Since the very moment that oil was discovered to be a viable fuel resource, we have been warned that we will one day run out. Viable alternatives to oil have been available since before the discovery of petroleum as a fuel and have been successfully used. These have been as efficient as oil, many times cheaper than oil, but have not managed to change our oil guzzling habits not one iota.
As long as there is oil in the ground to be pumped, the powers that be will not make any real commitment to getting us off of our dependency for oil. They will milk the earth and the pocketbook dry before they will admit that other sources of fuel are available and are as efficient.
As far as I am concerned anymore, go ahead, pump it dry. Use up all the petroleum and the sooner, the better. Because we will not see "true" corporate support for energy alternatives until that point at which the petroleum is gone.
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At the 1876 Centennial exposition there were more solar powered products available for sale than than are on the market today.
The Indy 500 has run successfully on alcohol as have most races for many many years.
Brazil has been running alcohol engines almost exclusively for some 30 or 40 years.
Offroaders have been using hydrogen as a fuel for over 30 years, safely and reliably.
Many small farmers run their equipment on alcohol that they can produce themselves.
The gas turbine engine (extremely energy efficient) has been multiple times termed as "unsafe" for automobiles, yet, city buses have been using it successfully for 30 or 40 years without any major "safety" incident.
Henry Ford's automobiles, through 1931, were designed to run on Alcohol or Oil. Henry Ford himself was a big advocate of alcohol as a fuel.
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http://www.permaculture.com/alcohol/intro.htm
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One enterprising automaker of the era preferred alcohol as a fuel. It was safer, cleaner, cooler burning, and being a consistent product rather than a dirty burning, variable industrial solvent/by-product, was easier to engineer for. Henry Ford opposed centralization of energy, population, industry, and political power in the cities. He envisioned a day when the industrial revolution would benefit the rural landowner and technological innovations would make his work easier and life more ideal. In short, Ford was as philosophically opposed to his contemporary, John Rockefeller, as one could be. Until 1931 Ford's automobiles, including the Model A, were designed to run on either alcohol or gasoline.7
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Alcohol was killed as a fuel alternative by high taxes (designed by the temperance movement to curb the drinking of alcohol and financed by the oil industry):
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But those uptight citizens found a powerful patron and benefactor in, of all people, the Rockefellers! That family donated $1.5-$4 million (the figure varies according to whose report you read) to the anti-alcohol movement. Members of the large influential Rockefeller family sat on the boards of several temperance organizations, including the Anti-Saloon League.9 10 And $1.5-$4 million went a long way in 1918.
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