>How many years do the laborers have left? Is it less than the medium term of raising prices to 80-100/bbl? I don't think the ageing workforce is a huge proble

>How many years do the laborers have left? Is it less than the medium term of raising prices to 80-100/bbl? I don't think the ageing workforce is a huge problem, if that is what you are asking. The labour pool can smoothly absorb new entrants to replace the retirees. The problem is that if a rapid expansion of workforce is needed - eg in response to increased demand for rigs if oil prices jump into the $80-100/bbl range - the quality of the labour pool will suffer, the productivity will decline and costs will increase. Are the prices likely to grow suddenly? In some scenarios (eg effective OPEC action, ME conflicts) - certainly. More interesting is what ought to happen in a "business as usual" scenarios. I see it as a race between the decline in production from major "conventional" fields, the growth in energy demand esp from India, China and the "little tigers", and the transition to renewable energy and the "electric economy". My pick is that the speed of the transition to renewable energy will not be sufficient to compensate for the other two factors, and that we will see an increase in the oil prices to $80-100/bbl by 2020, which will enable new production to be brought on stream profitably.