GLOBAL ENERGY DEMAND WILL GROW 53 PERCENT BY 2035

Sept. 19, 2011 - Becket Adams - theblaze.com

The US Energy Department’s Energy Information Administration (EIA) has released its latest global projections and the headline numbers are not terribly surprising. The agency expects energy use to rise by 53 percent by 2035 and that the two most populous countries in the world, China and India, will account for 31 percent of all energy consumption by then. China alone will consume 68 percent more energy than the US by 2035.

The International Energy Outlook 2011 projects that the developed countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) will account for 18 percent of the demand for more energy by 2035. The developing world will consume the rest. The EIA’s annual Outlook is based on a reference case that does not include the effects of political prospective legislation or policies that could affect energy markets.

Currently, the compound annual energy demand growth rate is 1.6 percent. The EIA expects the average price of a barrel of crude to be $100 by the end of this year, rising to $108/barrel by 2020 and $125/barrel by 2035.

At current pump prices for gasoline, US drivers are already paying the equivalent of $109/barrel, the price for Brent crude (the biggest of the major classifications of crude oil). According to 24/7 Wall St., the $85/barrel price for US-produced West Texas Intermediate (WTI) is an essentially meaningless number. They argue that, for the EIA to continue to use the WTI price as its benchmark, they are creating a distorted view of the crude oil market as it is now and as it will become over the next several years.

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