3 oct
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Predictions of global oil production peaking, and then running out, have been around almost as long as oil was discovered in the second half of the 19th century. Time and again, such dire predictions turned out to be false, largely because of the Peak Oil’s apparently sound but actually deceitful logic: while it is true that, as Peak Oil maintains, oil is a finite natural resource that is bound to run out some day, it does not follow, again as Peak Oil argues, that therefore oil is or must be running out soon. A major flaw of Peak Oil is that it is based on a static, or technology-neutral, assumption: it implicitly assumes that limits to oil are set as natural, innate, and immutable. Yet, limits to oil, like those to most other resources, are determined as much (if not more) socially as they are naturally. Research, development, and technological advances have made (and will continue to make) both the amounts of oil reserves and of oil production much more fluid or elastic than perceived by the champions of Peak Oil.
Another equally-flawed proposition of Peak Oil is that it implicitly views the limits of oil supply independent of substitutes or alternative sources of energy. These include solar, wind, non-food bio-fuel, and nuclear energies. They also include natural gas. Further, they include “unconventional” oil: Tar Sands, Heavy Oils, and Oil Shale. Although, with the exception of natural gas and nuclear technology, the use of these substitutes is sill quite expensive, and therefore, limited, technological advances are bound to reduce their cost and increase their sue. [More]
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