IEA raises forecast for global oil demand this year
loosening the typically rigid contracts that have dominated the long-distance trade.
“This change will be further accelerated by the expansion of US exports, which are not tied to any particular destination and so will play a major role in increasing the liquidity and flexibility of LNG trade,” the IEA said.
Qatar said last week it planned to raise its LNG output by 30 per cent to 100 million tonnes a year (roughly 140 bcm a year) in the next five to seven years, in what was seen as a challenge to other exporters.
The IEA report did not assess the impact of Qatar’s plans as the extra capacity was expected to be in place after the report’s forecast period of 2016-2022, Keisuke Sadamori, the IEA’s director of energy markets and security, told reporters.
Global demand for oil will be slightly higher than expected this year, driven by increased consumption in India, the US and Germany, the International Energy Agency (IEA) predicted yesterday.
“Estimates of global oil product demand growth in 2017 have been revised up ... to 1.4 million barrels per day, on surprisingly robust preliminary second quarter demand numbers,” the IEA wrote in its latest monthly oil market report.
After “lacklustre” oil demand growth in the first quarter, “there was a dramatic acceleration” in the second quarter, “due to a combination of expected increases in India, and some surprise additions in the US and Germany,” it said.
In total, global oil demand was projected to reach 98 million barrels per day this year.