The concept of “running out of oil” or “Peak Oil” is contrary to basic, natural laws of economics.
You don’t ever really “run out” of any resource or commodity. It just gets more expensive to extract. As the prices go up, previously unattainable deposits become financially viable.
At some point, the costs & prices lead the consumer to choose an “alternative”.
The leftie/greenies want to get to this point artificially through mandated taxes, regulations & subsidies.
Not really, economics has a lot to do with scarcity and allocation of what is available. Peak oil is about maximum optimal flow rates, not running out in an absolute sense.
You don’t ever really “run out” of any resource or commodity. It just gets more expensive to extract. As the prices go up, previously unattainable deposits become financially viable. At some point, the costs & prices lead the consumer to choose an “alternative”."
True ... but the problem is scale [think 85 million barrels a day or one thousand barrels a second] and the resulting difficulties in developing enough of the more expensive oil and the oil substitutes quickly enough and at prices consumers can afford to pay.
With oil, the price signals are such that a few percent of over supply is a truly a glut. A few percent of under supply can push prices through the roof, because the alternatives are expensive and don't happen overnight.
As a rational person, you can take the word of OPEC [which doubled its "proven reserves" in the 1980s without finding additional oil for the most part has been reporting the same numbers ever since] or the US energy information agency [whose model forecasts demand and plugs in supply to match] --- or you can do your own research.
What will you find? What I found is that the information is lacking to really know. What is known is that wells peak, fields peak and countries peak. After peak, the decline can be slow or fast depending on the field or region, but the initial peak is rarely exceed and when this occurs, the decline resumes. We are currently drilling in some pretty hostile environments e.g. 7,000 feet of water, 250 miles offshore and 17,000 feet below the seabed about as deep as commercial oil --- but not natural gas --- has ever been found.
Consider the US. Current production is about half of the 1970 peak. We would need to more than triple current production to supply our current needs. With a couple million wells already drilled, I think the chances of this happening are remote.
Are there new oil provinces yet to be developed? "Yes." Can they make up for the likely peaking of existing fields. "Maybe" but if so for how long?
Think about it. Reach your own conclusions, but examine your assumptions carefully.