Ok. Full disclosure: Although my background is in geology, I've consciously shunned to be funnelled into the oil industry. Hence, it's more a dish on the side for me.

The question regarding Peak Oil is better answered by others, so I won't go there. I'm sympathetic toward your arguments, but it has been abundantly argued here that the (biotic) oil reserve has seen its peak.

Nevertheless. Although contrarian views is what science needs, I've already some serious problems with a number of Dr. Gold's exclamations.

First: Hydrocarbon gas clouds on other planets isn't oil. That they can form there is a non-argument to me that abiotic oil can form here.

Second:

The official theory of the development of coal will not accept that reality, since human beings were not around when anthracite coal was formed.

This story is also run by creationist Ed Conrad and is wholly debunked by now. Last I knew, it was far from certain that the found "skull" was even bone. Eat your heart out here.

"The coal we dig is hard, brittle stuff. It was once a liquid, because we find embedded in the middle of a six-foot seam of coal such things as a delicate wing of some animal or a leaf of a plant. They are undestroyed, absolutely preserved; with every cell in that fossil filled with exactly the same coal as all the coal on the outside. A hard, brittle coal is not going to get into each cell of a delicate leaf without destroying it. So obviously that stuff was a thin liquid at one time which gradually hardened."

Yes, because it was a thick bog from decomposing organic materials? Occam's Razor anyone?

The theory of deep, abiotic petroleum origins is not a vague, qualitative hypothesis, but stands as a rigorous analytic theory within the mainstream of the modern physical sciences.

Oh? But I was never even educated on it, while my alma mater had a certain reputation to keep up. But everyone has its flaws, of course.

So if abiotic hydrocarbons are from another source, where does it come from and how is it able to concentrate so locally? Can Gold offer a mechanism of its deposition and localisation? And how is it possible that there hasn't been found any distinctive criteria between biotic and abiotic oil?

So, in short, I highly doubt Gold's position. For the benefit of the planet, I hope he's wrong, too.