Global oil production: Has it peaked?

– Since Henry Ford rolled out the first Model T almost a century ago, the world has been riding a hydrocarbon bubble that transformed America’s landscapes and lifestyles.

But some oil experts and economists warn global oil production is peaking. Oil production isn’t going to drop off a cliff, they say, but the future is one in which annual supplies will for the first time begin gradually diminishing, precipitating even higher prices and perhaps shortages.

It’s a vision where $70-a-barrel oil – which translates to about 11-cents a cup – could be considered a bargain.

Myron Ebell, director of energy policy at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which is funded in part by ExxonMobil and other energy companies, said there have been past estimates of oil drying up, including one by the Interior Department in the 1930s saying oil would be depleted in the United States by 1940.

“These predictions have a long history of being proven wrong,” he said.

Knox Studio