In a press release published in mid-May, the NOC confirmed that world consumption of fossil gas had fallen to 4,000 billion cubic meters, “in a context of an unprecedented energy crisis and high inflation”.
The organization told AFP that this drop can be considered historic after a record increase of 4.5% in 2021 and a drop of 2% in 2020, witness to the Covid-19 epidemic.
However, the organization, which includes 100 members from around 40 countries, estimated that 2022 will remain the year of “the worst natural gas and energy crisis in history due to the Russian-Russian war”. Ukrainian”.
And she said: “The year 2022 has witnessed, in particular, the largest fall in gas consumption in the European Union in history, amounting to 13%, to 353 billion cubic meters .”
A significant decrease was also recorded in the CIS countries and Ukraine (-4.6%), as well as in Asia and Oceania (-1.6%), in contrast to the increase in consumption in America North and the Middle East.
Among the reasons for the decline were a mild winter that reduced “domestic and commercial gas demand” in the northern hemisphere, a slowing Chinese economy and high gas prices, which reduced demand in the industry and have led to an energy saving movement.
And while Russian gas played a “dominant role” in European supply, pipeline exports to Europe fell “to the lowest level since the mid-1980s, resulting in a loss of 77 billion cubic meters, equivalent to 20% of gas consumption in the world”. the European Union in 2021.”
This new situation prompted the continent to diversify its supplies thanks to gaseous gas imports from Norway and the “rapid rise in LNG supplies” from the United States, transported by ship.
LNG accounted for 32% of European gas supplies in 2022, compared to 19% in 2021 and 2020.
In this context, global gas production remained stable. The organization specifies that “the strong loss of Russian gas sales was compensated by a strong growth in production” in the Middle East (+14 billion cubic meters), in particular in the United States (+41 billion cubic meters ).
The United States’ share of global gas production has fallen from 24% to 25% between 2021 and 2022, and Russia’s share from 18 to 15.5%.
The net international flow of LNG exceeded the volume of volumes transiting through pipelines for the first time in 2022, with the share of LNG increasing to 51% (46% in 2021).
However, the “clear recovery in LNG trade (+4.7%)” failed “to offset a historic and huge contraction (-12.7%) in pipeline trade”.
In total, international gas trade fell by 4.7% to 1,016 billion cubic meters.
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