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W1V1-Energy Scene-V2016-Handout PDF
W1V1-Energy Scene-V2016-Handout PDF
Arash Farnoosh
If we observe what happened during the last century, population, economic wealth and
energy consumption grew almost without any interruption, one influencing the others, and
vice-versa. Global population was 1.6 billion in nineteen hundred (1900), 2.5 billion fifty
years later, and we are more than 7 billion human beings today. Wealth, estimated by the
gross domestic product in real value, has been multiplied by a factor of 40 over the same
period .
Energy consumption has been both a support and a consequence of this growth, rising from
slightly less than 1 billion tons of oil equivalent in nineteen hundred (1900), to almost 13
billion tons today.
Nutrients contained in food, were probably the first energy resources, powering human
muscles to perform the basic subsistence activities. Humans may have used the first extra-
somatic energy conversion about eight hundred thousand years ago (800 000), by mastering
the control of fire.
Since then, there have been many energy revolutions. Just take a look at the last hundred
years. Coal replaced wood as a more efficient resource to power steam machines. Then oil
became the leading fuel in support of the automobile boom. After the first oil shock in 1973,
and the second one in 1979, that multiplied the price of oil by 10, natural gas and electricity
supply, increased their share in the global energy mix.
But energy systems require heavy infrastructures, therefore they require time to evolve. Due
to this inertia, the mix will not change rapidly and fossil resources will remain the dominant
fuels in the energy mix for many years ahead.
Fossil resources remain dominant in the mix, because so far, they appear to be the most
economic and efficient energy sources for our main uses. Heat, that accounts for more than
half of our needs, is mainly satisfied by oil or natural gas. Transport, which is almost one
third of the global energy demand relies almost entirely on oil, while coal is the main source
for electricity, which represents 15% of the final energy consumption.
In the meantime, new discoveries are made every day, pushing back the often predicted, but
yet to be seen, end of fossil fuels. Moreover, we have to keep in mind that reserves depend
on the price. As the oil price goes up, more resources become profitable to extract from the
ground and are added to the global proven reserves.
What may be coming to an end however is the easy oil. By easy oil, I mean the reserves
easy to find, easy to extract from the ground and easy to transform into ready-to-consume
products.
Since the mid-20th century, the most important oil and natural gas reserves have been
discovered in the Middle East. This region, led by Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait and the
UAE represents almost half of the worlds proven oil reserves. For natural gas, notably
thanks to Iran and Qatar, the Middle East holds 43% of the global reserves.
But for countries such as Venezuela and Canada, reserves have been recently re-assessed
and have increased dramatically. They now rank first and third for proven oil reserves.
The most recent oil discoveries have been made in unfamiliar locations. For instance in Brazil
with ultra-deep offshore pre-salt reservoirs, or in Northern America with tight-oil regions.
During the last 5 years, almost 30% of the global oil & gas discoveries have been made in
Sub-Saharan Africa. The oil price increase in the past decade and the development of new
extraction techniques have made some resources profitable to produce, changing the overall
reserves landscape.
The largest reserve-holders are not necessarily the largest producing countries. Venezuela,
that holds the largest reserves in the world, only ranks 11th in production. Conversely, the
US, that holds only 2.6% of the worlds reserves, is currently the top producer.
Besides, oil is not necessarily produced where it is consumed. Saudi Arabia, Russia and the
United States are the 3 main producers, but only the US is among the top 3 consumers,
along with China and Japan.