When do you think peak oil will happen?

Question

When do you think peak oil will happen?

Answer 1

The oil Pundits say we are either already there or we will be in a year or two. In the demand sense it shouldn't happen at all as we adapt new energy sources but the oil cartels and companies discourage this for obvious reasons.------So I assume people think that the Earth will keep up with our demand?

Answer 2

I don't believe in peak oil as people like to talk about.  My father attended one of the top science universities in Russia, and between the scientists there the common knowledge was that oil is -not- just a result of thousands of little sea creatures dying in prehistoric times.  Oil seeps out from deep within the earth, so depletion and peaking will take a while even after all of the known sources of oil are gone.  There will always be new sources of oil somewhere.

Of course the price of oil will continue to go up.. the two aren't directly related.  It's also hard to say because even with the amount of money spent on foreign oil, it's still not cost effective to pump our own oil, which we have a relatively good supply of.

Answer 3

I don't believe it will happen because I agree with the Russian theory of abiotic oil, which states that oil is not a fossil fuel. The Russian science is very advanced on this topic and I recommend you check the theory out. Here's a good website to get you started:

Answer 4

If it hasn't happened already it will happen within 5 years. To those that think it won't happen, look at it on a country-by-country basis.  How many countries have already passed their oil peak? Most of the countries that produce oil. For the US, it's been almost 40 years since we peaked (1970).  Eventually the world will have to reach peak oil, since we can't just create more countries!

Answer 5

2030 or 2050

Answer 6

I think it is happening. think china and India.....

Answer 7

The  answer will be written by historians.  Technology is keeping the oil industry alive.  

Early predictions of peak oil were made when the main drilling technology was cable tool.  Rotary drilling changed all that.  

Peak oil predictions were made when seismic was no more complicated than shouting into a canyon with a stop watch.  Multi-arrays, vibrasize, 3D & digital processing, and high-speed computers changed all that.

Exploration, drilling and extraction technology will evolve just like your computer that you are reading this has evolved.

To answer your question, sometime in the next 200 years.

Answer 8

Linear shares my belief.  As a geologist schooled in America, I am familiar with the so called "fossil" fuel theories.  The problem is that the theory doesn't fit the evidence.  A better theory, IMO, shared by the most Russians, is that oil comes from hydrocarbons that were in the original comets, asteroids, etc that formed the earth, at least the last couple hundred miles.  These hydrocarbons are mostly methane.  As they flow upward through cracks and fractures, it encounter a deep zone of methanotrophic (methane eating) bacteria.  These ultimately produce petroleum.  High grade coal and methane hydrate deposits are also created by methane upwelling.  On Titan, all methane is abiotic.  On earth, all methane is assumed to be biotic but this makes no sense.  With the Deep Hot Biosphere theory, there is a limit, but if this theory is true, it is far higher than most American geologist believe.  There is good evidence for this to be true.  For example, petroleum has been found in places it should not be.  Also, some fields have been found to refill themselves, presumably from deeper deposits.  

Peak Oil has been predicted since the 1880s when oil was first developed and they have always been proven wrong.  The answer then is "peak" oil probably won't be encountered for thousands of years.  That is not counting the lack of resolve in looking for oil.  If you are unwilling to drill offshore, In ANWR, etc, then forget it, we are already past it.