Oil Depletion Debate

Because petroleum has been so instrumental in the development of modern societies and because it is also a finite resource that will some day go into decline, supply needs will fall short of demand at some point. The main focus of this blog is on the arguments put forth by the pessimists. I believe geopolitics will play an equal part in causing a supply shortage before an absolute geological peak, governments will limit their oil production levels

Congressional Crude Oil Speculation Hearings - June 23, 2008

copy/paste the following real audio links to the address bar and hit "Enter"
These are long recordings but the quality of info is well worth the study
rtsp://video1.c-span.org/project/energy/energy062308_manipulation.rm
rtsp://video1.c-span.org/project/energy/energy062308_manipulation2.rm

Along these same lines:
Der Spiegel: How Speculators Are Causing the Cost of Living to Skyrocket
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,559550,00.html

To Sum: that supply/demand fundamentals are tight is acknowledged but there also appears to be a speculative premium as well.