Cleantech stocks vs. Oil stocks – peak oil

Cleantech investing isn’t about finding the next big field or formation. It doesn’t rely on finding the next property with enough oil to satiate global demand for — let’s face it — a few months or, best case scenario, a year or two.

In a world that consumes 60,000 barrels of oil per minute, large finds these days are the equivalent of adding a few drops of ketchup to the bottle that’s been upside down in the fridge for weeks.
At that rate, the 10.5 billion barrels of estimated recoverable oil in ANWR would last a whopping 121 days. And remember, that’s expensive oil — not the cheap stuff that squirts out of the ground. The latter hardly exists anymore.

Any bet on oil is really a referendum on when demand will once again outpace supply. It’s a good bet, don’t get me wrong. . . but it’s only a good bet because oil is scarce. Betting that oil will rise is betting that there’s not enough, because the price wouldn’t go up if there were.

So make your money while you can.

Just know that the very reason the price of oil will rise is the declining economic availability of a finite resource. A day will come when there’s nothing left to wager on.

That being said, investing in cleantech isn’t reliant upon a fading resource. That’s the whole beauty of it — the resources it needs are naturally available, abundant, and renewable. What cleantech investors are betting on is improvements in the technology used to harness that energy.

When great improvements are made, it’s like finding the next Cantarell in the oil business.

Cherry Creek News