Inventor of public key cryptography comments on peak oil

... in 1998 I became friends with a man who used to be head of world wide E&P for one of the major oil companies and asked him "Ever since I've been a kid, I hear that we're going to run out of oil. And yet, today, we're using more than ever before [and it was then near $10 a barrel, a local minimum]. What do you think?"

He proceeded to tell me about Hubbert's prediction for US oil production peaking in the 1970's, how it was laughed at, but became a reality. He then told me (as your site also does) that the same analysis applied to world wide production predicted a peak sometime in the first decade of the 21st century and that he thought that was realistic. Looks like he was right! I thought this independent input from an "oil man" might be of interest.

Our thinking needs to break out of the rut it's been caught in for so long, so thanks again for the site.

(4 December 2005)

When we received this email, I thought I recognized the name... Sure enough:

Hellman is best known for his invention, with Diffie and Merkle, of public key cryptography. In addition to many other uses, this technology forms the basis for secure transactions on the Internet.

- Professor Martin Hellman was one of the authors of the Diffie-Hellman key exchange protocol - if you've accessed a secure website for doing online ordering or Internet banking, chances are you've made use of his work.

(2005-12-04 23:14:16 SGT) [Energy] Permalink

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