When will the supply of conventional oil peak?

Question

I don't mean oil shales, tar sands, oil we don't know exists etc.

Answer 1

Richard Hardman of the The Oil Depletion Analysis Centre looked at this a couple of years back. The crunch comes not when the wells run dry, but when demand outstrips supply. We are currently only finding around 1 new barrel of oil for every 4 we consume, so most of our oil must come from known reserves.
Best estimates for the total volume of oil in the world are around 2 trillion barrels, of which we have used just under a trillion already, so at first glance it looks like we have a long way to go.

However...we have been using the easy stuff to get at. It is going to get increasingly hard and expensive to recover the rest. So when does the crunch come? The most pessimistic view is that we're about there now, the more optimistic think within 20 years. Either way, well within the lifetimes of most people alive today.

Answer 2

Been and gone, it was a few years ago. From now on the price of oil will gradually increase until it becomes economically sensible to make complex carbohydrons from simpler ones instead of sucking them from the ground.

Answer 3

Dunno about the oil but a Brough Superior was a rather fine British motorcycle.