Running On Empty Again

The world is running out of oil. We have been for 100 years. In 1914, there was only enough supply left for 10 more years, according to the US Bureau of Mines. In 1939, we only had 13 years to go. In 1951, we still only had 13 more years of reserves. In the 1970s, it became obvious to everyone that the world was running out of fossil fuels during the oil crisis. It was predicted that, if consumption didn

The known oil reserves that are reported are not all of the oil known to exist. The reported reserves are only those that are both currently accessible and economically feasible to extract and process with the current technology. At the end of 1980, known reserves of crude oil were approximately 660 billion barrels. At the beginning of 2004, according to the Oil And Gas Journal, there were 1.27 trillion barrels of known reserves of oil. That is 53 billion barrels of oil more than that of 2003, only one year before. According to the US Energy Information Administration, known oil reserves in 2025 may be twice as much as estimated today. Their 2002 report indicates that there are possibly thousands of years of crude oil and crude oil substitutes remaining.

The peak oil theory implies that we have used up all of the easy sources of fuel. As time goes on, ever more energy will be expended to recover the reserves and the cost of fuel will skyrocket, crippling society and bringing progress to a grinding halt. It sounds plausible, and many people embrace it.

Jamestown Post-Journal (New York)