Chinese oil demand

Stuart Staniford notes that the number of trucks and passenger vehicles in China has been growing at about 23% each year.

Vehicle growth rates for U.S. and China. Source: Early Warning.

You don't have to extrapolate that too far into the future to come up with a pretty scary picture.

Number of vehicles in U.S. and China. Source: Early Warning.

Is that a silly extrapolation? Stuart notes that the plot for 2015 would still leave the U.S. with 7 times as many vehicles per person as China. And the level of oil consumption per person in China today is 1/3 the current oil consumption per person in Mexico ([1], [2]). No question, there's potential for a lot more growth in demand from China

What's substantially less clear is where the oil to fuel those cars could come from.

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