Nearly all of the economic analyses we see today have as their basic premise a view that the current financial crisis is a temporary aberration. We will have a V or U shaped recovery, especially if enough stimulus is applied, and the economy will soon be back to Business as Usual.

I believe this assumption is basically incorrect. The current financial crisis is a direct result of peak oil. There may be oscillations in the economic situation, but generally, we can't expect things to get much better. In fact, there is a very distinct possibility that things may get very much worse in the next few years.

In this post, I will put together some of the pieces I see. This post is based on a presentation, so includes more than the usual amount of graphics. The post repeats many things I have said before, but I wanted to bring more of the pieces together into more of an overview article. This is a link to a PDF version of the presentation. This is a link to the Powerpoint version.

Ed note: This is a repost of Gail's Peak Oil Overview with a new comment thread and node. It originally ran Mar 2008. We appreciate you spreading this around to anyone who needs to learn more about this topic.

Preliminary data regarding oil production through December 2007 is now available from the US Energy Information Administration, so it is a good time to put together an updated summary of where we are now with respect to peak oil. The major themes of this presentation are

• The US oil story
• The world oil story
• Five myths

I have put this summary together in the format of a PowerPoint presentation plus notes. In this format, it is a multi-purpose document. You can

1. Read the post yourself, with or without my comments.

2. Use the presentation (PDF) as a handout, to give to one or two of your friends. My comments are intended to give you some more background, so you can better explain the presentation and answer questions.

3. Use the presentation for a group, using the PowerPoint format.