Zim:
"Then why is it that 'We' still had all the oil we needed in 2020 - FIFTY years after 'peak oil' . . ."
Because the UNITED STATES hit peak oil 50 years ago. Within 1 year of when Hubbert predicted it would happen.
You must be a youngster! Take a history lesson from this old guy: the US *USED* to not only be 100% oil self-sufficient, with the highest grade of crude, but we were also BY FAR the biggest oil exporter in the world! Then, exactly as predicted twenty years before, US production hit Hubberts Peak and fell off the predicted cliff. Within years we went from top exporter to having to BEG other countries for oil.
Did you really not know that? Hubbert was a petroleum geologist, who, around 1950, first noticed the bell-curve lifespan of ALL oil wells to date and extrapolated for the US as a whole and, then, the world.
Look, there are VOLUMES of data backing up what has happened. But it just comes down to common sense: oil doesn't grow on trees. It is a DEPLETING resource which took *billions* of years to produce. Physics -- not the good fairy and not economics -- determines when oil in the ground can gainfully be used for net energy.
You need to do some serious reading. With all you're getting, get understanding. If I am wrong, I can deal with that. If YOU are wrong, I don't think you can. You keep saying things that make clear you haven't nearly done your homework.
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P.S. I presume you are going to raise the topic of "fracking". A couple of questions: (1) are you aware that the typical fracked oil source only lasts a couple of years, vs. the decades traditional wells last? (2) Are you aware that fracked oil is generally really low quality? It's not anywhere near to equivalent to what traditional wells provide and what the US used to produce in boundless quantity. (3) Are you aware that, as a whole, the "miracle" of US oil fracking since 2000 has been merely a Ponzi scheme? That is, the oil extracted required MASSIVE amounts of subsidy, because the quantity AND quality of the "fracked" oil never paid for the drilling and other inputs?
Fracked oil is sort of like drinking your own blood to sustain your energy, or maybe doing methamphetamine. It makes you feel good for just a little while. Then it is payback time and everything comes due.
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PPS, I got this new account so I could read Zimblers posts. Zim, sometimes I get overstimulated and post things which I later regret. Now that I know how to edit my posts, there should be less danger of that but it might still occasionally occur. If that happens, please forgive. Writing has its upside and its downside.
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