The ACEGES laboratory for energy policy: Exploring the production of crude oil

Authored by Vlasios Voudouris, Dimitrios Stasinopoulos, Robert Rigby, Carlo Di Maio

Date Published: 2011-09

DOI: 10.1016/j.enpol.2011.05.014

Sponsors: No sponsors listed

Platforms: Java

Model Documentation: UML Other Narrative Mathematical description

Model Code URLs: Model code not found

Abstract

An agent-based computational laboratory for exploratory energy policy by means of controlled computational experiments is proposed. It is termed the ACEGES (agent-based computational economics of the global energy system). In particular, it is shown how agent-based modelling and simulation can be applied to understand better the challenging outlook for oil production by accounting for uncertainties in resource estimates, demand growth, production growth and peak/decline point. The approach emphasises the idea that the oil system is better modelled not as black-box abode of the invisible hand' but as a complex system whose macroscopic explananda emerges from the interactions of its constituent components. Given the estimated volumes of oil originally present before any extraction, simulations show that on average the world peak of crude oil production may happen in the broad vicinity of the time region between 2008 and 2027. Using the proposed petroleum market diversity, the market diversity weakness rapidly towards the peak year. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Tags

ACEGES Oil depletion Oil scenario generation