14.06.2004, 15:36
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Zitat:AMERICA AFTER OILLesenswerter Artikel...
June 13, 2004 -- OIL produced the modern world — its ways of work, warfare and recreation — and soon, we are told, the end of cheap oil will produce abrupt, wrenching changes in the way we live. Changes, certainly, but not convulsions, because the modern world responds to price signals.
That is why U.S. energy efficiency — energy consumed to produce a dollar of GDP — has roughly doubled since the oil shocks of the 1970s. America's less than 5 percent of the world population consumes more than 20 percent of all oil. Surging demand by India and especially China will cause prices to rise. And terrorists, or chaos in Venezuela (America's fourth-largest supplier, behind Canada, Saudi Arabia and Mexico) or Nigeria (the fifth-largest) could cause prices to soar.
However, in 1920 the inflation-adjusted price of gasoline was twice today's. To match 1981 prices, a gallon of gasoline today would have to be $3.50. Inexpensive gasoline is one reason why since 1988 the average gas mileage of U.S. passenger vehicles has declined, and why in the 2003 model year, for the first time since the mid-1970s, the average weight of a new car or light truck was more than two tons (4,021 pounds).
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