Eni reports strong oil demand growth

Oil production outpaced demand in 2015 though both set record growth, said Eni’s 15th World Oil and Gas Review released on Thursday. The study also found that global oil reserves increased while gas reserves went down last year.

The 2.9% increase in oil production was largely driven by the Middle East and North America, the report added, while the 2% increase in demand was sparked in large part by the low prices over the past two years. In terms of crude quality, Iraq’s rising production contributed to an increase of 12% in the supply of “heavy sour” crude, while “heavy sweet” went up by 8% and “ultra light” by 6%.

Gas demand, on the other hand, reversed its 2014 decline of 0.2% and registered 1.7% growth in 2015, slightly outpacing the growth in global natural gas production, which stood at 1.6%.

Production in the USA and Iran grew by 5% in each country, in Norway by 8% and in Russia, which is the world’s largest natural gas producer, by 1.3%. In the EU, production declined by 8.5% even as gas demand on the continent as a whole grew by 2.2%. Demand increased also in the MENA region (by 4.8%) and in North America (by 2.2%), though growth in Asia slowed considerably and in some places – including in South Korea, where it went down 8.8% and Japan, where it was down 6% – registered steep declines.

Over the past five years, the report added, global refining capacities have grown by some 4 million barrels per day.