The ELM focuses on the portion of oil that is exported - that's the interesting bit because it's what we in oil importing countries care about. Saudi production that's burnt in Saudi cars is of little consequence to the world. The ELM evaluates the impact of indigenous production (typically decline) and consumption (typically increase) to determine the remaining net exports.

Where I think the model breaks down, is to assume that there is no relationship between net exports and indigenous consumption - in countries where oil is a major part of the economy. How will a country earning much of their foreign exchange from oil exports be able to grow their economy (and indigenous consumption) whilst losing their main source of income? The UK is not a good example as oil is small part of our economy (~$50bn in a ~$2,000bn economy). The ELM, taken to its logical conclusion might see OPEC nations still producing some 20mbpd+ in several decades time yet exporting none of it as their internal consumption will have grown to use it all. In that scenario a country like France may well not be able to import any oil. However I think this scenario is nonsense since without the foreign exchange generating oil exports the OPEC countries will be in ruin, not able to feed themselves let alone import BMWs to burn all that oil. They will curtail their consumption in order to export oil.

For that reason I think that as long as oil is extracted from the ground somewhere in the world, there will be an export market and the French, for sake of argument, will be able to secure as much as their relative economic standing in the world allows them.