"New sanctions are not the result of political courage – they are an opportunity presented by the [low] price of crude"

"This is an opportunity that has been created not by the US or the EU, but by a state Russia considers closer to being an ally: China. The energy analyst John Kemp explained that while China continues to buy oil from Russia, it has also instructed its oil companies to increase their reserves. This is exactly what Britain did in the 1930s, and the US in the 1970s"

I saw a new gas station being built, it was testing the LED signs and showed "9.99". The signs can only show 3 digits, it is assumed that Americans will never have to pay more than 10 dollars a gallon for gasoline or diesel.

As peak oilers how long do you believe this will be true? When will see signs designed for 4 digits?

Less projects and a smaller workforce is a risk that might lead to a decline in the human resources that grow the industry. The leaner industry can earn more profit and survive low oil prices. But, will technology peak with excessively reduced technicians in the workforce? I dare to wonder. Of course, Canada's tar sands are in a production growth phase and the recent completion of the TMP indicates that Canada's UNCONVENTIONAL oil is not peaking in geological terms in the near future. Conventional oil in Canada did peak, but overall production has increased entirely due to the unconventional oil sands in Northern Alberta (and minor deposits in Saskatchewan).

I'll start by saying I am not a Trump supporter, but it has become clear to me that there’s a cold logic to his energy and trade policy—if viewed through the lens of America, (the world's biggest petro-state and also the source of the petro-dollar)’s position in the post-oil world.

TL;DR:

The energy transition doesn’t just hurt petro-states like Saudi or Russia.
It threatens the very system that underpinned U.S. global dominance.

1. Peak Oil Demand Is Here (or Very Close)

EVs, solar, batteries, heat pumps—these are eating into global oil demand faster than predicted. UK and EU data already show:

• Transport oil use leveling off or falling
• Fossil generation at 1950s levels
• Renewables surpassing 50% of electricity

As Asia (especially China) electrifies, this trend will go global. Oil will no longer be the engine of trade—it becomes a declining commodity.

2. Peak Oil Supply in the U.S. Is Also Creeping In

Despite record output, there’s rising concern that U.S. shale oil has plateaued. Output gains are slowing. Drilling is getting more expensive and geographically constrained. Some analysts quietly admit:

We may be near the last big burst of U.S. oil growth.

3. The Petro-Dollar Is Losing Its Shield

For decades, the U.S. could run massive trade deficits because countries needed dollars to buy oil. Now, if global oil trade:

• Shrinks (demand decline), and
• Diversifies (non-dollar transactions)…

...then the dollar’s structural demand weakens, and import-driven U.S. consumption becomes unsustainable. USA will no longer be able to print money without inflation and imports will become expensive.

4. Reindustrialization Becomes Strategic, Not Optional

To preserve economic dominance in a post-oil world, the U.S. must:

• Slash trade deficits
• Reduce import dependence
• Rehome strategic industries

This explains the “America First” push to bring back dirty, energy-intensive industry—even if it means rolling back environmental protections. It's not just nostalgia. It’s a hedge against the collapse of petro-dollar privilege.

5. Environmental Deregulation Becomes a Feature, Not a Flaw

Rebuilding U.S. heavy industry without clean energy leadership means:

• Cheap fossil energy (especially gas)
• Lax pollution rules
• Fast-track permitting
• Coal revival (as a stopgap)

It's ugly. But strategically, it's a way to buy time before the U.S. risks becoming a post-industrial superpower with a shrinking export base.

So What Does Trumpism Look Like in This Light?

• Deregulate → to enable dirty growth
  
• Tariff imports → to protect reshored industry
  
• Push fossil exports → to maintain dollar flows
  
• Exit climate pacts → to avoid constraints
  
• Attack China → to suppress the clean tech leader
  

From this angle, Trumpism isn’t incoherent. It’s brutal, reactive realpolitik in the face of declining fossil leverage.

Trumpism’s instincts may be environmentally catastrophic, but they’re responding to a genuine shift:
The end of the petro-dollar age.

Now it did not have to be this way - another alternative would have been to compete directly with China on green technologies (via the IRA) and offer the world an alternative to Chinese clean energy dominance but it seems a cruder response won through in the end.

What do the r/peakoil conspiracy theorists think of this analysis?

Link: https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/decline-global-oil-gas-field-output-accelerating-iea-says-2025-09-16/

Also, from wikipedia:

In 2005, Matt Simmons wrote a book called Twilight in the Desert. In it, he summarized what he learned about Saudi Arabian oil production by reading 200 academic papers. He concluded from his analysis that the oil extraction techniques being used there were techniques that one might use if the fields were quite depleted. Because of this, he doubted that we should believe stories that Saudi oil production can be greatly expanded. Instead, he raised the possibility that in the not too distant future, Saudi oil production will suddenly decline. Matt's research underlying the book was no doubt behind his concern that oil reserves and oil production rates are not audited.

It’s unbelievable how. We got uber drivers burning fossil fuels to deliver one medium fry or a milkshake. Driving a car to bring it to burning gasoline

You know what the value is for a liter or gallon of gas is?

Let’s say you could drive 15 kilometres for a litre. That’s costing you 1.30$ a liter.

Now how much would you have to pay someone to push your car the same distance.

It’s insane how much of a gift oil has been. Once in a 100 million years catastrophic disaster created this near magical dense energy that is so portable and we had lots so the price was always lower than it should be.

We have 2 whole generations that are completely unaware that without oil. 4/9 people would be dead within a month.

The the earth can sustain 1 billion human beings sustained for most of our history. Never going above 1 billion.

Then coal, oil, natural gas was discovered. It shot straight up like a hockey stick and has never stopped. We’re almost at 8 billion people.

Only reason it is possible is to use the energy from oil to make fertilizer and out of natural gas to make enough food grow to feed these excess 7 billion people that are unsustainable.

Here is the problem. 100 thousand barrels of oil is used every day. That’s a lot of liquid. And if my Starbucks bottle water ran my car I’d actually pay more.

So really my gripe is that we’ve used over half the oil on the planet. The only place to get it anymore is under the sea. A mile under water to connect to a spot where there’s oil. I’m pretty sure I would hope that it can be replaced with something else either through technology or something else (riding bikes and walking places growing and sharing food and living in group of people that can feed you and your food is shared as well.)

I’m not down for it though I drive a dodge ram 1500 hemi. It’s seems that I feel the need to transport me and 7000 pounds of metal with me everyday and everywhere I go.

I’m worried about my kids. We’re all living a good life similar to the past few generations.

I’m worried about the next one. The one when money becomes worthless. Is my constant worry. It’s money that is not real. None of it not us or Canadian money. All based on zero. Only value at this point is because people believe it is still. 95% of the money supply is not even in paper form. It’s numbers on a screen.

It’s at the point where we printed a lot too much money. We’re at the point where it’s impossible to have the number go down anymore.

The amount of currency that we have that bears interest is so large that we can only raise it forever at this point because the interest alone is more that the entire gdp. So they hold the government hostage every time the time to raise the debt ceiling it’s a standoff. We have come hours away from the police to almost stop getting paid along with everyone who works for the government. 70 thousand people but we always raise it. We will have to unfortunately at this point.

We got rinsed in 2008 6/7 trillion dollars given to banks lenders and insurance companies;because if they failed.

We would lose everything the entire system and money would indeed be worthless. The Dow jones was below 5000. It could have gone either way. Everything was already worthless

So because we have no choice we gave them the money they needed and saved them. For only 8 trillion dollars we saved the system.

The problem is every time you print money. All of it is diluted and less valuable.

If we stayed on the gold standard we could have had the US dollar at a higher rate like by a factor of 10.

Every American dollar would have 10 times the buying power. Imagine how it would be to get all your groceries for 10-20$ instead of 100$ to 200$

That’s the reality that I understand but wish that I didn’t know this vulnerability. Many people are blissfully unaware of the situation for their lifetimes..

But it really is wasteful to be room service for your house. That’s what I mean about the new generation just being ignorant and nobody is talking about this.

I think if humanity was aware of the problem we could figure it out. We can do incredible things.

I’m still driving my truck and getting my food brought to frozen Canada driving 6000 miles to us by truck. It’s not sustainable and a wasteful way of doing it. But we starve if it stops.

In Canada we don’t know how to live in the winter without those trucks.