THE news analysis feature on the future of oil and petrol used for road transport and aviation was interesting and very informative (August 12).

It is right to stress the need to consider changes in lifestyle to those that are more sustainable in the long term especially in relation to climate -emissions from burning fossil fuels.

However, I have to question the suggestion that one day fuel will run out or that prices will have risen to astronomically high levels.

This is unlikely because continued price hikes will lead to further technical development of vehicles, especially petrol/electric hybrids.

I have driven one for the past five years and regularly achieve 60 to 65 miles a gallon on my urban journeys. The key feature is that the hybrid needs only unleaded petrol and no other energy input. It also has low emission levels, especially in town.

The other factor is that, as conventional oil reserves are depleted and prices rise, the vast reserves of oil contained in tar sands and oil shales will become economic to exploit.

In his most recent book Professor P R Odell suggests that even at the end of the century these resources will be only half depleted and by then oil supply will be more demand than resource-constrained.

David Randon,

Blue Slates Close,

Wheldrake,

York.

Updated: 10:57 Wednesday, August 17, 2005