[wordup] If oil were to run out where would you want to live?

[Adam Shand]

Sorry I'm bombarding you today, but I thought this was interesting.  
Lets make the assumption that this article is correct and oil prices 
are going to skyrocket in the nearish future.

Where would you want to live?  Would you rather live in a rural area or 
an urban area?, I'm thinking the suburbs would be the worst of the 
three, without the carless convenience of the urban areas or 
self-sustainability of the country.

What do you think?

Adam.

Via: Brett Shand
From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3623549.stm

When the last oil well runs dry
By Alex Kirby
BBC News Online environment correspondent

Just as certain as death and taxes is the knowledge that we shall one 
day be forced to learn to live without oil.

Exactly when that day will dawn nobody knows, but people in middle age 
today can probably expect to be here for it.

Long before it arrives we shall have had to commit ourselves to one or 
more of several possible energy futures.

And the momentous decisions we take in the next few years will 
determine whether our heirs thank or curse us for the energy choices we 
bequeath to them.

Industry's lifeblood

There will always be some oil somewhere, but it may soon cost too much 
to extract and burn it. It may be too technically difficult, too 
expensive compared with other fuels, or too polluting.

An article in Scientific American in March 1998 by Dr Colin Campbell 
and Jean Laherrere concluded: "The world is not running out of oil - at 
least not yet.

"What our society does face, and soon, is the end of the abundant and 
cheap oil on which all industrial nations depend."

They suggested there were perhaps 1,000 billion barrels of conventional 
oil still to be produced, though the US Geological Survey's World 
Petroleum Assessment 2000 put the figure at about 3,000 billion 
barrels.

Too good to burn

The world is now producing about 75 million barrels per day (bpd). 
Conservative (for which read pessimistic) analysts say global oil 
production from all possible sources, including shale, bitumen and 
deep-water wells, will peak at around 2015 at about 90 million bpd, 
allowing a fairly modest increase in consumption.

On Campbell and Laherrere's downbeat estimate, that should last about 
30 years at 90 million bpd, so drastic change could be necessary soon 
after 2030.

And it would be drastic: 90% of the world's transport depends on oil, 
for a start.

Most of the chemical and plastic trappings of life which we scarcely 
notice - furniture, pharmaceuticals, communications - need oil as a 
feedstock.

The real pessimists want us to stop using oil for transport immediately 
and keep it for irreplaceable purposes like these.

In May 2003 the Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas (Aspo), 
founded by Colin Campbell, held a workshop on oil depletion in Paris.

Changed priorities

One of the speakers was an investment banker, Matthew Simmons, a former 
adviser to President Bush's administration.

 From The Wilderness Publications reported him as saying: "Any serious 
analysis now shows solid evidence that the non-FSU [former Soviet 
Union], non-Opec [Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries] oil 
has certainly petered out and has probably peaked...

"I think basically that peaking of oil will never be accurately 
predicted until after the fact. But the event will occur, and my 
analysis is... that peaking is at hand, not years away.

"If I'm right, the unforeseen consequences are devastating... If the 
world's oil supply does peak, the world's issues start to look very 
different.

"There really aren't any good energy solutions for bridges, to buy some 
time, from oil and gas to the alternatives. The only alternative right 
now is to shrink our economies."

Planning pays off

Aspo suggests the key date is not when the oil runs out, but when 
production peaks, meaning supplies decline. It believes the peak may 
come by about 2010.

Fundamental change may be closing on us fast. And even if the oil is 
there, we may do better to leave it untouched.

Many scientists are arguing for cuts in emissions of the main 
greenhouse gas we produce, carbon dioxide, by at least 60% by 
mid-century, to try to avoid runaway climate change.

That would mean burning far less oil than today, not looking for more. 
There are other forms of energy, and many are falling fast in price and 
will soon compete with oil on cost, if not for convenience.

So there is every reason to plan for the post-oil age. Does it have to 
be devastating? Different, yes - but our forebears lived without oil 
and thought themselves none the worse.

We shall have to do the same, so we might as well make the best of it. 
And the best might even be an improvement on today.

Published: 2004/04/19 09:15:29 GMT
© BBC MMIV