Once upon a time it would take a whole generation to use up any amount of oil we found....it came in such large underground pools...this graph is "the cheap and easy oil" from those immense reservoirs, each of a half billion barrels or better, easy sites providing high production at low costs due to economics of scale. (The United States consumes a half billion barrels of oil every 29 days, one unit on this graph) But maybe you have noticed where the curve is going lately? From "bottomless" pools to niggling puddles? When do we switch from abundance to shortage, stop threatening Saddam, start placating Saddam, whose oil reserves outlast ours by 40 years? What will that do to commuters, our kids, price at the pump and the expense of maintaining a luxurious urban lifestyle? (Next batch: 200,000,000 years.)

[data from c. j. campbell's THE COMING OIL CRISIS]