Peak Oil: How Soon? How Serious?

[@valupak]

Excellent! I wish everybody would watch this, Jeffery Brown's part, especially.

[@kw0s]

We will never run out of oil. Never, never, never. Today it is around $90 per barrel. In the future it will be $90 per drop. It will never run out. But it will price many people out.

[@KrunchyJD]

I went to a ZERO emmissions meeting last year, in which the speaker was talking about Zero emmisions renewable energy ideas to power our electricity. While, it was interesting and useful, and I agreed with a lot of what was said, when questions were allowed to be asked I said "while that's all fine, and excluding those who had to come a long way and the frail, how come there is only 2 bicycles out the front and one of them is mine". Needless to say I wasnt real popular, but the point is valid!

[@DK-gl3ih]

Preach!!!

[@KennedyLawOfficesScranton]

Above video released in 2008! And we have STILL not seen PEAK OIL. dopes

[@vig6321]

Shale only gave us a temporary reprieve. You're like a bacteria colony which colonizes an entire bottle, runs out of space, finds another empty bottle, and believes it has nothing to worry about anymore.

[@AgentSmith911]

The theory still stands, it will peak, we just don't know when. Right now, it looks like some time between 2030 and 2045. When Saudi Arabia, Russia, Brazil, US tight oil, Canadian oil sands and other unconventional fields peak, the world will peak. But peak demand might come before peak production.

[@jrstsb1353]

Cantarell, North Sea, Prudoe Bay and many many other conventional fields have dramatic peaked and declined since this time. One by one the dominos fall. Unconventional oil is a temporary reprieve, the smart countries are preparing, the not so smart are rolling with business as usual. The consequences of the latter will be extremely painful or even horrendous.

[@walter0bz]

55:59, he hits the nail on the head

[@daveed3791]

@ImoenOfTelengard Just curious - where do you get your figures on world reserves of oil from?

[@AyushkaPartohap]

@energyquicksand i dont think we will come as far as oil depletion. It's just that at some stage we wont have access to cheap energy that is oil anymore and therefore forced to face drastic changes to our current way of life.

[@walter0bz]

i believe that resources are running out, and indeed people are taking steps to ensure they come out on top.

[@vpaczkowski]

There used to be a lot of Oil under Texas and it is pretty much gone. Wells dry up and there is only so many Oil fields and the amount of Oil is very limited.

[@robbenvanpersie1562]

Oil is not fossil fuel

[@walter0bz]

overshoot,thats english. it describe what we are doing perrfectly. it describes bubbles aswell. "overshoot/crash". the process of growing, then overshooting, resulting in a painful crash

[@walter0bz]

@soylentgreenb - are you saying the falloff after peak is very rapid, i.e. longtail means averaging 10% production over 10 time units instead of averaging 50% production for 2 time units

[@SonnyCorl]

I did not understand the conclution. When could we see the peek on the world market?

[@kimweaver3323]

Peak WORLD oil production was reached in late 2005. US oil production increases are very short lived, as cracked wells put out a lot of product for the first year or two, then the rate drops rapidly. So, the output increase is based on drilling a LOT of wells. The new wells are out of the sweet spots and so are less productive overall. This is not financially sustainable. Peak oil is NOT about running out of oil entirely, but reaching a point where production can not be increased economically. Unconventional oil plays (deep wells, offshore wells, fracked wells, all require that oil prices over a hundred dollars to be sustainable and we know that oil prices over a hundred dollars kill economic activity and growth.

[@kimweaver3323]

If you use oil production per capita, we have already passed it. If you mean total production, then it's about three years out.

[@albertosoto4280]

Sometime around some century

[@sardar_gurjot]

2018

[@clubadv]

Guys, nothing to worry about. Again, when the price is right ($100 per barrel or so) we have new solar technology that is as cheap as coal (about $1 per watt). With the creation of better batteries, and quality electric substitutes for every gas powered device. The fix can happen almost overnight as the price skyrockets. there will be a little pain, but not that much.

[@energyquicksand]

I confess that I am unaware of the process that you outline. I will do some research> However, having said that I doubt that the process you point to is most probably too slow to provide the copious amounts of oil that we presently consume. My point is that regardless of how much oil (from whatever source) is still available to be brought to market, at some point it will become totally depleted and we (humanity) will be forced to develop alternatives (or is my logic flawed?)...thanks Ed

[@KrunchyJD]

True environmentalists would suggest we re- modell our cities to include more close proximity, and ease our reliance on cheap oil. True "greenies" as you put it suggest we stop driving SUV's, and start making more of our trips by bicycle, and develop the infrastructure to support this (eg Copenhagen). Affodable city housing and higher taxes on petrol (Gas), I have no problem with. More people riding bicycles and less cars great, bring it on!

[@walter0bz]

they came up with theories about how oil was created to assist in figuring out where to look for it. the difference between solar energy and oil/anything ele we dig up is: we can't "over-spend" the sun and make it burn out quicker. the oil however, we burn as fast as we like, allowing exponential growth, like bacteria in a petri dish. just look at the process

[@albertosoto4280]

My models explain that peak oil will be sometime in somewhere in the future. My models are Cindy and Sandy.

[@AllBobsAllTheTime]

"Peak oil" is somewhat similar to estimates of a river cresting in that it's a moving target.

[@TheNorweiganHippie]

@djlazlow1 I have....hmmm......used the hemp plant for other purposes so far. I know I always heard it made good rope too!

[@walter0bz]

>>"and finally the debt bubble is not related to the oil supply it is related to the printing press" -- its when the oil or other technological progress doesn't keep up with the printing press. (which it *did* pretty much for the past 200 years, but now is the global turning point).

[@walter0bz]

ok resources. a bettter answer than i as expecting. (i've encountered deniers who are convinced wealth is possible without resources and who wont admitt mondy is merey the ability to consume someone elses resources/labour). well in the modern world i dont think logging is not enough to make you rich,just comfortable. the bulk of the wealth comes from oil. it was the increasing shortfall in oil that america bridged with increasing debt since 1970s. of course local variations in big country

[@KrunchyJD]

I do think it is important for real environmentalists to put their money/ actions where their mouth is, so to speak. I advocate that we adopt a society where we reduce our dependence on cars, and as such I ride my bicycle where possible. I agree totally with your suggestion that we should act ourselves on our contentions. Al Gore should indeed ride a bike more. It would have been good to see world leaders ride around Copenhagen on bicycles, it is one of the best cycling cities in the world!

[@kakmolnia]

@velcroglove well in that case...were have all the good assasins gone?

[@MrGnarus]

@itisaduck the fact that we are in iraq means that we must need to be. second the fact that we are exploring even more must mean that people in the know are worried about depletion. canada's oil is in shale which is harder to extracted the oil and will only get harder to retrieve

[@walter0bz]

@persevere67 - it was our ancestors fault for becoming dependant on a distant resource and using it to multiply beyond the capacity of more local, personally controllable resources. Even if oil wasn't finite, the hazard of excessive dependance should have put you off.

[@metamaggot]

@metamaggot in the uk it's probably about 3 dollars a liter

[@monsterhigh1975]

nope... i was referring to your ID

[@dubbleoj]

What will be even funner is when the videos start coming back out in a year do to the extreme shortages due to lack of investment--which many say will happen regardless of the peak. The oil industry will also allegedly face an employment shortage in the next decade. Hope you're ready to watch a lot of these.

[@albertosoto4280]

It is funnier to realize the bullshit it is

[@DK-gl3ih]

@@albertosoto4280 huh?

[@walter0bz]

understanding that it was going to peak and run out many decades ago people could have avoided becoming even more car dependant, and avoided further population growth.Many think oil peaked already. oil wont run out, it will just get more scarce and increasing numbers of people that relied on it will no longer have access. that shows up as a financial crisis...

[@walter0bz]

money is a symbol for energy, when its working right. so if the energy isn't there the money loses value. even gold and silver are still just tokens (although they also have industrial use). Did you get the point about the "petrodollar". the link between energy and money. ultimately "stuff" is the application of energy. Same story here really. UK oil peaked 1999. since then we had the worlds biggest housing/mortgage bubble, suprise surprise...

[@walter0bz]

so we could have LESS resources than in the 18th century, but divided between more (7billlion instead of 100's of millions) its going to be hell. Back to "unsecured loans crisis". in the UK it clearly believed, "we can't make more houses, so houses are best investment". of course in the past you could always build vertically, and increase transport..(railways,cars) no shortage of physical space,even here. What we need is ENERGY. heating for winter. food & food storage. purifying water etc

[@soylentgreenb]

@Grichal1981 "The fact that oil fields deplete on a bell curve profile?" They don't. They never have. Individual reservoirs have a fairly sharp peak and a long tail. The usual claim made is that when you sum all the individual wells you get a bell curve because of the central limit theorem. This is also wrong; oil production drastically deviated from a bell curve starting 40 years ago.

[@OldJackWolf]

This is important but I don't think anyone is listening. People don't seem to be changing their ways.

[@KrunchyJD]

Agree totally, I would not advocate a society where people were hypocrites. Vehicle use should be based on NEED, (not percieved convenience). In some countries you have business people in suits travelling to meet an important client on a bicycle. The only problem here, I guess, is that while the above is preffered the other solution involves impossing a tax on petrol (Gasoline), which may see those with more money more likely to afford it. That's capitalism for you!

[@walter0bz]

peak oil is common sense. there's only so much in the ground to dig up... its really easy to understand if you dont have rocks in your head

[@mr.d.8008]

Unless new oil is being created by a process that they don't want you to know. The only thing you can count on: "They" are lying.

[@montesutts]

I think your missing the fact that oil is present in everything from pain killers, plastics and of course gasoline. Its not just the oil that lubricates your engine..... Its the product that our society pretty much relies on to function

[@robbenvanpersie1562]

Peak oil Is a scam to control prices

[@mycatisromeo]

I live in Des Moines, Iowa. A mega-millionaire car conglomerate is opening the first dealership in America that sells cheap, chinese made cars under $10,000 that get 50 mpg - they guarantee credit approval to anyone with a job. It will be the Walmart of cars. Pretty soon, everybody will be forced to buy one due to their financial position. Globalization - helping spread poverty everywhere while making the rich richer.

[@TheNorweiganHippie]

The economy today means energy. All other forms of commerce is the direct result of cheap and abundant energy. People will not be told when peak oil has arrived, it will just happen to them. We may be forced back to a sub-billion population if we don't get the fossil fuel substitute sorted out soon, and that will be one of mankind's most important undertakings to date. Strange times we may see. The whole planet is connected to this.

[@jeremymenning56]

48:20 Russia net exports zeroing out in 2024.

[@walter0bz]

the paper tracks resources. empires have a phase of growth and overshoot. the growth was invading & assimilating new resources. in the current case, the growth was from digging resources out of the ground. same thing will happen, when the growth is no longer possible the system built to track the growth collapses

[@DK-gl3ih]

Facts

[@tuttt99]

I'm working on nuclear energy. In Texas we are adding two new units to the South Texas Project Electric Generating Station (STPEGS) As more people start to drive hybrids, the demand for electricity will skyrocket, and windmills won't be able to keep up. STPEGS will double its capacity with the two new units, and Exelon Nuclear has plans to begin a new Power Plant in Victoria (temporarily on hold due to recession) We can't maintain our current population and standard of living without nuclear.

[@DK-gl3ih]

Where are you at now?

[@FszystkoHuj]

4$ gasoline is outrageous - in Poland we have it for 6,8 $/gallon and we earn much less than in the USA. It would be real paradise if gasoline would be so cheap like in the USA…

[@DK-gl3ih]

What about now?

[@gukonni]

There're 30 to 40 years of conventional oil left in this world. Unconventional oil will sell in a high oil price environment, but so will alternatives. And alternatives won't come along with GhG emissions and the same excessive amounts of pollution (whihc have traditionally been ignored when making a price estimate).

[@urungu21]

@walter0bz i have read about a guy that predicted that world's population will die out from 900milion to 300 million, that was before the industrial revolution happened :) thanks to industry we were able to expand so drastically and feed such a huge increase in population

[@SteffiReitsch]

This is out of date. The U.S. shale oil boom over the last few years since this presentation has skewed their data. Peak Oil has been delayed by a few years, however unconventional tight oil production will be more expensive.

[@kevinwayte]

@clubadv You have to think of the world just before oil. Where we were. Then add electricity. But we're still back to farming with mules & horses, human labour, wooden structures, fire & hand-forged metals, zero rubber, zero plastic, and a world population that cannot be sustained on traditional farming. It cannot be fed. We'll be dead, but within 60-100 years, these are the realities when crude is gone.

[@kevinwayte]

@clubadv It's not that simple. Electricity didn't cause the population to go from 1 billion people to 7 billion people. The oil age did. People have to stop thinking about gasoline, cars, and lawnmowers as the problem to solve. All plastic is from oil. 8 gallons oil in every tire. Mass crop production is solely based on oil (fertilizer, herbicides, pesticides, seeders, harverters, etc).

[@pohjalo]

We should convert that heat back to energy...

[@walter0bz]

lol. how long did it take nature to create the oil how quickly are we returning this material to the atmosphere how quickly are we using it. Its a simple process to understand , the difference between renewable and non-renewable.. sustainable and non-sustainable. the parts of nature that last establish cycles. we aren't doing that at the minute. looks good for a couple of centuries but whats around the corner?

[@floriangoldschmied9231]

2021

[@walter0bz]

This is how serious it is: without fossil fuel exploitation, and before the industrial revolution , the earth supported 500million people.. i think 800 million at the time of the revolution, but we were already using coal.(steam engine was invented to drain coal mines). Its possible we have new knowlledge & efficiencies - so I use the optimistic figure that earth can support 2billion people without fossil fuels. But you have to accept the possibility of environmental damage aswell..

[@walter0bz]

"Nothing in nature is or ever has been "sustainable." " agriculture depends on sustainability (taking the chemicals out of the equation - if you drain nutrients faster than they replanish, you get a dust bowl. everything is about sustainability. yes things evolve, but there are cycles they need to exploit to survive.

[@walter0bz]

Inflation doesn't just feel nice,I've read its necessary while the population & economy is growing. if prices are falling,people hold back and stop buying things, and a market ceases to function. fiat works fine when you're gambling on new resoures. Ok I dont know all the factors leading to zimbabwes hyperinflation, but ours is not the same. germanys was an externally imposed resource shortage (reparations) and the government trying to hide the population from it by printing, i think?

[@walter0bz]

poulation in 1900 was 1.5billion 7billion today. oil +coal allowed 5+billion extra people to live exponential growth the growth goes into overshoot that shows up as a financial crisis. politicians spend to give people what they want. more people need more things to live. people want cars etc. cars rely on fuel fuel runs out, no more cars. shows up as bankruptcy somewhere along the way.

[@walter0bz]

" countries have always printed money" the money printing is a symptiom of resource overshoot. Populations in the past have had stronger upward pressure, balanced by greater misery... infant mortality, famine, more regular wars between great powers. Bankruptcy is a symptom along the way - insufficient resouces for population growth, but each woman producing 3.5 babies on average... 1.5 out of every 3.5 garanteed a miserrable end unless resources were also increasing that fast.

[@antred11]

7.4 billion barrels of oil, if it can all be extracted, is enough to meet global demand for about 3 months.

[@walter0bz]

many wars are about religion. that doesn't mean all wars are about religon, or that all religions cause war. many hyperinflations have happened, we have one coming. its not for the same reasons as all the past ones. YES THE SAME SYMPTOM IS MONEY PRINTING.. but it can have many underlying causes. local resource overshoots are common in history, and many empires have come and gone as they overshoot.

[@walter0bz]

@29Gixxer - frustrates me when people can't see it. but it should be obvious with fairly basic education. our complexity (our bodies & our civilization) is a function of the energy we can harness. and the end result of any organism is turning fuel(food) into entropy. People make the mistake of attributing the progress purely to 'human ingenuity' omitting the contribution of millions of years of dead plants... many of natures machines are far more sophisticated and efficient than ours

[@walter0bz]

as the life evolved, it changed the atmospheric gases - the life evolved again, and some species were marginalized. Originallyoxygen wasn't abundant (like on other dead planets) - thefirst life was anaerobic. then when photosynthesiers evolved, the anaerobic life was marginalized, it had to go underground. we've evolved for the climate & atmosphere in its current state, if we change it, we suffer the same fate.

[@metamaggot]

4 dollars a gallon of petrol! wow that's cheap...and they're complaining! in france it's about 2.30 dollars a liter!

[@chuckbyf1]

@kakmolnia We'll see about that later, won't we?

[@josejongful]

Why arent there more ITERS. why arent there more research funding into other viable alternatives? exclude photovoltaics and wind which produce unstable and minuscule sources of energy. We have all hedged our bets on this chip and i think that things are going to end up badly.

[@MrSirGareth]

If it depends on something that nature never has or never will provide then its doomed in the long term, The dust bowl was not created by agriculture. It was created by a 10 year drought. Equally the Sahara was not caused by poor environmental policies, it was created by too little rain. "Don't worry, be happy"

[@Grichal1981]

@Belgravia88 Really! So which part of 'Peak Oil theory' are you disputing exactly? The fact that oil is a finite resource? The fact that world oil discoveries peaked more than 45 years ago, and oil cannot be produced unless it is discovered first? The fact that oil fields deplete on a bell curve profile? Only oil prices aren't falling now are they!

[@tetekofa]

@Jacobrester, LMFAO, why liquify? not feasible, takes to much energy. Now, a Steam Powered Car, now thats something to write Grandma about, throw a few chunks of coal in the ole' boiler, and off you go mate... it's for real, and being developed as we post. - motorcycles too!!!

[@PeterSodhi]

There are 2 trillion barrels of oil in the ground, since 1900 we have used 1 trillion. we use 88m a day we have 40 years left. In the next 5 years Oil will rise to $300 a barrel. There is the primer... any questions?

[@walter0bz]

yes but why were people driven to subprime in the first place. this was a global crisis too, not just US. why? Of course there are always reckless people, but why did everyone en masse suddenly go mad? I think, because resource peak was imminent, that was enough to drive people to pursue ponzi schemes/hoarding instead of constructive endevour.

[@walter0bz]

it doesnt have to run out to cause chaos- the supply just has to start shrinking. just because elites back the green movement, doesnt make it invalid. of course people are trying to figure out how to come out on top and ride any wave. you know that elites compete with eachother? If you beleive peak oil,you lose faith in all the existing systems. (government, banks). some "elites" want things to stay just as they are. if there really was "lots left", the debt bubble could just keep growing

[@proud_dark_skinn7288]

2020?

[@paulzibert9985]

Yeas. Peak oil is here.

[@MrSirGareth]

Why is the basic food of virtually all life on earth somehow dangerous. Are you worried there will be too much phytoplankton in the seas, hence too many fishes swimming around to eat them? Should there be a one fish policy per mom and pop tuna? Do environmentalists worry that too much life might encroach upon, and perhaps destroy all the dead areas of earth with plants, trees and billions of critters?

[@walter0bz]

if the number of people increases, the amount of money also has to increase otherwise people see deflation, the new people have no purchasing power .. something like that. fiat was invented for a reason

[@featherjackMaine]

@HBOMB99 "wring it from the air" -- I'd like to see that. Not gonna happen though.

[@walter0bz]

>>"the elites don't try things , they make things happen " i bet you think advertizing "programs" people. The reality is a subtle difference. The media "elite" dont *tell* people how to think. they *correctly predict* how people think. (hence resonating with the crowd). he who tells the crowd what they want to hear is empowered by the crowd. we have serious problems (REAL) , but elites try to be seen to have the solution, or maybe provide a scapegoat for problems people dont want to accept

[@walter0bz]

yes peak oil will cause hyperinflation.

[@walter0bz]

>>"there was kind of a glut . " oil price wil be volatile on the way down. production WILL decline, thats geological, thermodynamic reality. all the BS people tell eachother is minor details. So consumption can go down due to [1] price rises [2] stop issuing people money to bid for it in the first place (UNEMPLOYMENT), and state rationing (CARBON TAXES). Oil will cease to be traded by the free market. it will be controlled by specific strategic arrangements between states.

[@walter0bz]

not every case is the same but where does a ruler get his power? he needs at least the support of the military. i dont know the history of zimbabwe well enough. but I know german hyperinflation was a symptom of reparations i.e resources taken by the victors of WW1. money counts resources, if resources ample money works, if resources are shrinking money collapses.

[@neehahsq]

@rdsanchez1966 ‎"Problems cannot be solved at the same level of awareness that created them."-Albert Einstein

[@walter0bz]

You're in the philipines on holiday? any particular reason you dont want to just move there permanently. what are the employment prospects. I gather many people work somewhere expensive then retire somewhere cheap. the cost of living is skewed by many factors. same thing within a country. cheap to live in the middle of nowhere, expensive to live in london.

[@samreznek]

Word is out: zombie apocalypse on the way.

[@walter0bz]

this unsecured loans crisis was not limited to the USA. people the world over reached a consensus (perhaps subconciously) that real progress is no longer possible so its time to hoard and/or gamble. unsecured loan? If the resource is running out, maybe its actually really smart to consume the other guy resource and leave him with a paper IOU. of course that IOU will eventually be settled with warfare but the US doesn't mind that because it has the biggest guns. that seems to be the plan ???

[@walter0bz]

- at this population level we need oil to survive. the solution is a 1child policy until the worlds poopulation is back to sustainable levels, i.e able to survive based on recylcling and solar energy alone. thesafe use of finite resources is zero. we made a mistake becoming dependant on it and using it to increase population. the issue is human suffering \9those born to suffer depletion0 and minimizing it.

[@walter0bz]

but why are countries printing money in the first place. it worked fine when resources were increasing, with all the progress since the industrial revolution. more resources & more paper to track it.

[@walter0bz]

>>"alberta is one of the richest places anywhere" define "rich", without using the words "money","wealth","prosperous" etc. what does this physically mean, in tangible terms.. what makes alberta different from somewhere you think of as 'poor'.

[@MrSirGareth]

Lets try this one. Rich Alberta is a nicer place to live than Poor Somalia

[@strasheep]

thats so weird.. i was having dinner with spiderman lastnight and he said that exact same thing!

[@MrSirGareth]

If we add 29,000 parts per million of NaCl to H2O we approximate the salinity of seawater and change the boiling point of water by .5 C and the freezing point by 1.8 C (very little physical changes for big scoops of salt. When we are talking about man made carbon dioxide in the atmosphere the amount is laughably minute. There is not enough carbon in all of the known deposits of hydrocarbons on earth to make the the air toxic to humans if it all were released to the atmoshpere.

[@walter0bz]

>>"Ans: There is no evidence that it came from the atmosphere." .. if you think it *didn't* come from the atmosphere, its even MORE likely its a dangerous pollutant to put there

[@ManicEightBall]

@Meowbay "It's really sad that Gautier, the first speaker, sounds and presents so horrible. " I think you meant to say "horribly" rather than "horrible". You've never been to a scientific conference before, have you? They always have people with thick accents, and the audio is usually iffy. Scientific discovery is NOT about audio engineering. You would probably have a hard time getting your thoughts together, too with all that stuff to learn, and speech to memorize, etc. Don't be a jerk.

[@walter0bz]

" old fields are now producing more than they ever did in their hayday ." well that is just plain bullshit because many fields do infact show decline.

[@walter0bz]

"yes money is a symbol for energy but that would be human energy . not oil " but most of the work in this world is done by machines. machines multiply human effort. mass production... you want more food, you need a bigger tractor, not more farmers. (as the fossil fuels deplete, we'll tend backtoward manual labour and the amounts of food availble in the C18th... the majority of humanity will starve or die in resource wars)

[@walter0bz]

you want more resources than are available. along comes Mr Banker or politician with a home loan. "look, you can get free money by borrowing to buy a house, it will go up". Well of course its nonsense that wrecked the economy. but it doesn't change the underlying cause. people wanted more than was available. For reference peak oil *per capita* already occured in 1979. since then population has grown faster than oil supply. Yet the population was used to increasing resources for 200 before then..

[@walter0bz]

"now they have the resources..." no, globally resources have peaked and are shrinking ; already world population was rising faster than resources (peak energy per capita, 1979). they're still printing because they're in the same boat as the rest of us. trying to sustain an advanced economy whilst resources are shrinking. TPTB print, because people dont want to be told "RESOURCES ARE SHRINKING, YOUR CHILDREN HAVE NO FUTURE"

[@walter0bz]

And WW2 was all about germany and japan trying to get oil, whcih they wanted/needed for economic growth. you can't grow an industrial economy wih depleting resource. Up until 1970's, america's oil production was increasing, then it peaked just like hubbert said it would, and since then america's govt has 'taxed' the worlds oil via the "Petrodollar"... the ability to print inflatingIOU's (aka $) in exchange for foreign oil. the Iraq war was because saddam wanted to sell oil in Euros.

[@walter0bz]

want is everything to do with resources. deficit is when wannts exceed resources, its that simple. USA oil peaked in 1970s. politicians answer was to print IOUs (dollars) in exchange for foreign oil to continue the growth americans were used to.... it is that simple. americans had only ever known progress, they expect it, and dont want to hear about resource limits.. you're doing it now :)

[@nellre]

the deniers have no idea how fast the world consumes oil They think 175 billion barrels is a lot. I'd last a couple of years if it was the exclusive source. The EIA admits that peak oil occurred in 2006

[@allahBurpsCum]

Oh, it is myth that oil is a finite resource! It is a fact that oil will always be cheap (depending on what you consider cheap), no matter how much demand increases or supplies are interrupted?! Common sense would say that is a foolish and dangerous assumption. I will go with what the experts and common sense say. Even the most optimistic estimates show peak coming relatively soon and it would be better to start moving to cleaner, renewable sources sooner rather than later.

[@earthstewardude]

Present your facts idiot!

[@Mystery207]

Speculation

[@walter0bz]

no, i dont desire to go and live in the bush with animals in peace and harmony. i want the world to continue as it is. my solution is zero kids . i dont want more people to suffer through the collapse of civilization. i'll enjoy my slice of the oil while it lasts, what else can I do.. (according to my view, life without it is impossible for billions of humans) but I dont come up with delusions for pretending it will last.

[@walter0bz]

@sabzz23 >>"What about the old days, how did we live huh?" - we lived by having under 800million mouths to feed. oil made the billions of extra people possible (petrochem agriculture) - thats the problem.

[@robbenvanpersie1562]

True

[@walter0bz]

tell you what. Why dont you run for office. tell everyone, "we're only going to print as much money as there is resources" (sorry that means increasing unemployment, because resources are shrinking). See how far you get with that. people only vote for politicians who tell them what they want to hear.