As Niels Bohr famously said: “predictions are difficult, especially about the future.” And they are doubly difficult if you are talking about the future of oil. The more uncertain the future, the more vehemently each side presents its case. For years a debate has raged about peak oil, the dreaded moment when we start running out of accessible oil reserves, a debate made only more heated by suspicions of vested interests. So environmental campaigners have been crying out that modern society is about to be plunged into darkness, while oil industry experts have blithely assured us that the oil is there, and they will fetch it for us. Even if it lies several miles under the Arctic seabed or has to be stripped from tar in Canada. Down Dale Now BP chief economist Spencer Dale, a former Bank of England policymaker, has thrown his reputation into the fray by […]