Denver (Platts)--13Oct2009/210 am EDT/610 GMT

One of the founding fathers of the peak oil movement, Matthew Simmons, renewed his call Monday for greater data transparency to help prove or disprove peak oil theories.

In his keynote address to the annual meeting of the US Association for the Study of Peak Oil, Simmons said the G-20 group of nations should be the tool for obtaining accurate data from producing nations. Under Simmons' plan, the G-20 would set up an auditing system to verify flows from the world's major producers.

But Simmons did not spell out details on how the G-20 would go about obtaining this data.

The G-20 group comprises the world's top two oil producers--Saudi Arabia and Russia, and the top five oil consumers--USA, China, Japan, India and South Korea.

The enforcement mechanism for those countries that refuse to comply would be a "transparency fine" of $20 to $40 per barrel for any oil imported into a member of the G-20 group. At the very least, he said, such a fine would create a "giant rainy day fund."

Such an audit "would prove or disprove the peak oil theory," according to Simmons, who has stepped down from day-to-day management of investment banking firm Simmons & Co. and now has the title of chairman emeritus.

The audit would create "an accurate data base to track likely future flows, and it would probably be pretty ugly," he said, implying that the data would support his long-held view that the world's crude oil flows peaked in 2005.

Though total petroleum liquids supplies have continued to rise, this has been supported by increased output of biofuels and LPGs. Simmons' speech touched on his standard review of declining flows around the world, with almost no forecasts even slightly optimistic.

He also said world gas output has peaked as well, later dismissing increasing optimism about shale gas supplies as "hype beyond anything I've ever seen."

US government estimates about the potential of the shale oil and gas Bakken formation in North Dakota and Montana overlook the rapid declines in output that operators are telling him they encounter with new wells, Simmons said.

Output from Mexico's Cantarell field, most recently reported at about 500,000 b/d, will be down to 400,000 b/d by the end of the year, and Mexico will probably cease exports to US Gulf Coast refiners by the end of next year, Simmons said.

He also took the occasion to rip into analysts critical of peak oil theory, specifically citing what he called a gang of four: Amy Myers Jaffe of Rice University's Baker Institute; Michael Lynch of EnergySEER; Edward Morse, formerly of Lehman Brothers but more recently with Louis Capital Markets; and Daniel Yergin, chairman of IHS CERA.

"We've used up a lot of lumber producing the papers of optimists writing how stupid peak oil is," Simmons said. "These optimists abound in simple beliefs that energy resource endowments are boundless; that advancing technology makes new energy finds easy; that massive new finds are cropping up everywhere; and that shale oil and shale gas will provide a bridge to the 22nd century."

Although Simmons is widely quoted in the media, he said the so-called optimists are "winning the media battle."

--John Kingston, john_kingston@platts.com