"Sometimes, peak oil looks like an intellectual game that people keep playing by arguing whether it has arrived or not. But the point with oil is not how much of it is produced, somewhere, but how much you can afford to use. And, for Italy, the peak of consumption has already arrived, as you can see in the figure above. It is impressive: consumption went down of more than 30% in less than 10 years. Today we are back to the levels of 1967. And, in 1967, Italy's population was around 50 million people, some ten million less than today. We really have reached the other side of the peak and we don't see the bottom of the descent ... In short, the Italian economy can afford to grow its oil consumption when oil costs less than about 20 dollars per barrel (in today's dollars), it remains stable as long as oil is at less than ca. 40 dollars per barrel and it collapses when oil prices go above that level ... Around 2006, gas consumption peaked and generated "peak hydrocarbons" in Italy. Afterward, consumption has been rapidly declining; much faster than growth. It is a behavior that I termed the "Seneca Collapse". Italy may have the dubious honor of being the first major Western economy to experience this kind of collapse in modern times. So, what's going to happen, now, on this side of the peak? Difficult to say, but if the Seneca collapse continues, in the coming years it is unlikely that we'll be still seeing traffic jams at rush hour (and restaurants full of people)."
Zum Artikel von Prof. Ugo Bardi, erschienen auf Cassandra's Legacy (23. Januar 2014) »
Zum Artikel von Prof. Ugo Bardi, erschienen auf Cassandra's Legacy (23. Januar 2014) »
