In the past 4 or 5 years there has a great deal of banter about peak oil. This is the point where no matter how hard we, as humans, try to extract the precious liquid from the earth, the amount gained can not match the amount being depleted from older wells. We simply can not continue to exponentially expand oil production no mater how fancy the technology gets.
This discussion does not even take into account the fact that much of the new sources of oil, that would be all this unconventional production, will cost many times greater to extract. If it is tar sands, oil shale (there has, to my understanding, never been a single barrel of commercially available oil made from shale) deep wells and wells in hostile environments, it will not be dumped on the market at $100 a barrel.
This entire thing is a really big deal and is rapidly becoming an issue in the next presidential election. All we hear is "Energy Independence". What a joke. Presently we import some 12.5 million barrels a day and only produce 5.5 million. There is so much potential discussion here, but there is still another kicker. A thing called "Net Exports".
The Net Exports of oil is the amount available on the open market and any given time. It is the oil that is purchased by countries that can not produce enough at home. While the figure may be related to peak oil, it really makes little difference. If the USA wants to buy oil and there is none on the market, it will make little difference how much is in the ground. There simply may be a limit to what can be purchased. This will cause a shortage. A shortage will make us all squirm. It sure leaves me uncomfortable--- particularly when these candidates keep blathering as if oil is to just be be had by drilling more. It is a sad day. (Note the decrease in net exports from 2008 on!)
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