http://www.smartmoney.com/barrons/index.cfm?Story=20040315excerpt:
But this time they and Mr. Market may both be wrong. As the price of crude has moved steadily higher in the past five years, the market had assumed that each increase would be relatively short-lived. Supplies always were ample to meet demand, even as it expanded both in the U.S. and elsewhere around the globe, most recently in China.
That may not continue if, as some experts expect, oil output reaches a peak and subsequently declines in not too many years. The era of cheap, plentiful oil may be coming to a close.
"If you do not include
, we are at the peak of oil production. And if OPEC production is included, peak production is pushed out five years or so," says Felix Zulauf, founding partner of Switzerland's Zulauf Asset Management and a member of the Barron's Roundtable. "Before the end of the decade is over, we will have $60 oil," he concludes.
An extreme forecast, to be sure, but one consistent with the estimates of Colin Campbell, a 72-year-old retired geologist who believes production will peak around 2010 and the world will ultimately produce a total of 1.8 trillion barrels of oil. "Everybody calls me a pessimist, but I may turn out to be an optimist," says the Brit, who boasts a doctorate in geology from Oxford and did stints at major oil concerns including Texaco, BP and Amoco from 1957 till 1990.
...more...
(for those that doubt "peak oil" or do not understand what it means :)
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