Three meals or a tank of gas

Its been said by the great philosopher Arnold Rimmer on an episode of the British Sci-Fi sitcom Red Dwarf that "They say that every society is only three meals away from revolution. Deprive a culture of food for three meals, and you'll have an anarchy.". Today I would revise that to three meals or one tank of gas. For those of us that lived through the oil shocks of the 70's and 80's, you may recall the fights that broke out at filling stations between formally happy motorists, station attendants and each other over their God-given right to the unlimited supply of precious petrol.

Its no coincidence that our problems with money and credit began once world oil production peaked in 2005 or 2006, depending on how we count. The exact date is unimportant, the fact that the peak is now in the rear view mirror is devastating. World oil consumption has now surpassed production with most producing countries well past their peak, and the rest at maximum production and declining.

With no new big oil discoveries since the 1960's, discovery is way behind depletion. Competition for limited production can mean war not just at the pump, but across borders as well. Despite what clueless Americans and the idiots they send to Washington believe, the big oil companies don't control the price, or production of oil. 85 percent of oil production is in the hands of nations, not companies. Nations like Russia, Saudi Arabia Mexico and Venezuela. Countries that are consuming more of their oil production internally leaving less for export to places like the US, India and China that can't produce enough for their own population and industry.

The US is producing less than 25% of the oil we consume. Not because we don't want to, because we can't. The shock back in the 70's was when the US oil production peaked. There were plenty of countries around the world that were happy to sell us the oil we needed after a short lesson of what happens when geology meets economics from OPEC. Now the world has peaked. There's nowhere else to import from. Perhaps you should re-think that new Hummer purchase, at least until they start making a plug-in hybrid model.