This post is for everyone who was part of the “peak oil” conversation at CATS last weekend.

A page from 1997 predicting the year of occupation of Iraq based on peak oil calculations. (via random($foo))

CONSPIRACY THEORY

… After the Cold War was over, low oil prices made it difficult for the Saudis — and oilman President George Bush’s [Sr.] friends — to make ends meet because OPEC members were cheating on quotas.

The obvious solution to OPEC cheating was to sequester an entire country: Iraq. In order for our scheme to work, Saddam would have to remain in power and the UN would have to embargo his oil. That’s exactly what we did.

We only need to keep Saddam in power for a few years — till the rest of the world’s oil production “peaks” … It seems reasonable to assume that global production will soon be unable to keep up with surging worldwide demand, and that global oil production must peak by the year 2005.

SPECULATION

Once global oil peaks, and we NEED to start pumping Saddam’s oil, I expect Americans to invade and OCCUPY Iraq … Obviously, once oil production peaks in a couple of years, the public will throw their total support behind an invasion of Iraq. There is simply no other way we can guarantee access to the oil patch.

We seem to have slightly accelerated the time line, but it was probably too much to imagine we’d have another oil baron back in the White House so soon.