When 'sailing', the main engine's daily use is registered not in gallons but in tons. What an absurd use of finite resources! Don't get me wrong - I can understand private jet aviation for obvious reasons. Would you trust Heathrow and British Airways to get you, or your luggage, to the right destination on time, or together?

Imagine arriving a day late, breathless and without luggage, to seal a multi-million dollar deal, only to find that the contract had gone to a competitor who had used a private jet!

This would-be rant has made me think a lot about fossil fuels and the likelihood of them running out. Is there an upside? I relish imaginary scenarios. What if there were no more oil? For a start, I imagine, electrical power would replace the internal combustion engine entirely. The mindless production of gas-guzzlers would cease altogether but the workforce would still be employed making electric cars.

The only difference between electric cars and their predecessors is the form of propulsion, after all, so the much-publicized freaking out about having to lay off employees if old-fashioned automobiles are no longer built is nonsense.

Electricity will still have to be generated, whether from nuclear, gas or 'alternative' sources. Somebody will crack this nut and, when they do, the former oil producers will no longer be able to hold the world to ransom. Their bargaining chips will have, literally, gone up in smoke. The world will be a happier and more peaceful place.

The only people to be disturbed will be the oil-producing cartels that will have the pleasure of returning to their old way of life and sharing the misery of the indigenous people that never benefited from 100 years of oil production.

I used the word 'producing' in error - I should have said 'peddlers of their countries' resources', dug out of the ground by Western oil companies who prospected, invested and gambled heavily on their expertise.

If a multi-million dollar search for oil failed, the investment was lost at no cost to the country where that speculation took place. When oil was struck, however, the outrageous demands of these countries for a vast percentage of the proceeds from the find never took any of those losses into account.

In truth, I have come to terms with the fact that man has squandered, in a hundred years, what Nature took billions of years to make and I am now looking forwards to the installation of an electric propulsion unit on the boat.