AAPG FOUNDATION PRATT CONFERENCE: PETROLEUM PROVINCES, 21st CENTURY
January 12-15, 2000
San Diego, California

DAVID DEMING, School of Geology and Geophysics, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK

Abstract: Oil: Are We Running Out?

Predictions of imminent oil shortages have been made throughout the 20th century. Although all previous predictions have been false, in recent years a new generation of predictions based on the Hubbert model have become ascendant and attracted media attention. The Hubbert model assumes that a resource is limited and finite.

Although the conventional oil supplies are finite, it has proven difficult to estimate the size of the ultimate resource. Over the last 50 years estimates of the size of the world's conventional crude oil resources have increased faster than cumulative production. The estimated size of the ultimate resource base will continue to increase in the future as unconventional fossil fuels come on line. Oil production from Canadian tar sands has already begun. Unconventional oil resources such as tar sands and oil shales will eventually replace conventional oil and ensure a supply of petroleum for a period of time somewhere on the order of 100 to 1000 years. The only uncertainty concerns the nature of the transition from conventional to unconventional oil resources. The transition may be slow and seamless with no economic disruptions, or it may be characterized by a difficult transition period.

In the long run, nuclear power has the potential to provide large amounts of power for very long periods of time if low-grade uranium is used in breeder reactors. The technology and resources to utilize nuclear power already exist. Limitations on the energy used by our technological civilization are not imposed by finite resources, but by social and political attitudes. 

©Copyright 1999.  The American Association of Petroleum Geologists.  All Rights Reserved