The supply of oil IS limited.
But there are a lot of other possibilities. If you dig a very small hole about 100m deep, you can tap the warmth of the earth to heat your house. To install the technology costs only about twice as much as a normal central heating system using oil.
So, as always, the question ist: "Cui bono?" Who profits?

From the BBC:

"Analysis by the US Department of Energy (DoE) - seen by Newsnight - shows that at $50 a barrel Venezuela - not Saudi Arabia - will have the biggest oil reserves in Opec.

"Venezuela has vast deposits of extra-heavy oil in the Orinoco. Traditionally these have not been counted because at $20 a barrel they were too expensive to exploit - but at $50 a barrel melting them into liquid petroleum becomes extremely profitable.

"The DoE report shows that at today's prices Venezuela's oil reserves are bigger than those of the entire Middle East - including Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states, Iran and Iraq."

And at $50/barrel, local windmill building will continue. At first, I wanted my local mountain to remain pristine, and then I looked at it and realized it's already studded with communication towers and antennas, airplane beacons, and the like.

Small point here: You only hear about peak oil mostly on lefty sites. It’s been a recent development that you now hear about it in the MSM. And even there, it’s very sporadic. If you wanted to, as you claim, have a justification to increase oil prices, wouldn’t you advertise the fact at the top of your lungs that peak oil is here? If that was the intent of the oil companies, they are going about it in the most stealth way possible.

It doesn’t seem as the best way to maximize profits by fear, as you imply.

With all due respect. Comrade Chavez and his huge "reserves" of heavy crude are not at all inconsistent with the "Peak Oil" theorists, at least the rational ones. The world's supply is truly vast, but the cost to find, produce and refine it goes up rapidly. In 1840, you poked a 100 ft hole in the ground in Penna, you got a geyser of gasoline that would run in your car (if there were cars, which there weren't). Today, we drill 10K deep in godforsakenstan to get heavy crude that is expensive or impossible to refine into 87 Octane unleaded. That heavy stuff doesn't geyser out into your tank.

It will be centuries or millenia before we pump the last barrel. The Peak Oil types say that the cost will start going up rapidly (heavy crude, faraway places, etc.) and the rate at which we can pump, at any price will go down.

They are surely correct, the only question is when.

The good news--it makes wind power, etc. make economic sense. It is hard to compete with a geyser of gasoline. Much less hard with Chavez's crude.

Turn it over to the lefties, they will do what they did in the Carter era--put in price controls, windfall profit taxes, etc. and we will have what you have in any workers paradise--cheap but unavailable oil. Great black markets, and rich gangsters.

Glad to have you on board, Rich. Who do you work for?

I have several gigs that I use to keep the wolf away. I have spent a fair amount of time in the last five years or so flailing away at small wind power--see www.wind-sail.com. Tilting at wind mills.

Web site is pretty neglected. I created it to begin with as a repository so that I didn't have to cut CD's all the time.

Shared a podium once with Richard Heinberg, a noted Peak Oil doomsayer. While he makes a living predicting the end of the world, he does make some very intelligent points.

My grandparents built a house in western PA after grandfather got home and recovered a bit from WWI. Digging the basement, he struck a seam of natural gas. Common. He capped it off, used it to heat the house, cook, etc. My grandmother nearly detonated the place several times. It did not have the added "odor" we associate with NG--she would turn something on, neglect to light it for a little while, then nearly blow the place up. Grandfather lost it on about the third time; capped the well and rewired the place for more electricity.

BTW, the CEO of ExxonMobil Exploration has written one of the more referenced articles on Peak Oil.

There are lots of windmills in SW Pennsylvania, and IIRC a German company has opened a windmill factory there.

My great aunt ran her farm, including an electric butter churner and a refrigerator, off a windmill in the barnyard in the 1950s. When she got a TV, though, she had to run electric lines in.

Conspiracy theories come in two flavors: those that subsume the facts, and those that ignore them. The first kind is often useful, and sometimes accurate. The second kind consists of male bovine excretions. You can often differentiate between the two based on the number of spelling and grammar errors in the presentation.

I have to say the theory quoted, that Peak Oil “ is pure military-industrial-complex propaganda”, is one of the silliest conspiracy theories I've encountered. Legitimate experts — that is, geologists, not economists or politicians — who actually know what they're talking about are in basic agreement on the fact that Peak Oil is approaching. There are certainly disagreements about when it will happen; that, no one knows. But it will happen, and soon.

The true scam is the opposite of the one the theory proposes: namely, the oil companies and the oil-producing countries are soft-selling the idea of Peak Oil. Why? Because they understand what the popular reaction will be: people will change their lifestyles to reduce their use of oil, and the profits will drop drastically.

Far from jacking up the prices, they're keeping the prices low. If you think gasoline is expensive in the US, try Europe — I expect Peter will confirm this if asked. US prices are kept artificially low to encourage consumption of a resource that we're rapidly depleting.

IMHO.

Peak oil has or will occur. If not now, when? The oil companies seem to be the last to come around to embracing the theory. In the short run, they may profit. In the long run, they will go under unless they can adopt. Just because an interest group may profit from a theory does not make it invalid. Those on the right believe global warming is a conspiracy, in part because a few scientists are getting money to study it. That is about as logical as rejecting peak oil theory because the oil companies may profit.

Regardless, oil peaked in the 70s in the United States. That is irrefutable. It is also irrefutable that we are and will become increasingly dependent upon the middle east. That may fit in nicley with the those who want to go to war in the Middle East but it is still true. Peak oil, like everything else, should be argued on the facts, not whether or not whether one interest group or another profits from the theory. I'm invested heavily in solar energy. So, I guess, you should attack me since I stand to profit from peak oil.

So, in sum, Peak Oil is a conspiracy started by those who want to profit off alternative energy, not the oil companies. Makes a lot of sense, doesn't it.

As far as the oil companies being the last to come around, have you heard of BP Solar?

As far as Peak Oil being an excuse to go to war in the MidEast, I think you have the emphasis on the wrong syllable. You bet we are at war in the MidEast because of Peak Oil. If you consider the economic and human consequences (worldwide depression that would make the 30's look like fantastic times) of a cut off of about half the worlds supply due to widespread civil war in that area (almost inevitable, IMO) you can understand why Bush doesn't want it to happen on his watch. I call it a "reason" as opposed to an "excuse". You can debate the effectiveness of the strategy (I do--I think regime change in Saudi would have been a better move), but don't put it down to some childish desire to go play soldier. It is well thought out and deadly serious.

Time will tell. I give them credit for doing something. I hope they are successful, and am glad that I didn't have to make the decision.

Oil prices are higher in EU entirely due to taxes; the base price is trhe same worldwide. I agree that prices are lower than they should be--not because of some silly conspiracy among oil companies, but because of old fashioned competition. When it is all written, one thing that will be a wonder is how these reviled companies managed to pump oil from a mile or so below the ground transport it half way across the world, refine it, and sell it for less than bottled water.

The Peak Oil Theory is real and it will happen. I don't think it was manufactured out of whole cloth, but I also don't think the oil companies are above using it as a club to force more money out of consumers. They are corporations, and that is what corporations do. Not doing so may give their investors reason to shake up the leadership, or even sue, if they feel such inaction has cost them their returns on their investments.

One final comment, then I shut up. Peak Oil is real and will happen, and we won't know until it is past. A big part of the problem predicting when is because everyone in this industry lies. OPEC countries get their "quotas" based on reserves. Saudi has pumped 10-12M Bbl/day for years, somehow never has adjusted reserves down. There was the famous Shell Oil fiasco. OTOH, there are deposits offshore and elsewhere in the US that are downplayed for political (tree hugging) reasons.

Science, why do libertarians and repukes hate it so??

So, it is "mostly lefty sites" that write on peak Oil, eh?

I guess the geologist that CORRECTLY forecast the peak oil of the US reserves would be in early 1970's (correctly) was "just lucky"??

And same geologist that predicted Peak Oil in 2005-2007, also a "lefty" geologist??

So then tell me why you confuse corporate hoarding of limited supplies to create a high price to be the same thing as "Endless Oil Forever" but oil companies are lying to us about dwindling supplies???

Two. Different. Subjects.

Why the hell would PNAC need a strategy to control sources, if OIL WAS ENDLESS????

US doesn't have WELLS???

God, have you ever heard of SAMPLING the crude to determine the source?? It ain't "bubblin' up" from the core, yokel.

Unbelievable. Science: ignore it and deserve to be labeled STOOOOOPID.