Oil assessment studies by the U.S. Geological Survey, the U.S. Energy Information Administration and the International Energy Agency are seriously flawed and lead to unrealistic conclusions about future oil supplies, according to a new paper from the German think-tank L-B-Systemtechnik. In The Countdown for the Peak of Oil Production has Begun, the authors present a detailed critique of the assumptions and methodologies used by these agencies in their studies, which are widely cited as evidence that the world does not face imminent oil supply shortages. The authors review the present state of the world's oil supplies and find that production increases are clearly becoming more and more difficult to achieve for geological reasons. They conclude, therefore, that "These studies ignore future limitations in the supply of oil which are meanwhile apparent, and by doing this they send misleading political signals."
