Michael T Klare: The Saudi oil bombshell

Asiatimes: [..] Most of Saudi Arabia's oil output is generated by a few giant fields, of which Ghawar - the world's largest - is the most prolific.

# These giant fields were first developed 40 to 50 years ago, and have since given up much of their easily extracted petroleum.

# To maintain high levels of production in these fields, the Saudis have come to rely increasingly on the use of water injection and other secondary recovery methods to compensate for the drop in natural field pressure.

# As time goes on, the ratio of water to oil in these underground fields rises to the point where further oil extraction becomes difficult, if not impossible. To top it all off, there is very little reason to assume that future Saudi exploration will result in the discovery of new fields to replace those now in decline. Read More

DB: It's likely that Saudi Arabia's principal oilfields will soon peak, then decline. No country or group of countries will have the capacity to fill the gap in supply. An outrageously optimistic assessment (unaudited by independent experts) of Saudi reserves underpins US energy policy.
Viable alternatives to oil may take decades and hundreds of billions - if not trillions of dollars to develop. The large economies of the world may collapse - along with our current notion of 'society'. Bush's answer? Oil wars, Drilling in Alaska, and prayer. We are doomed.