We won't EVER run out of oil. literally.

And people would realise that if they understood economics. It's actually very simple. As the oil currently avaible oil is used up the price of oil goes up because there is less oil. When the price goes up, it becomes profitable to drill for oil at places where it was previously unprofitable. Technological advances also make it cheaper to drill for oil. It's very important to understand that how much oil there physically is on the planet is a wholly different thing from how much oil is currently avaible and profitable under current prices and technology. When people say we will run out of oil they are not talking about the former, but the latter, but they fail to understand that prices will make it increase in size. And were we to actually get to the last million barrels of oil, the prices would be so ridiculously high that no one in their right mind would use it as fuel let alone try to extract it. Some alarmists also seem to think that our economies would totally ignore that prices for oil goes through the roof, and that when the oil is gone, the economies will crash. No, the price system takes care of that too. As prices for oil goes up, it opens up for alternative fuels.

So people, stop panicking. We're never going to run out of oil ever, literally, and the economy is not going to crash because of oil. Learn economics so you can better sleep at night.

 

Good post.......

 

Oil is not a renewable resource. It isn't growing somewhere waiting to be found.

 

I wonder what the effects will be on earth when it's no longer a well oiled machine....

 

Did you even read the OP? probably not. Why bother reading he first post of the thread anyways? Let's be barbarians.

 

Oil is a renewable byproduct of decaying matter under constant pressure in the Earth's mantle. If it were all left up to the dinosaurs we'd have run out long ago.

 

Are you saying there is an infinite amount of oil and that it is infinitely available?

 

Why I was a kid and "Peak oil" first showed up.. the oil men howled with laughter.. It was a political move to assuage Americans because Texas and Oklahoma and Texas couldn't compete with ME oil.

When Bush attacked Iraq, Matthew Simmons (an oil broker) revived the "Peak oil" conversation as a scare tactic.. and boy he make a bundle jamming up the speculators.

 

No I am not?

 

What he means to say is we will never run out of energy source whether it's oil or some other technology. Obviously oil is a finite resource on a finite planet, but that still doesn't make energy a zero sum game.

 

The other thing is that as we end up drilling in new places it becomes more expensive and oil, as an energy source, becomes less competitive. Oil isn't still so dominant in automobiles because of its dominance or some conspiracy, its this simple: electric cars aren't competitive. They cost far more and most can't travel any serious distance. The only one I'd ever seriously consider is the Tesla, because I need that kind of distance, but that's what $90k? Look, I got a great brand new SUV with an MSRP of 36k that can go anywhere. I've literally taken it through five feet of water like it was nothing. Can I do that with an electric?

 

That process takes thousands of years.

 

I'm unaware of any moratorium on death over the past several thousand years.

 

It takes thousands of years for oil to be created. We are burning through oil at a much, much higher rate that it could ever be created.

 

Actually you should probably learn economics. The fact that the last drop of oil may never be used is irrelevant to the impact of energy prices on the economy. Now if you are pinning your hopes on the discovery of another cheap source of energy that may or may not be realistic, but for certain a replacement for fossil fuels does not exist at this time.

Try for example thinking about the impact on the economy if oil were suddenly to go to say four hundred dollars a barrel. Price of food skyrockets, travel shuts down, parts of the country become very difficult to live in without heat or air conditioning. Price of building solar panels to replace even a fraction of the energy from oil skyrockets. For every rosy scenario where a technological breakthrough save the word and equal number of scenarios where the breakthrough doesn't occur can be imagined. Conservation now just makes sense under all futures.

 

Your claim simply isn't logical and ties into the false theory we run to the store on dinosaur fumes. Crude oil is pushed to the surface over time where it degrades and evaporates. In fact it is unlikely a single automobile in the history thereof, has ever had a dinosaur fart. I can't believe I have to explain this to people who live and die by the hand of science.

 

If there is not an infinite amount of oil and we continue using more of it, then by definition it can run out.

 

That's arguable. There are some in the oil industry who claim oil may be renewable.
http://metaresearch.org/publications/bulletin/2007issues/0915/Mrb07cp5.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenic_petroleum_origin
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/on-energy/2011/09/14/abiotic-oil-a-theory-worth-exploring

 

Right, so what of what I have said indicates that I need to learn economics?

There isn't going to be any sudden dissapperance of oil, so that scenario is wholly irrelevant. Prices will rise gradually, and that means other energy sources becomes more competitive.

It can but it wont, as I've explained. Did you even read the OP?

 

Don't confuse them with facts. They confuse, well, everything, but, in this case, they confuse oil with their own hot air.

 

the op kind of forgot about this small detail. its like the assumption that MAD is totally fool proof.

 

Your not supposed to know about this, because media/politicians want your cash for other reasons.....AGW (Man caused GW) being an excuse, to finance whatever,

 

^ Pretentious fool

By god, can you people even read? I guess not.

 

The OP is one those simplistic ideas that get generated by fantasy economic theories beloved by libertoons and right wing cranks, based on the notion that marketrs are efficient and since there will always be rich people who can afford oil it doesnt matter what the effects are if 99.9% of 'everybody else' can't afford something, since by definition the bottom 99% are defective and make bad choices n stuff and deserve to go off and die in ditches somewhere. People who take Economics 101 and fail to take 102 often delude themselves that economics is a real science, and all those nifty graphs and mathematical hubris associated with it to make it all look 'really sciencey n stuff' are 'real', yet to grasp basic reality, like the political instability and death spirals that cause Depressions, because all the 'smart' people are doing the 'rational' thing as individuals ...

 

I don't believe that economics create more oil, if that's what you mean.