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Jim Yanik

(Roughneck) wrote in
:

"HeyBub" wrote:

And we're NOT running out of oil (we may be getting low on CHEAP oil).
World-wide proven reserves are greater than they've ever been. If all
the environmentalists would just go somewhere and die, we'd have cheap
oil for the next twenty generations.

Demand for oil is also greater than it's ever been, and increasing at
an exponential rate (the current recession not withstanding.) And,
it's been many a year since we discovered as much new oil as we pumped
out.

The coming production peak means we will have used about half the
recoverable oil in the ground. It's taken us about 100 years to get to
this point, and for a lot of that time, demand was much less than it
is today. So, going forward, you can bet it'll take a lot less than
100 years to use the rest. Twenty generations? I don't think so.

You're correct, though, that for the immediate future, we'll be
running low on cheap oil. After the peak, we'll no longer be able to
pump enough oil to meet demand and, thus, oil production will become
supply limited instead of demand limited as it is now.

Since oil prices tend to be inelastic (i.e., price changes don't have
a lot of impact on demand,) prices are likely to rise. How much
depends on how successful conservation efforts are.

We have not yet discovered all the world's accessible oil deposits.
(nor began drilling or producing from what we have discovered.)
So any claim of "peak oil" can be made is just a psychic prediction,and
worth about as much.

--
Jim Yanik
jyanik
at
kua.net