At this point there is little disagreement that the world's oil supply will peak, but people waste time and energy arguing over when it will happen. If it's inevitable that the world will run out of oil, eventually, whether it is 5 years or 100 years from now, it serves everyone's interest to be prepared. So why are we investing what little money we put into alternatives in ways to extract heavy crude or "clean coal," both of which could potentially require so much energy we would need nuclear power plants to provide enough energy to extract them?......or we just just skip the middleman and use nuclear itself as the main energy source instead of using it to extract fossil fuels to burn. New coal plants are built every week, but governments and private companies won't invest in solar or wind power. These industries aren't profitable yet, which is why the private sector is so reluctant to get involved. But this is the time when government is supposed to step up and bear the initial burden of a costly investment, but instead we dump money into subsidies for the flailing auto industry. Justifying the lack of interest or investment into alternative energy by saying they are unprofitable and claiming everything is about money is completely inconsistent with other policies. When will we move on from our obsession with fossil fuels towards a more sustainable future?