Despite current high oil prices and concerns about supplies beyond the 2040s, there may be plenty of oil to meet the world’s energy needs for the next century.

Technologies such as coal gasification may be employed around the globe to provide the second wave of ‘clean’ fossil fuel energy as countries turn to their own coal deposits to meet growing energy needs.

Energy consumption may continue to increase worldwide, with a heavy continued reliance on fossil fuels to meet the growing need.

Biofuels are unlikely to become more than a marginal source of energy, but research in the area may help drive breakthroughs in other areas such as energy storage.

A variety of parallel advances in materials and miniaturisation may provide more options for powering electrical equipment independently of national grids.

Consumers in industrialised nations may start a small but significant movement by demanding increasing energy efficiency.

If construction of LNG transportation infrastructure accelerates along with demand, natural gas could, within the next 50 years, join oil as the second essential energy commodity.

Fusion could be the answer to the world's energy needs. ITER, a $5bn experimental reactor will come on-line in about a decade but success is not guaranteed.

The moon's rich mineral deposits and other natural resources could one day be mined to fuel space exploration throughout our solar system and provide energy for Earth.

Despite its potential to cut fossil-fuel dependency, global use of nuclear power will probably experience only modest growth over the next two decades, driven mainly by developing economies.

Although the 'hydrogen economy' is decades away, hydrogen-based fuel cells may be increasingly applied in niche areas.

Estimates of how much oil the world has left vary, as do scenarios for phasing out its use. One thing is certain: as a fossil fuel, oil is a finite resource and its end will come, sooner or later, planned for or not.

Solar is the wild card of all energy sources, offering the potential to meet most of our energy needs once technological breakthroughs make the cost competitive.

Price spikes and geopolitical concern over secure oil supplies could motivate increasing investment in synfuels production and building of a synfuels oligopoly by large energy companies.

Thanks to technological improvements, wind energy is likely to continue to be the fastest growing major energy source over the next several years, but it will probably not displace oil, coal, natural gas, nuclear, or hydroelectric as a top energy producer for at least the next 20 years.

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