LOL.

Actually, I think they are wasting our taxes - 'fiddling while Rome burns'.

We are half-way through 2008 and the average price, to date, for Brent must be ~$115 already above the high-high prediction for 2010.

To be in error by such a wide margin in two months is pathetic - I am easily able to predict the actual price within ~$10 in that timeframe (the average moves even less), oil is trading in an escalating range, look at the graph on the Upstream site Euan links to, join all the high points with a curved line and join all the low points with a curved line and extrapolate both two or three months.

In reality nobody knows the future and predictions such as these are of no use to anybody. Best for BERR just to admit it and sack everybody involved and use the money saved to insulate poor housing stock.

What truly amazes me about the assumptions behind the predictions is that no allowance is made for reducing CO₂ - all we see is IEA predicted growth despite the Government signing us up to binding severe CO₂ reductions.