The free market always works...
I'm not sure what assumptions are being made for the growth of petroleum consumption. The charts you refer to show U.S. consumption growing at about 1.3 percent a year, while the actual consumption since the early '70s averages out to about 0.5 percent a year.
If you look at this chart, you can see that U.S. consumption of oil is by no means increasing rapidly, despite huge increases in our economy over the same period. Better technology is no doubt a big reason.
As a small lesson in economics, compare the above chart to the chart below showing oil prices:
Notice any correlations?