Includes bibliographical references and index.

"In 1956, geophysicist M. King Hubbert - then working at the Shell research lab in Houston - predicted that U.S. oil production would reach its highest level in the early 1970s. Though roundly criticized and occasionally ridiculed by oil experts and economists, Hubbert's prediction came true in 1970. The hundred-year period during which most of the world's oil was discovered became known as Hubbert's peak - a span of time almost comically shorter than the hundreds of millions of years the oil deposits took to form." "Using the same methods that Hubbert used to make his stunningly accurate prediction, Kenneth Deffeyes finds that world oil production will peak within five years and that there isn't anything we can do to stop it. New exploration and production technologies can't save us, and plans to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other areas to drilling offer no more than a small and soon-to-be-forgotten blip on the production curve. While long-term solutions exist in the form of conservation and alternative energy sources, they probably cannot - and almost certainly will not - be enacted in time to evade a short-term catastrophe of shortages, soaring prices, and global economic, agricultural, and possible political disturbance." "None of this is news to most specialists and many within the petroleum industry, but politicians, the media, and the public at large aren't hearing about it. Thanks to this book, they soon will. Thoroughly accessible, surprisingly charming, and filled with entertaining anecdotes, it demonstrates why a world wide energy crisis is just around the corner. And, though the near-term scenario is ugly, Deffeyes tells us what we can do to thrive after Hubbert's peak has passed."--Jacket.

English.

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