Hubbert's Peak: The Impending World Oil Shortage

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Princeton University Press, 2001 - Science - 208 pages

Geophysicist M. King Hubbert predicted in 1956 that U.S. oil production would reach its highest level in the early 1970s. Though roundly criticized by oil experts and economists, Hubbert's prediction came true in 1970.


In this revised and updated edition reflecting the latest information on the world supply of oil, Kenneth Deffeyes uses Hubbert's methods to find that world oil production will peak in this decade--and there isn't anything we can do to stop it. While long-term solutions exist in the form of conservation and alternative energy sources, they probably cannot--and almost certainly will not--be enacted in time to evade a short-term catastrophe.

-- "The Economist"

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About the author (2001)

Kenneth S. Deffeyes is Professor Emeritus at Princeton University. He grew up in the oilfields; his father was a pioneer petroleum engineer. At the Shell Oil research laboratory in Houston, he was a colleague of M. King Hubbert. He joined the Princeton faculty in 1967 and continued to participate in the petroleum industry as a consultant and as an expert witness. General readers best know Deffeyes as the guide/mentor in John McPhee's series of popular books on geology, collected and republished under the title Annals of the Former World.

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