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Global Petrol Demand ’To Peak’ By 2030

Petrol storage may be one of the largest end uses of automatic tank gauging systems at present, but according to energy experts, petrol will reach its peak within the next 13 years. Euractiv reports that UK-based Wood Mackenzie has made the prediction based on the timeline of electric vehicles replacing petrol powered cars in the near future.

Analysts have predicted that the global demand for petrol and oil is likely to have peaked by 2030. Of the 96 million barrels of oil consumed worldwide every day, 60 million are used in transport. The expected growth of electric cars will cut this demand for both oil and petrol significantly.

France and the UK have announced plans to phase out the sale of new petrol powered vehicles by 2040, something that China, the world’s biggest car market, are also considering at present.

Alan Gelder, a senior analyst at Wood Mackenzie, said that the challenge has begun already, as manufacturers are already facing regulations to make vehicles run more efficiently on less oil: “We are becoming increasingly efficient as we use our energy. So as economies grow we are less reliant on oil, so the significance of oil in the global economy should decline over time,” he said.

Experts say that petrol will peak first, followed by oil, however the industry has differing ideas on when this may happen, ranging from the late 2020s to the mid 2040s.

For governments who rely heavily on fuel duty, such as the UK which nets £28 billion a year, it will provide a new challenge, as well as for companies who specialise in petroleum, at all levels of the supply chain.