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Okay, bonus points if you can remember exactly which year that was...

Well if you were able to answer either of those questions you obviously weren't around in the 1980s when *every* year was supposed to be the mythical "year of the LAN".

The problem was that vendors and "experts" knew that LANs were going to become ubiquitous sooner or later and that in becoming so, they'd push the PC from its previous role as a simple stand-alone low-end computing device into a real tool capable of replacing mini or even mainframe units.

The reality is that, despite all the promises, there was no year of the LAN -- it just kind of happened slowly and progressively over a decade or so.

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Well as I drove home last night I caught a glimpse of the big price board outside one of the local BP stations and realised that there is something of an analogy going on in the fuel industry.

For decades we've had doomsayers predicting that we're almost out of oil and that the global economy will crash very hard when this happens.

The gloomiest of these prophets have repeatedly told us that the oil crisis is just around the corner and almost upon us -- but we've seen that this simply hasn't happened.

However, with oil prices now setting new records at prices in excess of US$60 a barrel, and the street-price of petrol and diesel also going through the roof, maybe we're a lot closer to meltdown than we'd thought.

So exactly what can technology do to help us cope with spiraling oil prices and the prospect of reduced supplies?

I've already covered the benefits that teleworking offers in this area so maybe it's time to take a look at other aspects.

Modern motor vehicles are significantly more efficient than those of even a couple of decades ago and this is due largely to computing power. Not only do onboard engine management systems ensure that only the bare minimum of fuel is burnt but powerful computers have also crunched the numbers required to come up with optimal designs for combustion chambers, aerodynamics, etc.

Unfortunately, as we try to further improve the humble internal combustion engine, we're seeing much reduced returns and every percentage point becomes harder-won.

So what about hybrids like the Toyota Prius?

Well on a recent episode, Top Gear discovered that the Prius is not only less fuel efficient than a small modern diesel-powered car like the Fiat Lupo, it's also a whole lot slower. Forget that option!

How about hydrogen-powered cars, maybe even hydrogen powered cars with fuel-cells?

Sorry -- these are neither affordable nor practical at this time. What's more (and as mentioned in this column before), hydrogen isn't actually a fuel! You can't dig it out of the ground (except in the form of crude oil or a complex hydrocarbon gas) and any other production method becomes very energy-intensive. So exactly where will that energy come from? Oil perhaps?

So the outlook is somewhat grim -- and let's not even try to imagine what would happen if war breaks out in any critical region of the Middle East.

When I was a teenager in the 1970s, I could buy a whole gallon of petrol for just 30 cents or so. At today's prices, that gallon would cost me closer to $6. Could it be that the year of the oil shock is a myth but we're already on the verge of that long-predicted crisis?

What on earth are we going to do?

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