Energy

The reserves

At present the oil production covers approximately 33% of the world energy consumption (the percentage increases to 54% if natural gas is considered). The reserves of that energy source are not distributed in a uniform way in the world; on the contrary, they concentrate in some countries: the Middle East alone has 51%, South and Central America has 16.7%, Europe with Russia and Central Asia has 7.4%, North America has 13.7%, Africa has 8.3%. The comparison between the annual oil production levels and the currently identified reserves shows that Middle East countries produce little as compared to their capacity, whereas the United States and Western Europe exploit their reserves at a fast pace. In fact, the countries that consume more oil are the ones that own less oil. Europe each year consumes 20% of the world production. This means that if the current production level remains unchanged and no new discoveries are made, Europe and North America will deplete their reserves in a few years (8 and 14 years respectively) and will be forced to resort to imported oil only. The reserves identified so far worldwide will be depleted in 45 years if the current annual consumption levels are maintained.   The age of oil is probably bound to last for several years still. However, the level of the world energy consumption is expected to grow in the future (the world population will grow as well as the per capita energy consumption), thus reducing the oil reserves at a faster pace than now. The possibility of avoiding new oil and energy crises (i.e. a situation marked by a limited quantity of oil available on the market to meet an increasing demand leading prices to soar) in the future will depend upon the oil industry’s ability to find new fields and above all on mankind’s ability to achieve an optimum exploitation of the currently available oil and develop alternative, possibly renewable, energy sources.
Source: eni, World Oil & Gas Review 2011