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ROI on non renewables are high because the producers do not pay (all) of the externalities such as the cost of pull the carbon out of the air after it's been burned. I would love to see the true cost of oil and then decide if the ROI is real, or if its just a shift of wealth from those who get to breath polluted air to those who pumped the oil.

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You'd have to put an unusually high value on air cleanliness to argue that oil, period, and the scale economies it has enabled, has not have a net ROI in total.

Whether the marginal added "value" to some, of commuting in a hummer vs a Prius, is worth the cost to third parties of the incremental added pollution is, of course, a different matter.

I agree with your general feeling that Oil has had a positive ROI, but I doubt it is very high after all the cleanup is paid for.

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