NYT: There Will Be Fossil Fuels in Abundance – For Decades To Come

But no sooner did the demand-and-supply equation shift out of kilter than it swung back into something more palatable and familiar. Just as it seemed that the world was running on fumes, giant oil fields were discovered off the coasts of Brazil and Africa, and Canadian oil sands projects expanded so fast, they now provide North America with more oil than Saudi Arabia. In addition, the United States has increased domestic oil production for the first time in a generation. Meanwhile, another wave of natural gas drilling has taken off in shale rock fields across the United States, and more shale gas drilling is just beginning in Europe and Asia. Add to that an increase in liquefied natural gas export terminals around the world that connected gas, which once had to be flared off, to the world market, and gas prices have plummeted. Energy experts now predict decades of residential and commercial power at reasonable prices. Simply put, the world of energy has once again been turned upside down. Somewhat different issue, but I've said this before: the whole problem of the peak oil theorists was that they were making predictions about a resource that we have never really had a good estimate of. I think it is pretty clear that there was always more oil than we thought, possibly much more. There is an oil field in the United States that should have run dry several times already based on successive estimates of how much was left made since the 19th Century! It's still producing and showing no signs yet of running out and it's not an isolated case. Fully two thirds of all possible oil-bearing strata have not been surveyed with modern geological methods according to an article in Scientific American published within the last year.