Peak Oil
The next global crisis
Globally, approximately 85 million barrels of oil
are consumed each day. Annually, that works out at
over 31 billion barrels. Speaking about the global oil
situation, Luis E. Giusti, Director, Shell and former
CEO of Venezuela State Oil Company, described it
thus;
“If you want to meet the demand, you will have to
supply, from the current level of 85m barrels per
day to 120m in year 2030. But in order to meet that
profile, you would have to supply oil in the order of
200m barrels per day, because a lot of that new oil
will have to compensate for the depletion of existing
wells.”
Oil has been powering the industrial world for more
than 150 years and has been the catalyst for the
modern world in which we live. The consumption of
oil globally is thought by many to have reached its
peak, meaning that production of known reserves has
entered, or may soon enter, terminal d ecline.
Years Peak Oil reached in specific Countries
Columbia
2004
Britain
2002
Venezuela
2000
Trinidad & Tobago
1977
Iran
1976
USA
1970
The Middle East is possessed of two thirds of the
world’s oil, and is thought to be the only region
where production has not yet peaked.
In the early 1970s, over half of the globe essentially
didn’t use any oil. The only serious consumers were
Europe, North America and to a lesser extent, Japan.
Today however, the picture has changed completely,
with all of the countries of the world competing
for the same finite natural resources to power their
domestic economies.
China’s Insatiable Appetite for Oil
Due to the rise of emerging markets, demand for
energy is rising faster than predicted. China is
exponentially expanding its need for energy. China’s
need for energy is projected to increase by 150% by
2020. To sustain its growth, China requires increasing
amounts of oil. Its oil consumption grows by 7.5%
per year, seven times faster than the U.S.
Once a society in which the bicycle represented the
most common form of transport, most urban Chinese
believe they will own a car in five years. With automobile
numbers growing at 19% a year, projections show that
China could surpass the total number of cars in the US
by 2030. A report by the International Energy Agency
predicted that by 2030, Chinese oil imports will equal
imports by the U.S. today.
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