tirsdag, april 29, 2008

It’s a myth that the world’s oil is running out

Another myth: we are running out of oil. According to WorldPublic Opinion.org, “majorities in 15 of the 16 nations surveyed around the world think that oil is running out . . . only 22% on average believe that ‘enough oil will be found so that it can remain a primary source of energy for the foreseeable future’ ”. Those majorities who think we are running out of oil include 85% of the British and 76% of the American citizens polled. Luckily, they are wrong.

Production of oil is being constrained by several forces, none of them due to God’s failure to put enough of the black gold under our feet. Several countries that are important sources of supply are in political turmoil, and unable to bring to market the oil they are capable of producing. Think Nigeria, where security problems have shut down about 20% of the nation’s capacity of 2.5m barrels a day and discouraged new investment, and Iraq, where political paralysis and terrorists have kept production at less than half its potential.

Link

På den andre siden så skriver en i kommentarene til artikkelen: "Since when is an economist an expert in oil reserves? Or maybe he's not paying close enough attention to the folks who do know like Total and Shell and BP whose senior executives tell us the days of cheap oil are behind us and the work will never produce more than 90 mmbd."

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