People are talking about peak oil since early 1970s if not earlier
But oil is still sticking around, and it doesn't seem like the availability of it is continuously decreasing if we look at the price of crude oil. Really, if it has been less and less available, then why do we have average prices for the last year almost 3 times lower than they were a few years ago? If there is shortage in something, its price usually surges, right? On the other hand, consumption of crude oil is also gradually increasing (though not as fast as before), so you can't say either that the prices are low because no one is any longer interested in it. How come?
Some reasons that the price isn't peaking as expected:
1. While availability is decreasing, current supply is outstripping demand (output has not decreased as oil producers did not want to give in to price) so stockpiles are growing.
2. The prices of 3 years ago were inflated and due for huge correction. It's a traditional pattern.
3. Alternative energy is cropping up. There are already some evidence that oil will no longer be used by some developed countries in future.
The question is not about why the price of crude oil isn't peaking as expected, while it doesn't even grow let alone peaking, and it is not clear according to whom it is expected to be peaking, either. The question is essentially about oil running dry, but since the consumption is still growing (though slowly) and as you say yourself current supply is outstripping demand (which also grows just because consumption directly determines demand), this necessarily implies that the availability of crude oil cannot possibly be decreasing by any means...
I fixed the formatting for you, and I hope you will fix it in your post too
Thanks for fixing the formatting... I unwittingly left out some lines I think!
One explanation is that price is really determined by those willing to buy it, and less and less the cartels like OPEC.
1. Now if consumers know for a fact that stockpiles are growing, they can just keep putting quotes for the low prices that can guarantee these stockpiles ship out.
2. Oil has to be cheap to compete with alternative energy... biofuel is increasingly getting cheaper, while oil exploration is increasingly costlier. Oil price has to be attractive to buyers who have growing list of alternative options now.
3. Scarcity plays a factor but only if the commodity retains value. Bitcoin, for example, has a max limit of coins and potentially when all have been mined, each satoshi becomes pricier. But if, and only if, people continue to value bitcoin. Theoretically if DOGE is a better (and limitless) alternative, for example, then bitcoin is not worth its price. In the case of oil, it can no longer be the commodity it once was. It is still highly valuable to developing economies but it is not unforeseeable that in 50 years, the developed world will no longer need oil. Today, already, some economies are planning to completely wean off oil dependency.
This isn't to say oil cannot again hit 100$. It's still fast to produce and there is ready tech to use it quickly and on massive scales. The pattern of history shows that oil must peak again, just not now.