The GAO asks: are you ready for peak oil?

Robert at R-Squared Energy Blog analyzed the Government Accountability Office's new Peak Oil analysis and he has three major points:

1. Peak oil is coming soon, but it's not in the past and it's not imminent.
2. As far as energy prices go, it doesn't matter because supply isn't going to be able to get ahead of surging demand in developing countries like India and China.
3. The United States better take the GAO report seriously, because our economy is heavily dependent on oil.

Some excerpts of the report from the Energy Bulletin highlight the challenges ahead for the U.S.:

Key alternative technologies currently supply the equivalent of only about 1 percent of U.S. consumption of petroleum products, and DOE projects that even under optimistic scenarios, by 2015 these technologies could displace only the equivalent of 4 percent of projected U.S. annual consumption...

...Under these circumstances, an imminent peak and sharp decline in oil production could have severe consequences, including a worldwide recession...

...While the consequences of a peak would be felt globally, the United States, as the largest consumer of oil and one of the nations most heavily dependent on oil for transportation, may be particularly vulnerable...

The GAO has the full report online and the Energy Bulletin also has a lot of great charts from the report.