An Illuminati Primer
The Religious Nature Of Politics - Astronomical Inflation

By Henry Makow PhD
11-20-5

Politics has banished Religion from public discourse but Religion still offers the best description of political reality.

The essence of political struggle is actually spiritual, a cosmic battle between God (Good) and Satan (Evil) for the soul of man.

The struggle is between an international financial elite dedicated to Satan, led by the Illuminati, and the remnants of humanity that still uphold God's Plan. The unsuspecting masses hang in the balance, inhabiting a fool's paradise like children.

This struggle is not between nations or between ideologies of Left or Right. This occult elite creates and controls both sides of every conflict in order to obscure and at the same time advance its long-term agenda.

The elite plan is to remake the planet as its private neo feudal preserve. This involves the reduction of the world's population through plague, catastrophe or war; mind control/breeding of the survivors as serfs; and the enshrinement of Lucifer as god.

A cataclysm could happen within the next 10-20 years. We're living on borrowed time, duped by the media and distracted by sex while the elite tests and imposes various methods of manipulation and control.

Thousands of organizations like the UN promote the elite's "world government" agenda with practically no public scrutiny. More recently, the elite instigated the Sept. 11 attacks in order to justify their "War on Terror" the repressive "Patriot Act", and Iraq War. The flooding of New Orleans, vaccinations and the bird flu epidemic are other tests or possible harbingers.

Sophisticated and dedicated people roll their eyes when told about this conspiracy. They are hypnotized by their "education" and the mass media.

The "Illuminati" sounds fantastic but it is NOT a chimera. Hidden within Freemasonry, it is the Church of Satan. Its membership was known; its premises were raided. Plans and correspondence were seized and published. Defectors attested to the grave danger at formal inquiries. It was suppressed but went underground. It has since grown so powerful that it has literally defined the modern age (under the guise of "progress," "reform" and "revolution") and now threatens the future of humanity.


THE ORIGIN OF MODERN DYSFUNCTION

The term "Illuminati" means "enlightened ones" and refers to Lucifer, the "light bringer." Its essential philosophy is to substitute "reason" i.e. expedience for "right reason" i.e. universal morality.

"Do as thou wilt" was the Illuminati motto. The Illuminati will define reality, not God or nature. Illuminism or "humanism" is a secular religion and a period of transition to Satanism i.e. "tolerance." The decline of public decency makes this increasingly apparent.

Whether it's a plant, a dog or a child, each flourishes naturally given some healthy nutrition and a little guidance. They follow an inherent design. The Illuminati wishes to negate the inherent course of human development by promoting dysfunction under the guise of personal freedom and equality.

The Illuminati represents the traditional feudal power elite, the alliance of European aristocracy and Jewish moneylenders, united by money, marriage and the occult. In 1770, Mayer Rothschild hired the 22-year-old Adam Weishaupt, a university instructor (son of a rabbi raised as a Catholic) to attract the cream of European society to a secret cult designed to reverse the course of Western (i.e. Christian) civilization (hence the term "revolution.")

I am summarizing "Final Warning" an online book by David Allen Rivera and James Wardner's excellent book "Unholy Alliances" (pp.34-51)

http://www.the7thfire.com/new_world_order/final_warning/ final_warning_table_of_contents.htm

The Illuminati was founded May 1, 1776. Weishaupt wrote: "The great strength of our Order lies in its concealment, let it never appear, in any place in its own name, but always covered by another name, and another occupation. None is fitter than the three lower degrees of Freemasonry; the public is accustomed to it, expects little from it, and therefore takes little notice of it."

An understanding was reached with the Masons at the Congress of Wilhelmsbad on December 20, 1781 to add the Illuminati hierarchy to the first three degrees of Masonry. On returning home, Comte de Virieu, a Mason from the Martiniste lodge at Lyons, reported: "I can only tell you that all this is very much more serious than you think. The conspiracy which is being woven is so well thought out that it will be impossible for the Monarchy and the Church to escape it."

Nesta Webster in her book World Revolution describes the modus operandi of the Illuminati. It applies to Adolph Hitler as well as Timothy Leary: "The art of Illuminism lay in enlisting dupes as well as adepts, and by encouraging the dreams of honest visionaries or the schemes of fanatics, by flattering the vanity of ambitious egotists, by working on unbalanced brains, or by playing on such passions as greed and power, to make men of totally divergent aims serve the secret purpose of the sect."

The Illuminati also used bribes of money and sex to gain control of men in high places, and then blackmailed them with the threat of financial ruin, public exposure or assassination. This continues to the present day.

Weishaupt wrote: "One must speak sometimes in one way, sometimes in another, so that our real purpose should remain impenetrable to our inferiors." And what was that purpose? It was "nothing less than to win power and riches, to undermine secular or religious government, and to obtain the mastery of the world."

The first priority was to enlist writers, publishers and educators. The modern pantheon of great thinkers, from Darwin to Nietzsche to Marx, were Illuminati pawns or agents. Of one university, Weishaupt wrote: "All the professors are members of the Illuminati...so will all the pupils become disciples of Illuminism." (Wardner, 45)

As the Order spread throughout Germany, money was contributed from such leading Jewish families as the Oppenheimers, Wertheimers, Schusters, Speyers, Sterns and of course, the Rothschilds. Gerald B. Winrod wrote in his book Adam Weishaupt: A Human Devil "of the thirty-nine chief sub-leaders of Weishaupt, seventeen were Jews."

From Bavaria, the Order of the Illuminati spread like wildfire... Soon they had over 300 members from all walks of life, including students, merchants, doctors, lawyers, judges, professors, civil officers, bankers, and even church ministers. Some of their more notable members were: the Duke of Orleans, Duke Ernst Augustus of Saxe-Weimar-Coburg-Gotha, Prince Charles of Hesse-Cassel, Johann Gottfried von Herder (a philosopher), Count Klemens von Metternich, Catherine II of Russia, Count Gabriel de Mirabeau, Marquis of Constanza ("Diomedes"), Duke Ferdinand of Brunswick ("Aaron"), Duke Karl August of Saxe-Weimar, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (a poet), Joseph II of Russia, Christian VII of Denmark, Gustave III of Sweden, and King Poniatowski of Poland.

By the time of the 3rd Masonic Congress in Frankfurt in 1786, the Illuminati virtually controlled all the Masonic lodges, which represented three million secret society members across the various German provinces, Austria, Hungary, England, Scotland, Poland, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, Holland, Spain, Sweden, Russia, Ireland, Africa, and America. (Wardner, p. 39)

In the 1790's there was an Illuminati scare in the United States. At Charlestown, in 1798, the Reverend Jedediah Morse preached: "Practically all the civil and ecclesiastical establishments of Europe have already been shaken to their foundations by this terrible organization, the French Revolution itself is doubtless to be traced to its machinations..." (Wardner 48)

In 1832 William Russell established a chapter of the Illuminati at Yale called the "Skull and Bones." President G.W. Bush, his father and John Kerry are members.

On Sept. 9, 1785, Joseph Utzschneider, a lawyer, and two other defectors revealed the Illuminati goals before a Court of Inquiry in Bavaria: Abolition of the Monarchy and all ordered government; Abolition of private property (which the Illuminati will assume); Abolition of Patriotism (nations); Family, (through the abolition of Marriage, Morality, and by government providing "Education" for children) and finally, Abolition of all Religion, particularly Christianity.

These are exactly the goals of Communism, enunciated by Marx in 1848. The Illuminati and Communism go hand-in-glove. The term "Reds" originates with "Red Shield" the Rothschild name. The satanic five-pointed star is the symbol of both.


CONCLUSION

Mankind has taken a wrong turn and appears doomed to annihilation. The political, cultural and economic elite of the West is either dupes or willing agents of a satanic conspiracy of cosmic proportions.

If we and our children are to suffer and die prematurely, at least we know the real reason. That is a privilege not granted to millions of our ancestors.

God and Satan made a wager for the soul of man. If God wins, man revels in the glory of his Divine Birthright. If Satan wins, man is destroyed. In a nutshell, this is the religious nature of politics.

We can instantly recapture an essential part of religion by incorporating the dictim, "Do Unto Others as You Would Have Them Do Unto You," in our lives. The essence of all true religion is to obey God (i.e. spiritual ideals like justice, truth and love) instead of personal desire, to be selfless instead of selfish. Like a snowflake, this is how disparate elements arrange themselves according to the Plan, and acheive Perfection.

The entire program of the New World Order is progressing according to a Satanic spiritual basis. Do not be deceived -- the leaders of the coming world system are practitioners of the ancient "Mysteries" religion dating back to the Satanism of Nimrod of Babylon. And the Bible clearly foretells that this is to be the case. In other words, the ancient occultism of 5,000 years ago is to come back full circle, and will be the religion of Anti-Christ. But, the Bible foretells that, until Anti-Christ destroys the False Religious leader part way through the Great Tribulation, the practice of the old Satanic religion will occur through the deception that it is really Christian.

And we see this coming true before our eyes in the activities of the Roman Catholic Institution. We have reported on this phenomenon consistently through our previous programs and we would be happy to share with you these programs if you would like to receive them; however, the startling facts we wish to share with you today about Roman Catholicism comes from a very unlikely and invaluable source. Doc Marquee is a former Satanist who was also initiated into the Illuminati. But, God had an important plan for Marquee's life. In 1979, the Holy Spirit led Doc Marquee out of Satanism/Illuminism and into the glorious light of Salvation through the atoning blood of Jesus Christ. Since his conversion, Marquee has been very active as an acknowledged expert in the occult. Marquee has given many seminars to police departments, training detectives to recognize signs in a crime scene which show that the perpetrators were occultic, and that, perhaps, the crime was committed as part of a Satanic ritual.

Doc Marquee has also written a book, which is being published by American Focus Publishing Company, entitled "Secrets of the Illuminati". While this topic has been explored before, no author has been able to bring a truly occultic angle to the discussion. In other words, Marquee looks at the plan to bring in the New World Order from the viewpoint of a former witch. In his book, Marquee includes a chapter entitled, "Is It Catholicism Or Witchcraft?" At the beginning of this chapter, Marquee makes a quite startling statement, "I must emphatically state that Catholicism and witchcraft are one and the same...there is no difference between witchcraft and Catholicism." Then, Marquee examines Catholicism and witchcraft from the vantage point of a former witch.

Marquee identifies several critically important areas in which the practice of Roman Catholicism and witchcraft are identical. We will first list these areas of commonalty and then comment specifically upon them. These common areas are:

The altar
The golden goblet known as a chalice.
Colored candles used in services
The use of incense.
The use of bells in the ceremony.
Praying to statues.
The use of Latin in services.
The use of a golden scepter in giving a large blessing to the people.
Common belief in Purgatory
The common belief in the host.
Common belief in the five elements.
Now, let us examine each of these areas of commonalty:

1. The altar in every Catholic church is prominently positioned at the front of the church. The "Mysteries of the Mass" are celebrated on and around the altar. In witchcraft, also, the altar is similarly used for three purposes:

To practice certain metaphysical rites, such as the casting of certain spells or to honor occult deities.
To hold the tools of magic.
To perform human sacrifice.
The Roman Catholic altar also holds their tools of their magic, and they daily perform human sacrifice. Remember, we are looking at this subject through the eyes of a former high-level witch who is now a born-again Christian. This daily human sacrifice is performed according to the false belief in "transubstantiation", the belief that the priest magically transforms the wafer into Jesus' body and the wine into His blood. Marquee states, "In other words, every day Christ is being reincarnated and then sacrificed.. they perform daily their human sacrifice in which Christ is ...sacrificed for their sins." It is shocking to realize that the Roman Catholics are daily performing human sacrifice in a manner similar to that of witches throughout the centuries.

2. The Catholic Golden Goblet, or Chalice. "It is this cup that the wine poured into it becomes the...literal blood of Christ. When a witch does a human sacrifice, after the victim's throat is sliced open, the spilled blood will be collected in a chalice, just as the Catholics do, except the witch's chalice holds the real thing." In Satan's eyes, the Catholics are performing the same rite as the witches.

3. "Candles were introduced to the Catholic mass about 320 A.D. There is no Scriptural reasons for them, unless... you are a practicing witch. Below is a list of different colored candles a witch would use throughout the year. See if you can recall any of these colors used during a Catholic mass:

White -- Purity, Truth, Sincerity
Red -- Strength, Health, Vigor, Sexual Love
Light Blue -- Tranquillity, Understanding, Patience
Dark Blue -- Impulsiveness, Depression, Change
Green -- Finance, Fertility, Luck
Gold/Yellow -- Persuasion, Charm, Confidence
Brown -- Hesitation, Uncertainty
Pink -- Honor, Love, Morality
Black -- Evil, Loss, Discord, Confusion
Purple -- Tension, Ambition, Power
Silver-Gray -- Cancellation, Stalemate
Orange -- Encouragement, Stimulation
Greenish-Yellow -- Sickness, Anger, Jealousy
"Using these colored candles and the right spells, a witch can cause anything to happen...our Catholic friends are not only using these occult tools, they also pay for them when they go to various statues and light...candles."

4. "Incense is a constant tool that is used by priests. They will take a philter (incense burner), walk around the altar, and then wave it out toward the crowd with an invocation...Not only do witches use incense, but they will consecrate their altar and their fellow witches in the exact way the Catholics do..."

5. Bells are also utilized by both Roman Catholics and witches. The bells are actually baptized, and in both witchcraft and Catholicism, altar boys attend the priest in sounding the bells.

6. Witches were praying to images or statues for many centuries before Catholics began the practice.

7. "Until recently, most of the rites of witchcraft were said in Latin...why is it, when the witches stopped using Latin as much as they did, about twenty years ago, that the Catholic mass was stopped being told in Latin? Today, it is spoken mostly in American English, the same way in which a witch's mass is held."

8. "...when the Pope, Cardinals, or priests want to give a huge blessing, they will take out a golden scepter, or wand, dip it in holy water, and then wave it on the people...wands are nothing new in the occult. When a witch wants to direct his power he can do it by means of wands." He can also control the demonic forces at his disposal by using a wand to consecrate a circle with a pentacle inside. Holy water is also used by a witch to purify himself and his instruments, and the water is made holy in both witchcraft and Catholicism by mixing water with salt.

9. The teaching of Purgatory is not found in the Bible. According to Catholic catechism, Purgatory is described as "a logically deduced place. Since a Catholic could not go straight to heaven if he had sinned, and since he could not go to hell if he had not died in mortal sin, there had to be a place in between where he could be purified" -- Purgatory. However, the belief in Purgatory is "totally occultic in origin". Witchcraft teaches that after a person goes through Purgatory, he is reincarnated and is more powerful in his next life than he was before. After several reincarnations, he will become purified enough to live with the gods and goddesses, precisely the same end as the Catholics teach.

10. Both Catholics and Witches teach that the host becomes the actual body of their respective gods. To the Roman Catholic, the host becomes the actual body of Jesus Christ; the witch believes the host actually becomes the body of their pagan deity, "I.H.S. -- or Iris, Horus, and Semiramis". This concept is known in both circles as transsubstantiation.

11. Both witchcraft and Roman Catholicism teach that the universe is comprised of five elements: Spirit, Water, Air, Fire, and Earth. These occultic five elements are also found in the Catholic mass.

Spirit -- of the wafer god they sacrifice daily.
Water -- Holy water they use to purify and baptize
Air -- symbolically used through the incense
Fire -- used in tangent with the incense burning
Earth -- The elements of the wafer come from the earth in agriculture, and the flesh of their sacrificed deity, Jesus Christ, also came from the earth.
Doc Marquee's conclusion is inescapable and damning: The practice of occultism has come full circle from ancient Babylon to the Roman Catholic Institution today. As Jesus counseled in Revelation 18:4, "Come out of her, my people, that you do not participate in her sins, neither in her plagues".

Last Updated: Friday, 27 January 2006, 18:05 GMT

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US plans to 'fight the net' revealed

By Adam Brookes
BBC Pentagon correspondent

A newly declassified document gives a fascinating glimpse into the US military's plans for "information operations" - from psychological operations, to attacks on hostile computer networks.


The document says information is "critical to military success"

Bloggers beware.

As the world turns networked, the Pentagon is calculating the military opportunities that computer networks, wireless technologies and the modern media offer.

From influencing public opinion through new media to designing "computer network attack" weapons, the US military is learning to fight an electronic war.

The declassified document is called "Information Operations Roadmap". It was obtained by the National Security Archive at George Washington University using the Freedom of Information Act.

Officials in the Pentagon wrote it in 2003. The Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, signed it.

Information Operations Roadmap
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The "roadmap" calls for a far-reaching overhaul of the military's ability to conduct information operations and electronic warfare. And, in some detail, it makes recommendations for how the US armed forces should think about this new, virtual warfare.

The document says that information is "critical to military success". Computer and telecommunications networks are of vital operational importance.

Propaganda

The operations described in the document include a surprising range of military activities: public affairs officers who brief journalists, psychological operations troops who try to manipulate the thoughts and beliefs of an enemy, computer network attack specialists who seek to destroy enemy networks.

All these are engaged in information operations.


The wide-reaching document was signed off by Donald Rumsfeld

Perhaps the most startling aspect of the roadmap is its acknowledgement that information put out as part of the military's psychological operations, or Psyops, is finding its way onto the computer and television screens of ordinary Americans.

"Information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and Psyops, is increasingly consumed by our domestic audience," it reads.

"Psyops messages will often be replayed by the news media for much larger audiences, including the American public," it goes on.

The document's authors acknowledge that American news media should not unwittingly broadcast military propaganda. "Specific boundaries should be established," they write. But they don't seem to explain how.

"In this day and age it is impossible to prevent stories that are fed abroad as part of psychological operations propaganda from blowing back into the United States - even though they were directed abroad," says Kristin Adair of the National Security Archive.

Credibility problem

Public awareness of the US military's information operations is low, but it's growing - thanks to some operational clumsiness.

When it describes plans for electronic warfare, or EW, the document takes on an extraordinary tone. It seems to see the internet as being equivalent to an enemy weapons system


Late last year, it emerged that the Pentagon had paid a private company, the Lincoln Group, to plant hundreds of stories in Iraqi newspapers. The stories - all supportive of US policy - were written by military personnel and then placed in Iraqi publications.

And websites that appeared to be information sites on the politics of Africa and the Balkans were found to be run by the Pentagon.

But the true extent of the Pentagon's information operations, how they work, who they're aimed at, and at what point they turn from informing the public to influencing populations, is far from clear.

The roadmap, however, gives a flavour of what the US military is up to - and the grand scale on which it's thinking.

It reveals that Psyops personnel "support" the American government's international broadcasting. It singles out TV Marti - a station which broadcasts to Cuba - as receiving such support.

It recommends that a global website be established that supports America's strategic objectives. But no American diplomats here, thank you. The website would use content from "third parties with greater credibility to foreign audiences than US officials".

It also recommends that Psyops personnel should consider a range of technologies to disseminate propaganda in enemy territory: unmanned aerial vehicles, "miniaturized, scatterable public address systems", wireless devices, cellular phones and the internet.

'Fight the net'

When it describes plans for electronic warfare, or EW, the document takes on an extraordinary tone.

It seems to see the internet as being equivalent to an enemy weapons system.

"Strategy should be based on the premise that the Department [of Defense] will 'fight the net' as it would an enemy weapons system," it reads.

The slogan "fight the net" appears several times throughout the roadmap.

The authors warn that US networks are very vulnerable to attack by hackers, enemies seeking to disable them, or spies looking for intelligence.

"Networks are growing faster than we can defend them... Attack sophistication is increasing... Number of events is increasing."

US digital ambition

And, in a grand finale, the document recommends that the United States should seek the ability to "provide maximum control of the entire electromagnetic spectrum".

US forces should be able to "disrupt or destroy the full spectrum of globally emerging communications systems, sensors, and weapons systems dependent on the electromagnetic spectrum".

Consider that for a moment.

The US military seeks the capability to knock out every telephone, every networked computer, every radar system on the planet.

Are these plans the pipe dreams of self-aggrandising bureaucrats? Or are they real?

The fact that the "Information Operations Roadmap" is approved by the Secretary of Defense suggests that these plans are taken very seriously indeed in the Pentagon.

And that the scale and grandeur of the digital revolution is matched only by the US military's ambitions for it.

Peak Oil: Problem Overblown?
The Economist recently ran a story airing Peak Oil concerns from "pessimists" and counters from "optimists." NPR ran a similar spot May 2.

FINANCE & ECONOMICS
The oil industry
Steady as she goes [$]
Apr 20th 2006 | BAKERSFIELD, CALIFORNIA, AND CALGARY, ALBERTA
From The Economist print edition

Why the world is not about to run out of oil
…For years a small group of geologists has been claiming that the world has started to grow short of oil, that alternatives cannot possibly replace it and that an imminent peak in production will lead to economic disaster. In recent months this view has gained wider acceptance on Wall Street and in the media. Recent books on oil have bewailed the threat. Every few weeks, it seems, “Out of Gas”, “The Empty Tank” and “The Coming Economic Collapse: How You Can Thrive When Oil Costs $200 a Barrel”, are joined by yet more gloomy titles. Oil companies, which once dismissed the depletion argument out of hand, are now part of the debate. Chevron's splashy advertisements strike an ominous tone: “It took us 125 years to use the first trillion barrels of oil. We'll use the next trillion in 30.” Jeroen van der Veer, chief executive of Royal Dutch Shell, believes “the debate has changed in the last two years from 'Can we afford oil?' to 'Is the oil there?'”

But is the world really starting to run out of oil? And would hitting a global peak of production necessarily spell economic ruin? Both questions are arguable. Despite today's obsession with the idea of “peak oil”, what really matters to the world economy is not when conventional oil production peaks, but whether we have enough affordable and convenient fuel from any source to power our current fleet of cars, buses and aeroplanes. With that in mind, the global oil industry is on the verge of a dramatic transformation from a risky exploration business into a technology-intensive manufacturing business. And the product that big oil companies will soon be manufacturing, argues Shell's Mr Van der Veer, is “greener fossil fuels”.

The race is on to manufacture such fuels for blending into petrol and diesel today, thus extending the useful life of the world's remaining oil reserves. This shift in emphasis from discovery to manufacturing opens the door to firms outside the oil industry (such as America's General Electric, Britain's Virgin Fuels and South Africa's Sasol) that are keen on alternative energy. It may even result in a breakthrough that replaces oil altogether.

To see how that might happen, consider the first question: is the world really running out of oil? Colin Campbell, an Irish geologist, has been saying since the 1990s that the peak of global oil production is imminent. Kenneth Deffeyes, a respected geologist at Princeton, thought that the peak would arrive late last year.

It did not. In fact, oil production capacity might actually grow sharply over the next few years (see chart 1). Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA), an energy consultancy, has scrutinised all of the oil projects now under way around the world. Though noting rising costs, the firm concludes that the world's oil-production capacity could increase by as much as 15m barrels per day (bpd) between 2005 and 2010—equivalent to almost 18% of today's output and the biggest surge in history. Since most of these projects are already budgeted and in development, there is no geological reason why this wave of supply will not become available (though politics or civil strife can always disrupt output).





Peak-oil advocates remain unconvinced. A sign of depletion, they argue, is that big Western oil firms are finding it increasingly difficult to replace the oil they produce, let alone build their reserves. Art Smith of Herold, a consultancy, points to rising “finding and development” costs at the big firms, and argues that the world is consuming two to three barrels of oil for every barrel of new oil found. Michael Rodgers of PFC Energy, another consultancy, says that the peak of new discoveries was long ago. “We're living off a lottery we won 30 years ago,” he argues.

It is true that the big firms are struggling to replace reserves. But that does not mean the world is running out of oil, just that they do not have access to the vast deposits of cheap and easy oil that are left in Russia and members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). And as the great fields of the North Sea and Alaska mature, non-OPEC oil production will probably peak by 2010 or 2015. That is soon—but it says nothing of what really matters, which is the global picture.

When the United States Geological Survey (USGS) studied the matter closely, it concluded that the world had around 3 trillion barrels of recoverable conventional oil in the ground. Of that, only one-third has been produced. That, argued the USGS, puts the global peak beyond 2025. And if “unconventional” hydrocarbons such as tar sands and shale oil (which can be converted with greater effort to petrol) are included, the resource base grows dramatically—and the peak recedes much further into the future. {emphasis added}

After Ghawar
It is also true that oilmen will probably discover no more “super-giant” fields like Saudi Arabia's Ghawar (which alone produces 5m bpd). But there are even bigger resources available right under their noses. Technological breakthroughs such as multi-lateral drilling helped defy predictions of decline in Britain's North Sea that have been made since the 1980s: the region is only now peaking.
Globally, the oil industry recovers only about one-third of the oil that is known to exist in any given reservoir. New technologies like 4-D seismic analysis and electromagnetic “direct detection” of hydrocarbons are lifting that “recovery rate”, and even a rise of a few percentage points would provide more oil to the market than another discovery on the scale of those in the Caspian or North Sea.

Further, just because there are no more Ghawars does not mean an end to discovery altogether. Using ever fancier technologies, the oil business is drilling in deeper waters, more difficult terrain and even in the Arctic (which, as global warming melts the polar ice cap, will perversely become the next great prize in oil). Large parts of Siberia, Iraq and Saudi Arabia have not even been explored with modern kit.

The petro-pessimists' most forceful argument is that the Persian Gulf, officially home to most of the world's oil reserves, is overrated. Matthew Simmons, an American energy investment banker, argues in his book, “Twilight in the Desert”, that Saudi Arabia's oil fields are in trouble. In recent weeks a scandal has engulfed Kuwait, too. Petroleum Intelligence Weekly (PIW), a respected industry newsletter, got hold of government documents suggesting that Kuwait might have only half of the nearly 100 billion barrels in oil reserves that it claims (Saudi Arabia claims 260 billion barrels).

Tom Wallin, publisher of PIW, warns that “the lesson from Kuwait is that the reserves figures of national governments must be viewed with caution.” But that still need not mean that a global peak is imminent. So vast are the remaining reserves, and so well distributed are today's producing areas, that a radical revision downwards—even in an OPEC country—does not mean a global peak is here.
For one thing, Kuwait's official numbers always looked dodgy. IHS Energy, an industry research outfit that constructs its reserve estimates from the bottom up rather than relying on official proclamations, had long been using a figure of 50 billion barrels for Kuwait. Ron Mobed, boss of IHS, sees no crisis today: “Even using our smaller number, Kuwait still has 50 years of production left at current rates.” As for Saudi Arabia, most independent contractors and oil majors that have first-hand knowledge of its fields are convinced that the Saudis have all the oil they claim—and that more remains to be found.
Pessimists worry that Saudi Arabia's giant fields could decline rapidly before any new supply is brought online. In Jeremy Leggett's thoughtful, but gloomy, book, “The Empty Tank”, Mr Simmons laments that “the only alternative right now is to shrink our economies.” That poses a second big question: whenever the production peak comes, will it inevitably prompt a global economic crisis?

The baleful thesis arises from concerns both that a cliff lies beyond any peak in production and that alternatives to oil will not be available. If the world oil supply peaked one day and then fell away sharply, prices would indeed rocket, shortages and panic buying would wreak havoc and a global recession would ensue. But there are good reasons to think that a global peak, whenever it comes, need not lead to a collapse in output.

For one thing, the nightmare scenario of Ghawar suddenly peaking is not as grim as it first seems. When it peaks, the whole “super-giant” will not drop from 5m bpd to zero, because it is actually a network of inter-linked fields, some old and some newer. Experts say a decline would probably be gentler and prolonged. That would allow, indeed encourage, the Saudis to develop new fields to replace lost output. Saudi Arabia's oil minister, Ali Naimi, points to an unexplored area on the Iraqi-Saudi border the size of California, and argues that such untapped resources could add 200 billion barrels to his country's tally. This contains worries of its own—Saudi Arabia's market share will grow dramatically as non-OPEC oil peaks, and with it the potential for mischief. But it helps to debunk claims of a sudden change.

The notion of a sharp global peak in production does not withstand scrutiny, either. CERA's Peter Jackson points out that the price signals that would surely foreshadow any “peak” would encourage efficiency, promote new oil discoveries and speed investments in alternatives to oil. That, he reckons, means the metaphor of a peak is misleading: “The right picture is of an undulating plateau.”

What of the notion that oil scarcity will lead to economic disaster? Jerry Taylor and Peter Van Doren of the Cato Institute, an American think-tank, insist the key is to avoid the price controls and monetary-policy blunders of the sort that turned the 1970s oil shocks into economic disasters. Kenneth Rogoff, a Harvard professor and the former chief economist of the IMF, thinks concerns about peak oil are greatly overblown: “The oil market is highly developed, with worldwide trading and long-dated futures going out five to seven years. As oil production slows, prices will rise up and down the futures curve, stimulating new technology and conservation. We might be running low on $20 oil, but for $60 we have adequate oil supplies for decades to come.”

The other worry of pessimists is that alternatives to oil simply cannot be brought online fast enough to compensate for oil's imminent decline. If the peak were a cliff or if it arrived soon, this would certainly be true, since alternative fuels have only a tiny global market share today (though they are quite big in markets, such as ethanol-mad Brazil, that have favourable policies). But if the peak were to come after 2020 or 2030, as the International Energy Agency and other mainstream forecasters predict, then the rising tide of alternative fuels will help transform it into a plateau and ease the transition to life after oil.

The best reason to think so comes from the radical transformation now taking place among big oil firms. The global oil industry, argues Chevron, is changing from “an exploration business to a manufacturing business”. To see what that means, consider the surprising outcome of another great motorcar race. In March, at the Sebring test track in Florida, a sleek Audi prototype R-10 became the first diesel-powered car to win an endurance race, pipping a field of petrol-powered rivals to the post. What makes this tale extraordinary is that the diesel used by the Audi was not made in the normal way, exclusively from petroleum. Instead, Shell blended conventional diesel with a super-clean and super-powerful new form of diesel made from natural gas (with the clunky name of gas-to-liquids, or GTL).

Several big GTL projects are under way in Qatar, where the North gas field is perhaps twice the size of even Ghawar when measured in terms of the energy it contains. Nigeria and others are also pursuing GTL. Since the world has far more natural gas left than oil—much of it outside the Middle East—making fuel in this way would greatly increase the world's remaining supplies of oil.

So, too, would blending petrol or diesel with ethanol and biodiesel made from agricultural crops, or with fuel made from Canada's “tar sands” or America's shale oil. Using technology invented in Nazi Germany and perfected by South Africa's Sasol when those countries were under oil embargoes, companies are now also investing furiously to convert not only natural gas but also coal into a liquid fuel. Daniel Yergin of CERA says “the very definition of oil is changing, since non-conventional oil becomes conventional over time.”

Alternative fuels will not become common overnight, as one veteran oilman acknowledges: “Given the capital-intensity of manufacturing alternatives, it's now a race between hydrocarbon depletion and making fuel.” But the recent rise in oil prices has given investors confidence. As Peter Robertson, vice-chairman of Chevron, puts it, “Price is our friend here, because it has encouraged investment in new hydrocarbons and also the alternatives.” Unless the world sees another OPEC-engineered price collapse as it did in 1985 and 1998, GTL, tar sands, ethanol and other alternatives will become more economic by the day (see chart 2).





This is not to suggest that the big firms are retreating from their core business. They are pushing ahead with these investments mainly because they cannot get access to new oil in the Middle East: “We need all the molecules we can get our hands on,” says one oilman. It cannot have escaped the attention of oilmen that blending alternative fuels into petrol and diesel will conveniently reinforce oil's grip on transport. But their work contains the risk that one of the upstart fuels could yet provide a radical breakthrough that sidelines oil altogether.

If you doubt the power of technology or the potential of unconventional fuels, visit the Kern River oil field near Bakersfield, California. This super-giant field is part of a cluster that has been pumping out oil for more than 100 years. It has already produced 2 billion barrels of oil, but has perhaps as much again left. The trouble is that it contains extremely heavy oil, which is very difficult and costly to extract. After other companies despaired of the field, Chevron brought Kern back from the brink. Applying a sophisticated steam-injection process, the firm has increased its output beyond the anticipated peak. Using a great deal of automation (each engineer looks after 1,000 small wells drilled into the reservoir), the firm has transformed a process of “flying blind” into one where wells “practically monitor themselves and call when they need help”.

The good news is that this is not unique. China also has deposits of heavy oil that would benefit from such an advanced approach. America, Canada and Venezuela have deposits of heavy hydrocarbons that surpass even the Saudi oil reserves in size. The Saudis have invited Chevron to apply its steam-injection techniques to recover heavy oil in the neutral zone that the country shares with Kuwait. Mr Naimi, the oil minister, recently estimated that this new technology would lift the share of the reserve that could be recovered as useful oil from a pitiful 6% to above 40%.

All this explains why, in the words of Exxon Mobil, the oil production peak is unlikely “for decades to come”. Governments may decide to shift away from petroleum because of its nasty geopolitics or its contribution to global warming. But it is wrong to imagine the world's addiction to oil will end soon, as a result of genuine scarcity. As Western oil companies seek to cope with being locked out of the Middle East, the new era of manufactured fuel will further delay the onset of peak production. The irony would be if manufactured fuel also did something far more dramatic—if it served as a bridge to whatever comes beyond the nexus of petrol and the internal combustion engine that for a century has held the world in its grip.

Natural gas is the energy of choice for the next 15 to 20 years. Data show that Federal
and private investment in research, and the creative application of technology helped
build the historical natural gas production curve in the United States. Research and the
creative application of technology will likewise grow natural gas production and slow oil
production decline in the future. The private energy sector has decreased fossil energy
research funding significantly over the past decade. The American public must get behind
Federal support of fossil energy research if we are to avoid dependence on foreign
sources of natural gas. The private sector can also be proactive by creating a Private
Energy Research Foundation (PERF) to help fund vital fossil energy research.
Introduction
Technology is a word that has become so overused that it actually means very little
without some context. A geologist might think of 3-D models, a petrophysicist, logging
tools, a geophysicist, waves, a reservoir engineer, numerical simulation, an operations
engineer, drilling and completions, and a manager might consider the leverage that
technology provides on Wall Street. The word means many things to many people. In
fact, all of these definitions are important, all are correct, and all are useful within a
known context. One thing is certain: technology does not equal wisdom, and technology
alone does not add value.
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A company needs both profit and value to survive over the long run. I consider value to
be a longer-term attribute than profit, which carries a fiscal quarter connotation. In the
descriptive, interpretive, research-oriented upstream-upstream world of the geologist,
geophysicist, and petrophysicist, it is considerably more difficult to quantify value than in
the quantified, blueprint, application-oriented downstream-upstream world of the
operations engineer (Figure 1). Value is difficult to quantify in the upstream-upstream,
and it is therefore difficult to assign, because it is far removed from the point where oil
fills the tank and gas fills the pipeline. The resulting mistake that is commonly made is to
consider the upstream-upstream a cost. I call this the value trap.
Many major oil companies fell into the value trap over the past decade when they asked
their Research Centers to become Technology Centers, which in the end meant 100%
technical service and very little innovative research. Technology Centers were asked to
justify their existence using a quarterly profit metric. In fact, scientists at Technology
Centers were asked to “bill out” to customers within the company at some hourly or daily
rate. Lawyers and accountants perform a service and quantify value by billable hours;
research scientists should not. One is service, the other is science. To those of us who
were in the science trenches at major Technology Centers, the result was predictable.
Based upon the billable-hour metric, Centers were shown to be unprofitable, and a vast
majority were closed. There were, of course, other business justifications for closing
Technology Centers. For example, “does not fit the strategic objectives of the company,”
“technology should be borrowed not invented in house,” and “we should contract the
technology as needed.” Time will tell the wisdom of these decisions.
In actuality, true research is represented by long periods of normalcy with no apparent
progress or results, which are punctuated by moments of brilliance and significant
breakthrough. As such, research does not lend itself to quarterly profit evaluation. In fact,
today’s research often becomes tomorrow’s technology application. An oil company
could certainly not be profitable with research alone, but can it be valuable without it?
The Value of Research
Quantifying the value of research is an age-old dilemma. What is the value of knowing
that seismic amplitude reflectors and depositional time lines are not always synonymous
(Figure 2)? What is the value of quantifying and visualizing the physical forward model
that produced complex salt tectonics (Figure 3)? What is the value of very rapid
acquisition of topographic data and mapping with sub-meter vertical accuracy (Figure 4)?
What is the value of 3-D visualization and the virtual reality presentation of data to
landowners in South Texas (Figure 5)? What is the value of mapping the salinization
variations of soil and ground water around oil fields using a very rapid-acquisition
airborne electromagnetic device (Figure 6)? What is the value of immediate access to 1.5
million boxes of cores and cuttings (Figure 7)?
Most industries recognize the importance of technology and innovation (Figure 8) as a
source of superior shareholder returns (Figure 9), as leverage in partnership negotiations,
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in differentiating themselves from competitors, and as a source of long-term corporate
value. It is, therefore, somewhat of a paradox that oil company research and development
(R&D) expenditures have been steadily decreasing for a decade (Figure 10). Part of the
explanation for this decrease in R&D can be found in the increase in joint industry
projects (JIP’s) over the past decade (Figure 10). Increased collaboration can help the
bottom line from a short-term cost perspective but may hurt it from a longer-term value
perspective.
Production as a Metric for Research Value
Until the late 1800’s, wood was the primary source of energy in the United States (Figure
11). Coal became an important energy source in the late 1800’s and dominated the energy
scene until the mid-1920’s, when oil and gas became an important alternative to coal. By
1950, oil and natural gas combined had surpassed coal in terms of energy consumption,
and they have dominated the energy consumption scene ever since. Today, with the
exception of nuclear power, demand for every major source of energy in the United
States is increasing. In terms of supply, coal is still the largest source of energy produced
in the United States, followed by natural gas and crude oil (Figure 12).
Oil
The University of Texas owns oil and gas royalty rights to approximately 2.1 million
acres in the Permian Basin of West Texas. Oil production from these lands has been
steadily decreasing for the past two decades (Figure 13). There are two “humps” in the oil
production decline, one in the mid-1980’s and one in the late 1990’s, that combined
represent more than 10 million barrels of incremental oil (production above the decline).
What was the cause of the two humps?
One possibility is that the humps are related to exploration and development driven by oil
price. However, oil price data indicate that the 1980’s hump occurred during a price fall,
the 1990’s hump occurred during a price rise, and there was a complete price cycle in the
mid-1990’s that had no impact on University Lands oil production (Figure 14).
Another possibility is that University Lands oil production is related to larger scale
production cycles, driven by a complex set of global economic factors. One proxy for
these larger scale cycles is oil production from all of Texas. In fact, the mid-1980’s oil
hump on University Lands does mirror the oil production in Texas, both falling in 1986
with the global price decline (Figure 15). However, the 1990’s hump on University Lands
occurred when Texas oil production did very little, and there is a hump in Texas oil
production in the mid-1990’s related to the oil price cycle (Figure 14) that has no
University Lands equivalent.
The Bureau of Economic Geology, funded in part by The University of Texas System,
performed two sets of studies on University Lands reservoirs, one that began in the mid-
1980’s and one that began in the late 1990’s (Figure 16). Often in partnership with
operators, 11 fields were characterized in the mid-1980’s study, and 5 fields in the late
1990’s study. Incremental production from these 16 fields accounts for nearly half of the
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10 million barrels of incremental oil represented by the two humps. Part of the remainder
can be attributed to “copy-cat” programs implemented by operators in similar fields. A $3
million investment in research and technology by the royalty owner, and a multi-milliondollar
investment in field development by operators, resulted in 10 million incremental
barrels of oil.
The study of multiple fields, coordinated with an operational improvement effort,
resulted in incremental production and a positive economic benefit. The ideal program
would shingle these production humps, resulting in a long-term improvement in
production decline (Figure 17). The impact of this type of program on all U.S. oil
production (Figure 18) would result in more than 6 billion barrels of incremental oil over
the next 15 years.
Natural Gas
Natural gas production in the United States was able to keep pace with consumption until
the mid-1980’s (Figure 19). Natural gas imports have risen from around 4% in the mid-
1980’s to more than 15% today (Figure 20). More than 3 Tcf of gas was imported in
2000, and that number is not anticipated to decrease. A large percentage of the U.S.
imported pipeline natural gas comes from Canada. Liquefied natural gas (LNG), largely
from Algeria and Trinidad (Figure 21), accounts for most of the remaining natural gas
imports.
Forecasts for annual U.S. natural gas production indicate natural gas supply will grow
from 21 Tcf in 2001 to around 27 Tcf by 2015. Demand is projected to exceed 30 Tcf by
2015 (Figure 22). Whereas most of the U.S. natural gas to date has come from associated,
high-permeability, and shallow offshore sources, around 50% of the produced natural gas
in 2015 is forecast to come from deepwater, subsalt, and unconventional (tight gas, shale
gas, and coalbed methane) sources.
Analysis of historical Federal and State exploration incentive programs and Federal and
private investment in unconventional natural gas research indicates that the supply curves
benefited greatly from natural gas research and the successful application of technology.
The tight gas production curve shows a large positive increase in slope in 1985 following
$165 million of combined investment in research by the DOE and GRI (Figure 23).
Studies were focused on advanced stimulation technology, the greater Green River Basin,
and the Piceance Basin. Combined with Federal and State tight gas production incentives,
and investments in exploration and production by private sector operators, these
investments in research have produced 11 Tcf of incremental natural gas to date.
The shale gas production curve shows a large positive increase in slope also in 1985
following more than $90 million of investment in research by the DOE in the prior
decade (Figure 24). Another surge in production from shale gas followed $6 million of
additional investment by GRI beginning in 1990. Studies were focused on the Antrim
shales and the Appalachian Basin shales. Combined with investments in exploration and
production by private sector operators, these investments in research have produced more
than 2 Tcf of incremental natural gas to date.
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The coalbed methane production curve shows a large positive increase in slope in the late
1980’s following $82 million of combined investment in research by the DOE and GRI in
the preceding decade (Figure 25). Combined with Federal and State production
incentives, and investments in exploration and production by private sector operators,
these investments in research have produced nearly 5 Tcf of incremental natural gas to
date, and show no evidence of slowing as coalbed methane expands its productive
horizons to Texas.
To summarize, Federal and State production incentives, combined with tight gas, shale
gas, and coalbed methane research, funded largely by the U.S. Department of Energy
(DOE: $240 million over 25 years), the Gas Research Institute (GRI: $140 million over
20 years), and the private energy sector, resulted in nearly 18 Tcf of incremental gas
production from 1970 through 2000. Investment in research had a positive economic
value.
Meeting Future U.S. Energy Demand
Production
Oil imports have exceeded U.S. domestic oil production since 1994, and the ratio of
imported to produced oil will grow in the future. However, the world is moving
progressively away from heavy carbon energy such as coal and oil to cleaner fuels such
as natural gas and hydrogen. This is good news for the environment but will place a
tremendous burden on the supply of natural gas in the United States.
To meet expected demand, the United States must replace and grow existing natural gas
reserves by nearly 50% over the next 15 years (Figure 22). Much of that growth is
forecast to come from unconventional and deepwater natural gas. Approximately 60% of
the natural gas produced in the United States historically has come from Texas and the
offshore Gulf of Mexico, and will likely remain at 60% or greater in the future (Figure
26).
As history has shown, increasing the natural gas production curve will require a
significant investment in natural gas research and application of new technology. Reserve
replacement will come from continued production of conventional and shallow-water
natural gas and be the primary responsibility of independent producers. Reserve growth
will come from unconventional and deepwater sources and will be the primary
responsibility of the major oil companies. With continued investment, shale gas, coal gas,
and tight gas will supply a part of the future U.S. natural gas demand, but it will not be
enough. Additional sources of natural gas such as deep onshore (>15,000 feet) and
methane hydrates could provide significant new reserves, but will require significant
government investment in research as well as private investment in exploration and
production.
Imports
Part of the U.S. natural gas supply will continue to be satisfied by imported natural gas
from Canada. Although Mexico currently consumes an order of magnitude less natural
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gas than the United States (<2 Tcf vs. >21 Tcf), demand for natural gas in Mexico is
forecast to increase considerably over the next decade. Several of the Gulf onshore basins
in Mexico, including Burgos, Veracruz, and Macuspana, and the underexplored Mexico
offshore have high natural gas potential. However, because demand for natural gas within
Mexico is growing dramatically, it is unlikely that Mexico will become a net exporter of
natural gas to the United States in the short or mid term. To fill the demand gap, imported
LNG must continue to rise over the next decade.
Energy Research
The United States is facing a very real energy problem. For the past century, the people
of the United States have enjoyed, and actually come to expect, very inexpensive fossil
energy. This cheap energy is the direct result of a century of technological advancements
developed by the private energy industry, with limited Federal support. Inexpensive fossil
energy has allowed the United States to become the most technologically advanced,
wealthiest nation on Earth. During this time of cheap energy, the general public has come
to believe that Federal support of energy research is a form of “corporate welfare.” This
idea is absurd.
In fact, just the opposite is true: the United States has been on “energy research welfare”
provided by the private sector for nearly a century. The major oil companies, who have
been serving up the energy research “soup,” have all but closed the soup lines. The
private energy sector has nearly eliminated the once-great private research and
development laboratories, and R&D expenditures are half of what they were a decade ago
(Figure 27). This is in part because of increased collaboration (Figure 10) and in part
because there are fewer companies than there were 10 years ago. John Rockefeller must
be smiling (Figure 28)! GRI, now called GTI, is no longer passing through funds for
natural gas E&P research, and the Department of Energy is funding limited gas research
externally and internally at the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL), but not
at levels necessary to support future reserve replacement and reserve growth needs.
The mega-merger frenzy has resulted in several market realities. There has been a
significant reduction in earth scientists and petroleum engineers over the past decade,
resulting in very “lean” technical staff within each company. Graduate students in
universities have recognized this shrinking job market and are now choosing other
disciplines. Finally, there has been an extreme divergence in “economic class” between
the super-majors and everyone else, which is unhealthy for the long-term survival of the
industry.
The American people must make a decision regarding fossil energy: Either invest in
energy research with Federal funding, including DOE and NSF, results of which would
support the independent producers in the country so that growing natural gas demand can
be meet with U.S. supply, or do not invest, and become dependent upon foreign sources
of natural gas, just as we have with oil.