posted on Apr, 10 2005 @ 08:37 PM
It seems as if Peak Oil is the new term that can be so easily thrown in the midst of any conversation.
The theory of 'Peak Oil' was actually coined
50 years ago by geologist M. King Hubbert who showed that the output of an oilfield or oil
production of an entire country, increases year by year up to the point (a "peak") at which approximately half the oil is exhausted. From there, he
said, annual output drops inexorably toward zero.
www.alternet.org...
Here is what has become known as 'The Hubbert Curve'
external image
Now when it comes to the Hubbert Curve reaching absolulte zero, well a low of 'Oil philsosphers' have preditions of their own:
- Colin Campbell of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas (ASPO) predicts between now and 2010.
- British Petroleum exploration consultant Francis Harper predicts between 2010 and 2020.
- Consulting firm PFC Energy predicts 2010 to 2015.
- The publication Petroleum Review predicts 2007.
- Richard Heinberg, author of the 2003 book,
The Party's Over: Oil, War, and the Fate of Industrial Societies, predicts 2007 or 2008.
- Retired Princeton professor Kenneth Deffeyes, author of
Beyond Oil: The View from Hubbert's Peak predicts Thanksgiving Day, 2005.
- Energy consultant Michael Lynch maintains that there's no peak in sight for "the next 20 or 30 years."
- Peter Odell of Erasmus University in the Netherlands predicts Thanksgiving 2035.
- And Uncle Sam has the cheeriest news of all: a peak year of 2037 forecast by the Department of Energy.
So who do you think has the most accurate prediction?