Readers Respond on "Squeezing More Oil from the Ground"

Letters to the editor from the October 2009 issue of Scientific American: End or No End?

In

Given the central place of oil-based energy in the modern world, it is critically important that governments should base their policies on realistic depletion profiles, despite ambiguous definitions and lax reporting practices. Decline typically commences at about midpoint of depletion, as already exemplified in more than 50 countries. World discovery peaked in the 1960s and must deliver a corresponding peak of production. A debate rages as to the precise date of peak but misses the point when what matters is the vision of the long decline on the other side of it.

Colin Campbell
Founder, Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas
Jean Laherr