Reply #8: I don't think your sources are dealing with the right information [View All]

[Dogmudgeon]

Look, the energy problem isn't something you should take personally. Second, hysteria isn't what's going on at all. If anything, the Peak Oil scenario has been underplayed.

There will be episodic gluts and droughts of any commodity on either side of a supply curve, and this applies to Hubbert's curve, too. Markets don't anticipate supply and demand perfectly. It leads to "stutters" in prices and supply.

But the idea of a coming "oil peak" and the subsequent damage it will cause isn't theoretical. For the first time in the history of the energy industry, we know a shortfall is in the making, and that we do NOT have the ability to compensate for it. The market will compensate for it as well as it can, but there are going to be major "discontinuities". Blackouts will occur, services will become unavailable, and temperature-sensitive people will die. Food won't get distributed. The economy will be damaged as companies cut back on hours, production, personnel, and finally some will close down. And we know this will happen because it has already happened in regional power-downs, such as the "rolling blackouts" that hit parts of California in 2001. China is having its own blackouts, gas shortages, and regional depressions right now.

It's always a good idea to scrutinize radical-sounding ideas or predictions. But this one is well-founded. We've seen it coming since 1970 at least, and a good case could be made that 1956 was the year when we knew it was coming -- M. King Hubbert started publishing his research on resource usage and predicted an oil resource fall-off for "around" the turn-of-the-milennium (2000).

Don't take my word for it -- check out the figures dealing with new oil finds, oil demand, oil supply, and petroleum-based commodities. The picture is not very rosy at all.

Hysteria won't do any good, either. It will take what it's always taken: intelligent, passionate, altruistic leadership. Running low on oil is a Bad Thing, but running low on leadership would be Fatal.

--p!