World energy consumption

Citation

Margaroni, D. (1998), "World energy consumption", Industrial Lubrication and Tribology, Vol. 50 No. 5. https://doi.org/10.1108/ilt.1998.01850eaa.001

World energy consumption

World energy consumption

Keywords: Crude oils, Engine oils, EOLCS, IEA

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has recently released its latest figures for world energy forecasts up to 2020. We are all aware of the finite nature of crude oil supplies, even though the day of reckoning seems to be as distant as ever as the oil majors locate new sources and find ways of improving recovery from existing wells. However, the IAE predictions throw the outlook into sharp perspective, even though the figures are open to challenge. If the business-as-usual scenario prediction adopted by the IAE is maintained at its current level, there will be a 66 per cent growth in world energy requirement between 1995 and 2020. This assumes an annual world economic growth rate of 3.1 per cent, also that fossil fuels supply 95 per cent of incremental energy demand to 2020, energy intensity falls at 1.1 per cent p.a. and that total energy use grows at 2 per cent p.a. These figures indicate that conventional liquids sources of fossil fuels will be unable to meet likely demand within 20 years, with obvious implications for the coal industry and other potential energy sources. Although this time limit is becoming uncomfortably close, there are a number of valid reasons to contest the findings. Even so, the prospects are not without significance to the lubricants industry. Apart from the obvious quantitative knock-on effects of factors such as increased drainage intervals for crankcase lubricants, there are likely to be a series of qualitative changes. These will arise from the need to develop and refine lubricants for a whole new range of applications associated with the procurement and utilisation of energy, and also the need to produce lubricants from raw materials other than crude oil. Earlier this year, Industrial Lubrication and Tribology featured an article which reviewed the first issue of the publication which came into being, entitled "Scientific lubrication", 50 years ago. One of the contributors to the first issue, who provided an article on the subject of "future lubricants" made no mention of the fact that the dwindling oil resources would play a major part in reshaping the future of the lubricants industry. While some might argue, with some justification, the profound changes which have been brought about in the lubricants industry during the last 50 years, in many respects, on an absolute basis, little has changed. We can today reasonably predict that the situation some 50 years hence will be very different!