Obviously, I'll have to continue to update once I research more about this topic, but showing above are just some graphs I pulled from basic oil data.
So the first graph from top. I only used Unleaded Regular Gas Prices (Please forgive my typo on the graph) since I don't believe there were many cases at all where variance between grades is big enough.
Right below I have put Chinese's average total oil consumption per day, then for entire world, and then the US.
I don't know why I pulled these data. Obviously consumption will continue to go up in China for awhile. However, as developed countries change their ways with new technologies, it should provide incentives and benefits to developing countries to diverge from using oil. Then again, oil prices are controlled tightly by OPEC that it could still hurt our pockets as we move on. And even though it makes sense for us to change to alternative energy in the future, for developing countries, they will likely stick with oil as in short run higher supply may benefit them to stick with oil. Then again, oil prices are unpredictable at best so there is no sure way that it would be a good idea for developing countries to stay with oil.
If you look at the last graph, you can see that our consumption level started a downward trend going into late 2000s. My graph only goes to 2008 but in 2010 our consumption level was average around 19mil/bbl/day. So, we are still not at the peak from 1980 to 2010.
Having said that, what if we actually increase the domestic crude oil production? Would it lower the gas prices? I'm saying this because people actually believe that domestically generated supply could lower the gas prices. From what I know, gas prices are heavily depended on market. They are not fixed and they are not just traded in the states.
Things that I will be looking into tomorrow (hopefully) are commodity futures in oil, domestic oil production level, alternative energy prices, alternative energy supply level/production, and more.
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