Global resources and energy trade : an overview for coal, natural gas, oil and uranium

Abstract

Despite efforts to improve energy effi-ciency and increase the usage of re-newable energy carriers, fossil fuels and nuclear energy will continue to be im-portant sources of global energy supply for the coming decades. Present global oil and gas supply is characterized by a concentration of production in a few world areas, mainly the Middle East and the Former Soviet Union, and a transport from these regions to the industrialized countries. Depletion of conventional reserves, especially oil, in combination with a surge for energy in emerging economies, as China and India, how-ever, is expected to change this picture in the future: unconventional resources in other world regions may be exploited to cover the surge energy demand, infrastructure for energy transport along new routes may have to be established. To provide a data base for such ques-tions, this report gives an overview of the current global resource situation for coal, natural gas, oil and uranium. In the first part, an assessment of the con-ventional and unconventional reserves and resources as well as their supply costs is given for the different regions of the world. The second part describes the current energy trade infrastructure between world regions and estimates the costs for existing and new trade links between these regions.