Reply #4: Oil use is currently growing at >4% per year [View All]

[Dogmudgeon]

This is based on Deffeyes' and Campbell's analyses (see www.DieOff.com for a full range of articles). At 4%, doubling time is something like 25 years.

They also measured the historic average growth of energy use at 2.8% per year since oil was struck in Pennsylvania right after the Civil War.

So we don't have 40 years -- probably only 20-30, and substantial price increases should start happening within five years.

Super-high-viscosity crude oils, like shale oil and sand oil, require much more energy to process and we don't have efficient, workable technologies to get to the oil right now.

--bkl