We all know that oil isn’t endless. When all of it is dug up, we’ll be in a serious trouble — unless we develop reasonable sources of alternative energy. However, experts predict that we still have several decades before reaching “the point of no oil”.
This estimation is confronted, or rather supplemented, by the Peak Oil Theory.
In short, peak oil theory claims that disaster will strike much sooner than we think. See, oil isn’t going to disappear one day all of a sudden. One day not too far away, oil reserves will start dwindling, and in fact it is from this turning point that things will start to get really bad — many many years before the earth completely dries out.
Our global economic system is very fragile. You only need to look around and see what’s happening now when oil prices rise steadily, without there being any shortage of oil. In response, food prices soar, riots break in Southeast Asia and in Central Africa, and the inflation is running wild. Now imagine what might happen when we do reach that peak: First of all, prices will jump up like never before. Secondly, oil-producing countries will have to place increasingly-smaller quotas on oil excavation in order to stretch their oil fields’ viability for as many years as possible. This will cause oil shortages around the world.
One estimation for when we’ll be reaching the peak point talks about 2010.
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