Reply #5: Credible as hell.

[bhikkhu]

I have read of the "peak oil" problem, or the energy problem in general, for years. As far as I can see, it is as credible as any prediction could be. Originally it was tinfoil hat stuff, resurrecting long discredited Malthusian ideas. But in the past couple of years there has been a real turn-around, with even industry insiders echoing the worst of the doom and gloom arguments.

It is not, however, inevitable. The peak oil problem describes the decline of a cheap energy source, the presence of which has fueled the massive growth in population and productivity over the past 150 years or so. Were this cheap energy source to be replaced with some other equivalently available energy source, all problems disappear. That we have no replacement energy source at the moment, as we teeter on the "peak", is worrisome to say the least, but disaster is not inevitable.