Press Quotes

19 July 2010, The Wall Street Journal
According to new data from International Energy Agency, China is now the world's biggest energy consumer surpassing for the first time the US. Fatih Birol, the IEA Chief Economist, interview by WSJ said: “The fact that China overtook the U.S. as the world's largest energy consumer symbolizes the start of a new age in the history of energy”. He added that China is expected to build over the next 15 years some 1,000 gigawatts of new power-generation capacity, approximately the total amount of electricity-generation capacity in the U.S. currently.

19 July 2010, Bloomberg Businessweek
China overtook the U.S. as the world’s biggest energy user last year, suggesting continued strength in global fuel-demand growth, according to the International Energy Agency. Fatih Birol, the IEA Chief Economist said: “as China overtakes the U.S. as the world’s largest energy consumer, it is not only a domestic issue for China, but has repercussions for the rest of the world not only in supply terms, but also in how the energy is consumed. If China uses electric cars, hybrids and so on, they will impose the manufacturing line on most of the rest of the world.”

19 July 2010, The Financial Times
China overtook the US last year to become the world’s biggest energy user, the International Energy Agency revealed yesterday. According to Fatih Birol, Chief economist at the IEA, the US had improved the efficiency with which it uses energy by 2.5 per cent annually during that time, while China managed only a 1.7 per cent annual improvement. Birol said: “In the 2000, the US consumed twice as much energy as China, now China consumes more than the US”.

07 July 2010, Reuters India
Speaking about the world fuel subsidies, the IEA Chief Economist, Fatih Birol said he expected substantial price reforms in countries with the largest subsidies, which include Russia and China, and that discussions were taking place in Iran. “We are hearing positive signals” he said, adding that eliminating the subsidies would cut greenhouse gasses blamed for global warming and help the world reach a target to prevent temperatures from rising by over 2 degrees Celsius by 2030.

05 July 2010, The New York Times
Article on China’s energy challenges and worries that these could become an international problem, likely to trouble any global efforts to try to avoid environmental damage from rising temperatures. The IEA Chief Economist, Fatih Birol said that of China will not be able to meet its own goals on energy efficiency, the chances of avoiding global warming “are very close to zero”.

04 July 2010, The Arab News
This first exhaustive study of the financial assistance devoted to oil, natural gas and coal consumption prepared by IEA, OPEC, OECD and World Bank combined on request of G20, reported countries spend more than $550 billion in energy subsidies a year, about 75 percent more than previously thought. Fatih Birol, the IEA Chief Economist, commenting the results of the study said he believes removing subsidies would be a policy that could change the energy game "quickly and substantially."

28 June 2010, The Australian
Speaking about the offshore industry, Fatih Birol the IEA Chief Economist said tighter regulation and higher costs for deepwater drilling were likely to increase the West's dependence on OPEC oil."Over three-quarters of non-OPEC oil supplies are expected to come from offshore drilling, so if there are increased costs and delays this will accelerate the dominance of OPEC." Birol said.

22 June 2010, Platts
Speaking at the World National Oil Companies Congress, Fatih Birol, Chief Economist at the IEA, warned of the possible impact on offshore exploration of the Macondo spill, including higher offshore costs and possible delays to projects. He said “If new deepwater projects elsewhere in the world are also delayed, the total amount of output affected by 2015 could be as much as 900,000 b/d”.

22 June 2010, NewsDaily
Fatih Birol, the IEA Chief Economist, speaking at the Oil Companies Congress in London said: “if this moratorium (about US offshore drilling ban) continues and there are delays, this may in the next five years worldwide lead to some 900,000 barrels per day of delays. Then, if the new safety regulations end up increasing the cost of drilling substantially the competitiveness of the offshore industry will be badly damaged". “If these two things come together” – he added - “I see an ever-growing reliance on onshore basins with a number of NOCs. This is from an oil security point of view a crucial question”.

22 June 2010, The Globe and Mail
At an oil industry meeting in London, Fatih Birol, the IEA Chief Economist, said he was worried that following the Gulf Of Mexico oil spill, government will impose high-cost regulations on the sector, which will drive away investment. He said “some new regulation is inevitable, but governments need to be aware of the unintended consequences.”