I ran the numbers myself using sources obtained from the federal government:

Current oil reserves (known technology)
Future oil reserves (known technology)
Current additional reserves (future extraction technology)
Future oil reserves (future extraction technology)
Potentially unknown future reserves (known and future technologies)

Add them all together, then apply them against the projected energy consumption rates, and wall - 2048 is the last year a drop of oil will drive anything here on this planet.

Well, that was my theory, which seems to approximate Hubbert's own theory quite closely, with a current peak production, and a drop to just 20% of current production by 2050.

Not bad for this armchair scientist!

The question is - what do we do about it???

Simple, but there are several more pieces to the equation:

1. Natural gas runs dry in 2017, just 13 years away.

2. Coal is good for a while, but pollutes the heck out of the atmosphere and waterways, oceans, etc., interrupting the food chain...

3. Nuclear fission is good to go for a couple hundred years, by which time either we've perfected fusion or we're really stupid and deserve to let bacteria inherit the planet.

4. Nuclear fusion is good to go for about 50,000 years, by which time we've either harnessed inter-quantum energy or we're really stupid and deserve to let bacteria inherit the planet.

5. All the solar, wind, tide, and geothermal sources combined won't amount to but a small fraction of our current needs, much less our future needs.

As for the nuclear nay-sayers - countless studies have proven the safety of nuclear energy over alternative forms of energy - and that's based on decades old, active-cooling reactor designs. Current, passive-cooling, dynamically stable reactors pose but a tiny fraction of the threat, and, if adopted, will reduce nuclear energy's detriments to incredibly small fraction of the detriments posed by alternative forms of energy.

So, here's what we do:

1. Write your Congressman. You're all scientists!!! They'll listen to you!!!

2. Research the facts and give them the facts.

3. When they realize they have 1,000 letters from scientists pouring in, all of which are on the same sheet of music, and that all the letters invalidate the widely varying research from a number of different lobbying groups, they'll go, "Gasp! I think there's something to this!!!"

4. Write your President. If Congress chucks too many of your letters, then the President, receiving all 1,000 in his own office, will have little recourse but to give it serious consideration and "Gasp! I think there's something to this!!!"

At which point the Congressional Inquiry begins.

That takes ten years, at which point natural gas has just three years remaining.

A crisis is declared, and 24 years later, they've mandate nuclear fission as the desired fuel of choice, which gives them just 7 years, in the midst of rampant rationing and hoarding, to finish enough nuclear power plants so as to keep the basics of human life, ie., food and water, in steady supply.

Yes, I'm amazed by the apathy of our government when it comes to issues such as these which require "long-term" (20 yrs) thinking (while at the same time they're mandating a plan for the second 10,000 years at Yucca??????????????????????????????????????????

But I'm more amazed at the apathy of readers like you who read this stuff and...

DO ABSOLUTELY NOTHING ABOUT IT

Why?

Why are you spending the next 2 hours on this board when you could spend the next 20 minutes writing both your Congressmen and your President?

Dudes and Dudettes - if we bite the dust in 44 years, it's YOUR fault - the fault of apathy.

Gett off your duffs and DO something about it!!![/u]