world oil shale reserves? Life.temp (talk) 00:52, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that's true that you can't compare resources and reserves. It is also explained in the Reserves section. This comparison was added during FAC review to give just some imagination about the amount of resources and not for saying that all resources could be used for oil production. The problem is that it is very difficult to say how big are oil shale reserves, because there are not enough studies of different deposits. At the same time it is also difficult to say how much oil is in place globally.Beagel (talk) 18:40, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

I second the congrats, an interesting article. SGGH ^speak! 10:35, 29 May 2008 (UTC)