Peak Oil?

According to most analyses, from within and without the petroleum Industry, the world supply of oil, relative consumption, will effectively peak in the next decade. What does this mean? If demand exceeds supply, someone will neccessarily have to go without. The issue is who?

Some nations will be priced out, most likely the relatively undeveloped countries in which automotive transportation is not really essential.

However, when there is not enough oil to satisfy even the industrialized nations, which totally depend on oil not only for transportation, but for farming, various chemicals industries, etc., how will they likely respond? Obviously, war is a possiblity; they have been fought for far less in the past.

Of course, access to petroleum itelf is not the only issue. Most of the world's food is grown using modern farming methods that require enormous amounts of gas. If the amount of surplus food suddenly decreases as a result of peak oil, the poor around the world will starve, lamentable in itself, causing instabilities that could lead to conflict over scarce resoures.

China comes to mind. The economy of that nation is being built, with questionable logic by the central planners, on the western model: i.e. dependent on cheap petroleum. What is unique about China is that the ruling party's legitmacy is intimately assosciated with rapid economic progress. If this were suddenly to halt or risk collapse, would that ruling party push the country into war, either to acquire access to oil or simply as a distraction, as so many authoritarian regimes have done in the past?

And so, after all that, which you might justly consider paranoia, my question is basically this; in light of the threat of peak oil, and of the general decline in American economic might relative the rest of the world (not to mention the current U.S. crisis), what do think the world will look like in a decade or two? If American hegemony fails, as appears inevitable, what will be its replacement?

I am not entirely without hope. Some small shift beyond the oil economy is already occurring. Don't forget the human species is capable of rapid adaptation.
And especially countries like the US have shown they can adapt real quickly if they have too. We saw evidence of that adaptability in the days of the new deal and again in the rapid transition from peacetime to wartime economy in the years 1917-1918 and 1941-1945. While some of the worlds wealth may be redistributed to other parts of the world the US is still the leading technology driver. That power can also drive a rapid change away from oil.

As you say yourself and illustrate with the example of Japan, wars are often and perhaps almost entirely fought over scarce resources, directly or indirectly. The idea is not for non-oil producing country A to attack non-oil producing country B to siphon its gas tanks; obviously the issue would be control over a third party that does export oil. Saudi Arabia is a prime example. Currently the House of Saud is sustained by the U.S. via hard and soft power. If that power should wane even temporarily, in a forced withdrawal of troops from Gulf bases due to an epic monetary crisis for example, there would be revolution of the Iranian sort: no doubt assisted by Iran. Following something like that, China could very easily assert its influence through Iran and become the new master and best customer of Saudi Arabia, cutting out the U.S. from a huge proportion of the world's oil. As far as war being expensive, when has that ever discouraged anyone?

I'm sure anarchists/protestors/rioters/looters would multiply in such circumstances, but that seems to me to make foreign adventures even more likely, especially in countries that will not be simultaneously experiencing hyperinflation and therefore be unable to supply large forces abroad (hmm..). There will always be some food and some amount of money (stuff if not paper currencies) that will be able to buy that food. Almost everyone might be starving, but not everyone.

Altogether, I think we're basically in agreement. Maybe you expect (hope?) that anarchy will be such that external war becomes impossible, while I think that will only be the case in the declining powers: i.e. the west. I expect East Asia and perhaps a few other regions to become much more influential in the coming decade or so, probably through war or at least the threat of war: i.e. bullying crippled, debt ridden, "undeveloping", western nations.

You folks all seem very skeptical and highly doubtful of the world's continued ability to fill its energy needs. The only ray of sunshine that is expressed is more a hope than an expectation. I believe, instead, that we can wean ourselves off the oil. It will be a slow, painful, and possibly violent process. But we will do it.

The alternatives for oil that are available to us are enormous. There's enough to fully do the job in each of these sources: solar, nuclear, geothermal, wave and tidal. Then there are: wind, gas, and if all else fails, lots more of that dirty old coal.

Our motivation is enormous and our ability is great. No matter how messily and controversially we humans live, we insist on living. Above all else, we cling to existence. Another trait is our resourcefulness as demonstrated by all the marvelous technological improvements we have made in our living conditions.

We have the resources, the will, and the ability. We can, and will, take care of this problem. More attention needs to be given to expediting the solution. We do tend to delay them unnecessarily. But overall, I see one more formidable problem to be resolved just as we have resolved other huge problems.

Yeah, I agree, it can be done, but I'm a bit bitter that a man tried to address these problems some 8 years ago and instead, George W Bush was vote to office.

The change can be found in many spheres of life and it's growing. I don't doubt the ingenuity of man. I just fear the domination of his greed which is cultured by our capitalist society.

I got too wrapped up with my oil replacement peptalk. I ignored the other concern expressed in this form - about the effect of the replacement process on the U.S. hegemony. I'm cautiously optimistic about that too. (Perhaps foolishly. I rediscovered optimism the day Barrack Obama was elected!)

You worry about the bad effect of man's greed on the entire process. This fear is justified, of course, but yours is greater than mine because your dislike of capitalism is greater than mine.. However, we both should feel better when the increased government regulation that is being promised is in place.

I'm not at all sure about this, but it might be that the nasty tendency of some to be greedy may greatly help all of us to get out of the energy crisis. Driven by their excessive selfish desires, the most greedy ones will put the most effort into the process, thereby helping us less selfish ones satisfy our modest wants better and sooner. What do you think?