Peak Oil, War and Team America
The year is 2040. Oil is trading at $1,000 per barrel and natural gas is trading at $35/MMBTU. The U.S. is the largest producer of both oil and natural gas. Frequent conflicts in the Middle East over its remaining oil reserves result in multiple production problems on their end and the U.S. wants nothing to do with stabilizing the region or promoting democracy abroad.
How does this affect the U.S. economy if we refuse to export oil and natural gas?
How does this affect the U.S. economy if we take the market oriented approach?
Given that hypothetical, the US economy does very well, provided the conflict doesn't spill over and become our problem. Even then, we'll probably have full spectrum dominance, so it's not like anyone would beat us.
Energy efficient technology will have radically advanced by then: not so much because people like hugging trees, but much more so because they can't afford, or don't want to afford spending an increasing percent of their income on gas/electricity/etc. 50MPG will be considered low for a commuter vehicle, just as an example. And come to think of it.....how often do you see anyone driving Hummers anymore? Almost never, it's just too expensive. Note: I'm not talking about going 'green', I'm talking about simply doing What Works.
More realistically, nuclear and other power sources will have an additional 30 years of R&D worth of advancements, so I'm thinking they're just going to continue to increase their share. I just read an article about engineering algae that produce petroleum. Stop and think about that: pool of water, add sunlight, remove petroleum. Free oil. Fascinating, and someone is going to get filthy rich off of that. I'm no Solyndra worshipping fool, but I think it's prudent to get ahead of what comes after peak oil: 2100.......no oil. It's my guess that people in America return to their traditional role as scientific and technological innovators well before the lights go out.
Or so I hope.
Those hypothetical situations are so far off this whole thread is pointless.
Something I heard the other day that I can't stop thinking about: "The 19th century was the UK, the 20th century was the US, and the 21st century will be China"
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