Peak Oil Production is 25 Years Away

Far from being a nearly exhausted resource, the world's oil reserves are three times bigger than what some popular estimates state, and peak global oil production is still about a quarter-century away, according to a new study by Pulitzer Prize-winning oil historian Daniel Yergin. Yergin's views carry weight because he won the Pulitzer for his 1991 book "The Prize," an exhaustive history of oil economics.

The world's total oil supply is estimated to be 4.82 trillion barrels, and 1.08 trillion barrels have already been consumed (see graph above). The remaining oil resource base is about 3.74 trillion barrels, according to a report released by Yergin's Cambridge Energy Research Associates. That's more than three times the 1.2 trillion barrels that "peak-oil" theorists suggest.

There's an estimated 1.07 trillion barrels yet to be discovered, and the incentive to explore and discover that oil will increase significantly when the price of oil eventually rises. As as the price of oil eventually rises, the incentive to conserve oil use by consumers will increase significantly as well. And as oil prices rise, the incentive to discover alternative energy sources will increase significantly as well.

Not to worry.