As it is a finite resource, by definition, we will run out of Oil at some point. Around the year 2000, Scotland (and the UK Continental Shelf as a whole) reached “peak oil” (Oil and Gas UK 2014). So what is “peak oil”, and what are the implications of it? Peak oil is the point at which the highest rate of oil production is achieved, and beyond which oil production enters terminal decline. This could be due to many reasons – be it due to conscious policy choices by world governments to leave oil in the ground, or it becoming impossible or undesirable to extract what oil remains. The reason it is so difficult to anticipate when peak oil will occur is because new technology becomes available which either makes it possible to extract more difficult and remote fields, or it becomes possible to get more oil from fields […]