And I ask because we’re not talking about it much. After a brief moment in the public consciousness when gas prices spiked in 2008, the issue of dwindling oil supplies has more or less vanished from the news. The Oil Drum did an informal study, searching for the phrase “peak oil” on 31 major newspapers, and came up with a paltry 941 hits.

Part of the reason it doesn’t get discussed much in the media is that the effects of dwindling oil supplies are going to be gradual, rather than sudden. In that way it’s more like melting glaciers than looming tsunamis. That makes it hard for people in the media to decide when the issue merits a headline.

A writer for Forbes, Christopher Steiner, has a book out that looks at how our lives will change as the price of gas approaches $20 per gallon. To listen to him, the changes will be dramatic: no more Wal-Marts or imported fruit, for example.

One thing that Steiner doesn’t discuss much in the interview above, however, is the possibility (indeed, the likelihood) that other, renewable sources of energy come to replace fossil fuels. How much our lifestyles change as the price of gas rises depends on how much slack alternative energy can pick up, and how quickly.

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