Peak Oil and the end of civilization?

The major downside is less cargo room as the CNG (compressed natural gas) containers take more space for the same range.

As a bonus those tanks are damn near bullet proof, you can have most of the weight of a big truck on it without problems(my dad used to have a natural gas system).
On a whole I don't think the end of oil will be the end of civilization but it will end the global economy and globilization for at time as localised regions try and deal with how to get around without oil. Europe, Russia and other places with more mass transit infastructure will do better, North America will be lucky if they maintain their goverment through it all. Hopefully the re-adjustment will also allow the worldwide ecosystems that we've been assulting time to recover a bit and hopefully be given some respect as the world emerges from the chaos of that transition.

What civilization?, seems to me, and I hope I'm wrong, we have little left to lose before we lose everything and us altogether.

Dallas

Hello all,

Have a read through all of this, I sure you're all smart enough to digest this and then compare it to Peak-Oil.

www.opec.org...

Although Peak-Oil makes sense as a theory, it probably will not happen anytime soon, not in any or your or your children’s lifetime or your grand children’s lifetime since our oil consumption is not increasing by 100% every year. And the oil companies are finding more oil on a regular basis, i.e. Alberta Oil Sands project, Ocean (Gas) Exploration, but yes exploration is on the decline not oil. NOT ALL DEMAND IN JUST OIL. You have OIL, Solids, Gas and then Nuke/renewable energy.

I do think that yes, it will happen some time in very far future, hopefully, we'll have moved on to better and cost effective fuels by then.

The other thing to remember is that there are many different types of liquid oil that are found and this impacts cost directly due to refining.

OPEC is an organization and they control most of the oil, for some of these countries, it's their blood line for their GDP, there would be mass panic between the heads of state if they were running out of oil. The peak oil is based on a North American view not a global view in my opinion.

You have to remember that the production capacity is different from reserve capacity. Look at them combined, OPEC sets reserve numbers aside from production numbers. Remember in most cases the reserves are not audited, so there's no way to know for sure. Unless that OPEC member tells you.

Also check this out, www.mees.com...
you can use it to calculate b/d consumption dating back to 2001. I would go all the way back to 1933 and then determine how oil we've already used and then take everything else and compare it to everything else.

Bottom line is that oil is only expensive in North America and countries in EU that have to rely on importing it.

A full tank of gas (65 litres) in the Middle East costs less than $10 US. (To be exact $9.30)

Conversion: 65 Litres = 17.17 US Gallons = 14.30 UK Gallons.

The US is or was trying to shed it's dependency of oil via politics and peak oil theory, price increases and what not, but the demand has gone up for oil in North America as well. Oil pricing is based on demand, economies and production capacity, rarely on reserves. If that were the case and we were truly running out then I think that every country would sell it for the highest bidder possible to every buyer even if the oil was produced locally.




Just my observation...

[edit on 31-3-2008 by Creo Coactum]