Green tide is turning against oil giants

Remember "peak oil"? It's had many iterations over the years. I remember sitting in a cafe just four years ago, while the executive of a small oil exploration firm explained to me that all the easy-to-reach oil was gone. What was needed, he explained, was for intrepid companies like his to go out and find the tricky stuff hidden in under-explored basins. This would be more expensive, but prices were high. What else could the world do?

The cost of buying an electric vehicle could
reach parity with normal cars by the early 2020s.

Rather a lot, it turns out. In fact, that talk of "peak oil" is now being replaced by another prospect: peak oil demand. This week, GTM Research and Wood Mackenzie, the influential Scottish energy research house, published an analysis suggesting global fossil fuel demand could peak in the next five years. Paul McConnell, the author of the analysis, said two or three years ago it was hard to get oil and gas firms interested. But in the last year, "it's become virtually all we talk about with clients”.

Read what Juliet Samuel had to say in today’s Melbourne Age - “Green tide is turning against oil giants.”