February 02, 2004
Quote of the Day
...I have to tell you that there is no oil shortage and there never will be. It's one of the commonest substances in the Solar System.
If asteroids have oil -- and they do, in tremendous, astonishing amounts -- then that means that Fred Hoyle was right, and there are vast pools (he said ten miles wide) of non-biological petroleum deeper under the ground than we've been drilling, but not beyond reach.
We will run out of a desire or need to use oil long before we run out of oil.
Even if we did run out of oil, however, it would change very little. Our civilization made the transition from whale oil, when that resource became impractical, with relatively little friction. There are several resources that can replace petroleum if need be, and simple economics lets us predict how it will happen.
There's enough in the world already to be worried about. This one, running out of gas, is about as serious a threat to us as Y2K was -- a panic over nothing.
Posted by Russell Whitaker at February 2, 2004 08:24 AM | TrackBack