Problem is, we just don't know when Peak Oil will hit.  It's been predicted for decades and decades (long before the '70s) ... yeah, someday it'll become true, but will we perhaps have enough cheap power then to simply make hydrocarbons out of cheap feedstocks (in the short term, tar sands and oil shale, then coal, and eventually pull CO2 out of the air?).<p>Huge new oil fields <i>are</i> being discovered, or did you miss the deep one off of Brazil?  Or how in most countries the government owns mineral rights, so property owners do everything they can to discourage oil exploration and extraction?  Or the ban on oil extraction off of most of the US coast?<p>There's also the potential for new extraction methods, look at natural gas in the contential US in the last few years.<p>A review of the whole '70s "Limits to Growth" obsession and its total failure to pan out might be in order.