ONE thing above all else underpins our comfy, mobile lifestyle 鈥� cheap energy. And on this score we could be in for a big shock: we are going to run out of cheap oil. That鈥檚 not oil per se, but we鈥檙e approaching the point when global demand for oil will outstrip supply. For rich people this will mean a rise in the cost of living, but for the poor it could spell disaster.
It is not clear when we will reach this tipping point. The timing is the subject of fierce debate between free-market economists, with their perfect markets, and petroleum geologists who know, as it were, where the bodies are buried. The economists say we have about 35 years before oil production peaks, while geologists think we have only a decade (see 鈥淧ower struggle鈥�). At present the geologists鈥� argument is in the ascendant, having won the backing of some investment banks and oil consultants.
The debate is long-running and arcane. The economists argue that as the oil supply falters, the price will go up and companies will find other means for meeting demand. So, like any other commodity, the more oil we use, the more we will have. And certainly, when supplies have looked like running out in the past, new reserves have turned up. But this time, say the geologists, economic theory is knocking up against a physical limit: there is simply no more cheap, accessible oil out there. That means oil prices will rise inexorably.
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This prophecy smacks of past doomsaying. At the end of the 19th century, the English cleric Thomas Malthus argued that the Earth could not support a larger population. And more recently, in the 1970s, the think tank The Club of Rome argued that food and other resources would run out early in the 21st century as demand increased. Both missed one critical point: technology鈥檚 ability to increase 鈥渢he power in the Earth鈥� to supply more food. It can also stretch oil supplies.
It is possible that technology will squeeze more oil out of existing fields or make marginal reserves pay off. More likely, though, it will bring 鈥渦nconventional鈥� sources of oil 鈥� such as tar sands 鈥� into play. These tend to be 鈥渄irtier鈥� than existing supplies. Given the world is now battling to slash global warming gases and the smog gases that are engulfing South-East Asia, this is the worst option.
What we really need is for technology to give us a different supply of clean, economic energy. And that alternative is starting to appear. In the next two weeks, New 杏吧原创 will describe two ways in which researchers and politicians believe technology will bring us affordable, green, abundant energy. The big question is whether these alternatives will kick in before the cheap oil runs out鈥�