r1a2c3e:

I don't think we are running out of oil.  I think this is a way to try and push us more towards "green" cars.

 

 

A conspiracy, eh? I hadn't heard that one yet. 

Now, there's a true conspiracy theory. (j/k).

However the math doesn't lie. According to the latest Government figuries, the known reserves of oil in the world will at best last us until around 2070. And that's being optimistic.

 The oilsupply is dwindling rapidly, by 2040 the oil supply will be gone at the rate the world consumes it. 

Natural gas can be made with waste products, so this can be a renewable energy source.

We have a 200 year supply of coal here in America alone, the problem is that more then half of it is dirty burning coal.

Back in the 1930's Howard Hughes and others developed a car that can run on steam and it worked, but the auto  and oil industry already had a monopoly on the market. This put the steam driven car on the back shelf.

The problem here is the powers that control big oil, they don't want to give it up and are slow to adopt new energy sources because it would entail huge investments that will have to come out of their pockets. 

they need to start using hydrogen...

 Inna, hydrogen won't make it due to the fact that it'll cost 10's of billions to fit the gas stations that now exist with new equipment, second there are some security concerns with the use of hydrogen and third the cost of a hydro run car would be out of reach for most people.

They tried to do something similar to this years ago with propane and it flopped because of these reasons. 

There is some real scientific evidence that we have reached a peak of oil production.

The truth is that there is a finite amount of oil in the earth. We have basically taken most of what is considered "sweet crude" oil; the oil that is easily extracable and profitable to refine.

The majority of what is remaining in our core is more of a "dirty" grade of crude. This oil is much deeper in the earth and much more costly to refine, practically to the point that it will be impossible to continue to produce it for a profit.

 Look at oil production charts over a period of 50 years. You will see a continuous increase with the last few years seeing more of a flat-line.

So, no, we're not yet running out, but yes, we are running out of profitable oil.

I wonder....forget the money, forget all that....what are we doing to the composition of our planet? It's taken millions of years to create what we have nearly depleted in less than 2 centuries. I think this becomes a moral issue more than a monetary one. Our civilization survived before the 1800s without it....what have we done!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!

 Perhaps our children and grand children (I'm only 29) will end up riding in horse-driven buggies again...Now, that would be green!

 P.S. I'll look for the source of the book that I read a couple of years ago that opened my eyes to this whole concept and post when I find it.

It's fact. Google the term "peak oil" or "Hubbert peak." M. King Hubbert was a Shell Oil geologist who figured out that all oil fields go through increasing production up to the point where it peaks, after which the supply becomes erratic and tends to fall down a rather jagged curve. This is partly due to things such as the pressurization of oil deposits dwindling over time (requiring more energy to recover), and as previously mentioned, the depletion of light sweet crude over heavy sour crude (requiring more energy to refine). Hubbert was considered a bit of a crackpot, until his theories were proven true -- he predicted that US domestic oil production would peak in 1970, and it did. When viewed on a graph over time, one can see an initial pattern of a spike in discoveries, then a tail-off, and then the production ramp-up curve follows as a kind of an echo. At this point in time, discoveries of new oil deposits are close to zero (compared to the supergiant fields discovered in the 1940s-60s period), and thus, production is peaking just about now. The same pattern exists for other resources, such as natural gas (which may deplete before oil) and coal. We haven't hit peak coal because we stopped using it, largely, in the early 20th century. If we were to try to satisfy the world's energy needs with coal today, we'd deplete it much faster too. In fact there are some studies that indicate that we are about 15 years away from a global peak in coal. http://www.energybulletin.net/29919.html What it means, globally, is that the one-time, century-long bonanza of essentially "free" energy is over -- and with it, the seemingly endless economic expansion and population explosion it fueled. We'll see things shrink back to more sustainable levels, organized among much more local, not global, economic lines.

The U.S. gets alot of their oil from the mid-east, that's what all the wars are about aside from the supposed terroism. We also get oil from Venezuela, which is why we are keeping an eye on their current president, specially when he threatens the U.S. As for oil prices, these fluctuate just like any other commodity based on demand and availability. The oil reserves are sometimes used to stabalize these prices, but are also meant to provide supply in case of emergency. But I do agree, these companies seem to take advantage of every news on war and every worry about supply. Here in Puerto Rico it's become ridiculous. Just the gossip about oil supply problems makes the prices go up overnight.

Anyway... when it comes to stocks, I found some that are doing extremely well. These are the oil companies that are exploring for new drilling locations. It makes sense afterall. When oil is in such high demand, these companies are the ones to profit the most. It's like mining facilities.

Sure, oil companies' stock prices seem somewhat appealing now, but I don't think I want to support their piggism. I don't think Congress is having the oil execs on trial for no reason - I saw the Shell guy on TV the other day acting like he didn't know how much he made. SICK. How can Exxon have made a 17% increase in profits and then blame Congress? Sick.

Bottom line, we have to stop supporting this.  Stop investing in these jerks. Keep putting your money in their stock and they'll keep putting it in their pockets.

 

SICK.

Are we running out of Oil? We are scared into thinking that we have to go green and seek out alternatives.

Here are my issues with that.

FACT

There are plenty of HUGE reserves of oil just waiting to be tapped in Alaska, several provinces in Canada and western US. There are HUGE oil pockets off the eastern seabord just waiting to be tapped. There are HUGE amounts of oil in the Arctic just waiting to be tapped.  The amounts of oil in these areas is estimated to DWARF the combined output and reserves already being drilled. Canada alone, let's consider the FACT that 90% of the population of Canada lives within an area of 700miles from the American border that leaves allot of relatively untouched areas to explore.

The call by GWB to remove ourselves from oil is NOT oil in general, rather he said Middle East Oil. Why? Obvious. Political manouvering and if you don't think that that is true, look at history dating back to the 1920s when a certain Californian Oil Company partnerred with BP at the end of WW1 in Saudi Arabia and hailed there's oil here. American and British companies started the oil rush to the detrement of the Middle East countries and the United States picked up the slack after the end of WW2 when Britain ended the colonial expansion in the Middle East and much of the North African countries. Every regime that existed in the middle east, if the leader did not comply with the protectionist United States, that regime was indirectly removed. There are other issues in the Middle East historically that should not be explained here, too much to explain. BUT needless to say, created plenty of ressentment towards the United States. OPEC was eventually created to replace the Oil consortium and the 1970's oil crisis wasn't a shortage of Oil, it was OPEC forcing the United States to allow Oil to be traded on the free market and they had succeeded. Oil was sent to every country but the US during that time. The end of subsidized oil and gas was done. Oh yeah..the Soviet Union played a part of the process by backing countries as well and at one point, tried to play a role in "keeping the peace".

Now, the US doesn't want the same issues to happen again as a result of their presence in the middle east. We call for the US to withdraw, but you know what? They can't because they are now the only buffer between Islamic States, Arab States, Iran and Isreal. They truly cannot withdraw from the Middle East until peace exists between all sides. Isreal has played a trumping card each and every time the US wants out of the east or if Isreal removes a regime or expands into Palestine or Siria and the UN wants to condemn the action. That trumping card is financial backing to politicians in the States and the fact they also have nuclear weapons.

We want to blame the oil companies, but you know what as well?? Lets instead blame fear and greed for the run up in prices. Oil companies aren't the only ones buying oil, they buy from the same place that Hedge Fund managers and commodity dealers buy from. They need to be fingerred out as well.

Back to the untapped Oil...that problem is answerred by ONE question..When was the last time a new oil refinary was built???

That is only scratching the surface of a much larger problem and I feel sorry for future presidents that want to make a difference and change foreign policies.

Complete fiction.  We in the USA are standing on the largest reserve on the planet.  It is what you've probably heard about being drilled into all over the US now.  Or in many parts of the US.  It is called the Barnett shale in the south and by other names with shale in the name all over the US.  What it is is the shale formations that the oil companies have known about for many years but had no technology to extract it and make money while doing so.  Right now they have been using technology called fracking(sp) to extract the upper natural gas first.  They basically drill into the shale and shoot it with noise cannons or water or something that breaks up the shale and allows the gas to escape up the well head.  They drill one hole and go out in different directions after reaching a certain depth.  this way there is less environmental damage to the surface ecology.  After about 100 or more years when the natural gas starts to ebb and when the technology is available, the oil under the gas will be extracted.  Plus we have coal reserves here in the US some estimate as being able to last another 350 years.  With the scrubbing technology being developed by a company to clean emmissions of coal fired electric plants, the issue of it being to dirty a fuel will be a thing of the past.  We have the oil, the big oil companies just want to deplete the supplies from the other oil producing nations before using ours.  When this happens and some say that peak oil has come already, the rest of the world will be coming to the US for its petroleum needs.  At least this is what I see as big oils plans for the future.  It could happen.  Maybe//???

either way bet on oil and u'll prob be ok for the short term 2-3yrs and then have a alt energy play for when the curtain falls cause on a long enough timeline oil is gone

I don't think we are running out either.  If you think about it, some new oil is probably produced each day, just nowhere near the amount we take out of the ground each day.  So, supplies are shrinking, but I think there is plenty to go around for years to come.

I think it is more  hype than anyting, I think that the oil comapany and contries are just trying to get more money out of the regual people

I dunno Oil is not manufactured it's refined and when there's none left to refine it's time 4 something else