Simple life is solution to a world less crude

The poor can offer


But there is growing consensus among geologists, energy analysts and even governments that the cheap, easily accessible oil on which our modern economy depends has reached maximum production and is about to go into permanent decline. Just as everyone in China and India gets the chance to own a car.

Inevitably, there are those who disagree. The oil industry, for example, insists it can still squeeze a lot more crude out of ageing fields with new technology, and that it