Turiel and the End of Oil: Why the Barrel Price Doesn't Back Him Up

Turiel and the End of Oil: The Debate and the Fall of Brent

Critics at the forum accuse Antonio Turiel of once again announcing the end of oil and, with it, capitalism; other users maintain that Turiel never said crude would run out, but rather that he speaks of the most profitable oil to extract. In the same thread, a user claims that Brent has plummeted by 10% in the last week. And the barrel, which a few months ago was bought at 50 dollars — with oversupply, not scarcity, according to another intervention — is not rebounding due to geological depletion, but because, trinc the narrative of some messages, the Strait of Hormuz would be closed and Saudi Arabia would have cut supply to European refineries. These are claims gathered from the thread and not independently verified.

That is the crux of the matter. The thesis of the end of cheap oil has been circulating for decades; the latest price crisis is attributed to specific causes. According to a message reproduced in the thread, the drone attack on the East-West pipeline operated by Aramco — with a capacity to move 7 million barrels per day — would have taken the infrastructure out of play for three to five weeks.

What is Peak Oil and Why It Doesn't Miccionan Oil is Running Out

It is important to separate two things that are deliberately mixed. Peak oil does not describe the end of crude down to the last drop, but the point at which production stops growing. From there, a plateau, stagnation, and, if demand does not fall, recession. The serious discussion is not whether there is oil left — there is more available now than ever, according to one of the stances in the controversy — but at what price and with what energy cost each barrel is extracted.

Geology does not help clean forecasts. According to a user's details, Libya could export 3 million barrels per day of high-quality crude and is far below that. Iraq and Iran together have a capacity for 14 million and produce little more than half. Russia is also below expectations, although there the brake is sanctions, not the subsoil, according to this intervention. Wars, embargoes, and bottlenecks explain more volatility than any production curve.

The End of Capitalism: A Forecast That Never Expires

This is where the matter breaks down. That oil is scarce does not imply that the economic system that burns it will fall with it. As a user summarizes, capitalism was born long before anyone thought of turning a dinosaur into Tupperware, and it has already survived several energy crises. The most repeated objection to Turiel does not dispute the data, it disputes the track record: decades of announcing the end of the world and a list of failed predictions that his critics know by heart.

The other uncomfortable objection is the usual one. If the problem were depletion, why was there a surplus of crude a few months ago? Why did the barrel drop to 50 dollars? Attributing to geological scarcity what, according to these messages, is explained by a closed strait and a war is a convenient way to never be wrong.

Why Doesn't the Electricity Bill Go Down If Renewables Are Growing?

The second front is electricity. The percentage of fossil fuels in the electricity system is decreasing — the graph provided goes up to 2024, with the trend continuing in 2025, according to its author — but the bill is not changing. The technical explanation is less epic than it seems: gas sets the price in most hours due to the marginalist design, as argued in the thread. When gas prices soar due to a war, the bill rises even if renewables produce in abundance. The proposed solution is not ideological: expel gas from the mix and add storage to stabilize the grid.

The disagreement is whether this is being done or is being faked. Some argue that private investment will solve it once market rules are in place. And others respond with the perennial question: if it works, why isn't it noticed in the pocket?

The Spanish Electricity Grid: The Plan That Never Arrives

Beneath the noise, a data point little discussed according to a user: in Spain, grid investment does not even replace capital. With the current model, it would be necessary to multiply by three or four the money allocated to infrastructure, and that means enormous tolls that no one wants to sign, according to this intervention. For twenty years, generation levels and underinvestment have remained the same, and God will provide.

The result is a paradoxical situation that is disconcerting. A user claims that Spanish electricity production is in surplus by an order of 3 or 4 times the real consumption. If that were true, building accumulators would make no economic sense.

With Brent falling 10%, according to the cited message, and crude at 50 dollars just a few months ago, the end of capitalism will have to wait, in this reading, until Hormuz reopens. Unless, as another party argues, real depletion is not measured in price, but in the slowness with which the grid adapts. That stopwatch does seem to be stopped.