Having read and listened to Matt Simmons it would appear that way before we really begin to see oil running out, many other factors connected with Peak Oil are going to make themselves known. For example, shortages of qualified oil workers, lack of rigs, shortages of steel pipes and drill-heads, not enough engineers...

This is all connected to demand racing ahead of our ability to ramp-up production at the same rate.

There was another part of the interview that I also found interesting. Mention of the 'geo-political' difficulties relating to OPEC and the cartels inability/reluctance to dramatically increase production. Increasingly these countries are going to realize that their oil reserves are going to be worth more and more the longer they remain in the ground. What is their incentive to rapidly increase production to satisfy our needs in the short and medium term? Aren't we rapidly moving towards a fundamental clash of interests here? Maybe their 'incentive' will increasingly be our promise not to invade them!

Increasingly we are going to find ourselves getting more and more frustrated with the oil producers, they have the oil, yet for a variety of reasons they will not be willing/able to procuce it in the quantities we need. How will we react to this situation? Will we just sit back and watch them sleeping on the job? Surely the gap between demand and supply will grow wider and wider, and prices will go up and up. It's going to feel like we are being slowly strangled. I have an unpleasant feeling that we just go in and take the oil or gas, of course we'll find some acceptable excuse for our actions, but the important things is we'll have the oil/gas, one way or another, after all we're talking about the stuff that keeps our civilization going aren't we?