Monday, March 15, 2010

Doomsday on hold?

Econbrowser includes this discussion of oil availability in the near term. The Economist includes this discussion of game-changing ways to drill for natural gas -- even mentioning an impending "glut".

It's almost a cheap shot to side with the optimists. Long run forecasts without prices are an impossibility -- as in Club of Rome. If global warming results from humans burning fossil fuel, that will change for the better; technology is never fixed or predictable. Gas burns cleaner than oil and it just got cheaper. If warming is not caused by humans burning fossil fuels then all the "green" policies in the world are irrelevant.