 Oil
Tremors Signal the Quake to Come
Michael T. Klare
St. Petersburg Times
Oct 10, 2004
High gas prices are provoking curses at filling stations
and organized protests from truckers. Unfor tunately, as the worldwide
demand for petroleum rises and global supplies dwindle, U.S. consumers
are bound to see even higher prices in the years to come.
This being the case, it's best to view the current
price situation as a gentle warning of the dangers ahead … like
tremors before a major earthquake.
Natural petroleum is a finite resource, and it's beginning
to run out. It took about 145 years to use up the first half of the
world's estimated supply of 2-trillion barrels of oil. At current rates
of consump tion and growth, the human race will use up the second half
in just a few more decades.
This is worrisome enough. But as we begin drawing on
the second half of the global petroleum supply, it will become harder
and harder to maintain current levels of output. Periodic shortages
of ever-increasing duration and severity are likely. Production may
rise again in the years ahead, bringing a degree of relief at the gas
pump, but the effect will be temporary and prices are sure to continue
their upward journey.
Energy analysts disagree over the pace and timing of
these developments. Many oil professionals contend that oil remains
abundant and that global output will continue to grow. But a growing
chorus of experts maintains that high production rates can't be sustained
in the years ahead as major fields are depleted and world supplies begin
to contract.
""The world will soon start to run out of
conventionally produced, cheap oil,'' said David Goodstein, vice provost
at the California Institute of Technology and the author of Out of Gas.
Even those experts who believe that global output will continue to rise
acknowledge that a production downturn will come eventually.
Whether you believe that depletion will occur sooner
or later, the current spike in prices should be viewed as an early warning
of a coming supply crisis. When it erupts, that crisis will have a devastating
effect on the United States and the world economy. Because so much of
our economy relies on abundant petroleum to power industry and fuel
our myriad transportation systems, a permanent oil shortage will produce
a global economic meltdown … causing pain and hardship on a scale
many, many times greater than what we are experiencing now.
Many trucks and automobiles will become obsolete, whole
industries will collapse, and the cost of many basic commodities …
including corn, wheat and cotton … will rise astronomically. This
will occur if we continue to consume petroleum as if it is a limitless
substance and fail to take adequate steps to conserve what remains of
it. If we see the current fuel price surge as an urgent wake-up call,
and begin devising effective energy conservation strategies, we can
avert many of the hardships expected from an inevitable downturn in
global output.
On an individual basis, people should minimize unnecessary
road trips and use public transportation wherever practicable. When
it's time to trade in older cars, replace them with a gas/electric hybrid
or a high-mpg vehicle. Eventually we will all be forced to make these
sorts of decisions, so the sooner we begin, the easier will be the inevitable
transition.
On a state and national level, the nation needs higher
standards for automobile fuel efficiency, and funding to develop alternative
sources of energy and to speed the introduction of hydrogen-powered
fuel- cell vehicles.
None of these steps will solve the immediate problem
of high gasoline prices … that's beyond anyone's control, given
the global shortage of crude petroleum. But they will help us prepare
for the much more severe shortages that we are certain to face in the
future. By viewing the current price spike as a warning, we can ease
in the difficult adjustments that will ultimately be needed to cope
with an historic, life-changing shift in global energy use.
Michael T. Klare is a Foreign Policy In Focus scholar and professor
of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College in Amherst,
Mass. He is the author of Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences
of America's Growing Petroleum Dependency.
Copyright 2004 The St. Petersburg (FL) Times
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