This book is an initial assessment of the fast changing oil outlook and its implications for the future of the automobile. Until recently, there was little reason to doubt that the automobile's role would continue to expand for the forseeable future. But that assumption no longer seems so certain. The automobile and the sprawling global auto industry are entering perhaps the most difficult period in their history. Their difficulties stem chiefly from the twin problems of growing precariousness in the world's oil supplies and rapidly rising oil prices.