Deffeyes, Kenneth S. 1931–

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Deffeyes, Kenneth S. 1931–

PERSONAL: Surname is pronounced "dee-phase"; born 1931, in OK; son of J.A. (an oil engineer) and Hazel Deffeyes. Education: Colorado School of Mines, B.S., 1952; Princeton University, M.S, Ph.D., 1958.

ADDRESSES: Office—Princeton University, B58A2 Guyot Hall, Princeton, NJ 08540. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: Writer, petroleum geologist, educator, and consultant. Shell Oil, research geologist, 1952–53, 1958–62; Minnesota Fish and Game Commission, geologist, 1962–64; Oregon State University, oceanography department, instructor, 1964–67; Princeton University, geology professor, 1967–98; professor emeritus, 1998–. Military service: Served in U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Presidio, San Francisco, CA, 1952–53.

AWARDS, HONORS: Coolbaugh Award, Colorado School of Mines, for undergraduate work in chemistry.

WRITINGS:

(With Sheldon Judson and Robert B. Hargraves) Physical Geology, Prentice-Hall (Englewood Cliffs, NJ), 1976.

Hubbert's Peak: The Impending World Oil Shortage, Princeton University Press (Princeton, NJ), 2001.

Beyond Oil: The View from Hubbert's Peak, Hill and Wang (New York, NY), 2005.

Contributor of numerous articles to professional journals.

SIDELIGHTS: A professor emeritus at Princeton University, Kenneth S. Deffeyes is the author of two books on declining petroleum reserves worldwide. A geologist and petroleum engineer with Shell Oil before he became a professor at Princeton University in 1967, Deffeyes worked with M. King Hubbert, who forecasted that the United States would reach the peak of its oil production by the 1970s. Deffeyes was enough of a believer in the forecast that he left his lucrative position at Shell to take up teaching, believing oil reserves were on the decline. Deffeyes honors Hubbert with both his books. His 2001 title, Hubbert's Peak: The Impending World Oil Shortage, expands on Hubbert's theory that the quantity left in the United States' oil reserves, when calculated, forms a bell curve, which points to contracting oil reserves domestically. After Hubbert's death, it occurred to Deffeyes to apply this same sort of analysis to world oil supplies. Through equations used in Hubbert's original theory, Deffeyes was able to predict oil production would peak somewhere between 2004 and 2008, thereafter declining. In Hubbert's Peak Deffeyes applies a numbers-crunching model founded on the basis that a full ninety percent of oil-exploration drilling is unsuccessful, even when employing the most modern and sophisticated of methods. With a world dependent on oil, such a finding is understandably contentious, and some scientists hotly dispute Deffeyes's theories. Some sources, including the U.S. Geological Survey, put the level of oil extant in the world at a trillion times higher than Deffeyes. Ronald R. Charpentier, writing for Science, stated that "Deffeyes's projection of an imminent drop in world oil production is based, however, on a questionable methodology." Specifically, Charpentier noted that Deffeyes does not mention miscalculations Hubbert made in the depletion of natural gas, and also that Hubbert's methodology should not be expanded beyond the situation in the United States. In his review of the book for American Scientist, Brian J. Skinner wrote that the author relates Hubbert's analysis with "engaging wit, humor and great insight." Addressing the controversy over the viability of Deffeyes's findings, Skinner concluded that "it's better to know what lies ahead than to be surprised too late to respond."

A contributor for Business Week, noting the author's credentials as a former Shell Oil researcher, commented, "Deffeyes is no tree-hugger." The same reviewer concluded that "The time to act is now, before the next wave of gas lines and rationing is upon us." Similarly, a critic for Natural History found Hubbert's Peak "sobering," and J.R. McNeill, writing for the Wilson Quarterly, concluded: "There are few things as important nowadays as the energy system, and few books on the subject as thought provoking as this one."

Deffeyes revisites his theories of declining oil production with his 2005 book, Beyond Oil: The View from Hubbert's Peak. In this book he reprises earlier arguments and expounds upon certain theories, delving into short-term solutions, the pros and cons of nuclear energy, gas and coal production, and the mining of oil shale. In his review of the book for Booklist, Gilbert Taylor found that Deffeyes gives the topic a "practical yet genial treatment," and a critic for Kirkus Reviews thought that Deffeyes presents a "timely, compelling argument."