jeffwRepublicans are pulling out all the stops to reverse EV adoption
phoneymouseWhat’s the plan if we run out of oil? I mean seriously, it’s gonna happen eventually. Even if you want to ignore the science on climate change, you can’t ignore basic laws of the universe that oil is a finite resource. If we don’t have a plan for when it runs out, there will be utter chaos.
There’s not going to be a moment when the world suddenly goes from having oil to having no oil. There are oil reserves that are relatively cheap and easy to extract, and there are other, very large reserves that are currently so difficult and expensive to extract that doing so isn’t profitable. As the easy oil gradually runs out, the supply drops, the price rises, and sources of oil that were not profitable at the old price become profitable. This maintains the supply of oil and stabilizes the price.
It’s true that the amount of oil is in principle finite, but that limitation isn’t really relevant on the timescales we’re talking about.
So prices will go up until you and me will get around with rickshaw.
Carbon prices and other incentives and disincentives can help accelerate this, and renewable tech and green(er) manufacturing will play into this too. I suspect (and hope) the decline in oil usage will happen well before we run low on it.
Eventually oil will become so expensive that alternative technologies will be cheaper than it.
We’re already there. If you remove the subsidies for oil and tariffs for Chinese EVs, driving a EV would be the cheapest solution.