CERAWeek Day III: On peak oil demand & more

As the end of day III of CERAWeek nears, for the Oilholic one panel session stood out in particular - Oil Demand: How will it look in a decade? This emotive and extremely polarizing subject turned hot late last year after the International Energy Agency issued a forecast predicting a peaking of oil demand in the 2030s. 

Naturally, OPEC blasted the IEA and said demand would continue to grow for many, many years. It also offered a bullish scenario of 116 million barrels per day in global oil demand by 2045. 

If the Oilholic were to offer his tuppence, oil will indeed continue to be a major part of the energy landscape not just for many years, but many decades. The stark reality of the matter is that no one can say for sure when oil demand will peak whether it is the IEA or OPEC. 

But kudos for the CERAWeek panelists to have at least tried. They included names familiar to the readers of this blog - Joseph McMonigle, Secretary General of International Energy Forum and Jeff Currie, a former Goldman Sachs partner and Chief Strategy Officer of Energy Pathways at Carlyle. 

Both were joined by Fred Forthuber, President of Oxy Energy Services, and Arjun Murti, Partner, Energy Macro and Policy at Veriten, and another former Goldman Sachs executive. The discussion was as lively as it gets. Here's the Oilholic's full report on the goings-on of the panel via Forbes. 

The panel followed a related quip by Shaikh Nawaf al-Sabah, CEO of Kuwait Petroleum Company, earlier in the day's proceedings. He told delegates that global energy demand will increase faster than the population growth rates through to 2050. "That means that we're going to require more energy intensity for the population in the world."

KPC's answer - why of course - increase its production capacity to 4 million bpd by 2035 from its current level of 3 million bpd. 

See, again the thing here is (as asserted earlier by yours truly), if the various forecasters can't even agree on what demand growth will be like at the end of 2024 (with the IEA predicting 1.3 million bpd and OPEC predicting 2.25 million bpd) - how can they predict for sure what the approaching horizon may look like in 2030! And on that note, it's time to say goodbye. More musings to follow soon. Keep reading, keep it here, keep it 'crude'! 

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© Gaurav Sharma 2024. Photo: CERAWeek 2024 panel on - Oil Demand: How will it look in a decade? © Gaurav Sharma, March 2024. 

On modest crude price gains and more

In what's coming up to mid-February, oil benchmarks are largely holding on to geopolitical risk gains made since the start of the month. That's after the U.S. response to an attack on its military base in Jordan allegedly by Iranian-backed militia and Israel's rejection of a ceasefire in Gaza.

Of late, Brent futures have found support around $80 per barrel mark but it remains to be seen whether the level will hold. For what its worth, the global proxy benchmark still remains in technical backwardation. It was though bemusing to read a recent Financial Times editorial declaring "The days of $100 oil prices are over" in a rapidly decarbonising world where "demand will continue but potential world supply is likely to peg back the cost." Indeed. 

In fact, it's something yours truly agreed with former BP boss Bob Dudley back in 2017 at the World Petroleum Congress in Istanbul, who if the Oilholic recollects well, was positioning his company to even weather a $30 per barrel oil price. Speaking of CEOs, Occidental's boss Vicki Hollub told Business Insider that oil oversupply may well be keeping prices low, but the situation is about to flip! 

And of course, Goldman Sachs analysts reckon we may be about to enter a commodities supercycle with a potential for driving oil prices as high as - yup you guessed it - $100 per barrel. Well we shall see, but for now $70-$80 will do, and the Oilholic seriously doubts we'll hit $100 imminently! Elsewhere, oil giant BP hiked its dividend by 10% and accelerated the pace of share buybacks in a bid - by its new CEO Murray Auchincloss - to woo investors. 

And finally, here is one's take via Forbes on US President Joe Biden's arguably barmy plan to pause the approvals of new LNG export projects for a review. All at a time when his country has become the world's largest LNG exporter! Clever eh? Well that's all for now folks. More market thoughts to follow later in the month. Keep reading, keep it here, keep it 'crude'! 

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© Gaurav Sharma 2024. Photo © Terry McGraw from Pixabay.