China replaces USA as peak energy consumer

[Sparty]

At the Excellence in Oil and Gas Conference in Sydney Commsec chief equities economist Craig James stated that Australia was a key export producer and well placed with coal and gas supplies and should benefit from a rising commodity market.

The market will be driven by China and other Asian consumers and that we are seeing a changing of the guard.

"The newly industrialised Asian nations will drive demand not just this year but for years to come," he said

"Asia as a consumer is the biggest consumer of energy and will become greater over time. US energy consumption trends sideways but Chinese energy demands soar."

"China will first overtake in energy and then economic leadership", James said.

Australia would be a winner from a commodity boom as it sits third behind Norway and Russia in terms of commodity dependence, and it is the eighth or ninth-largest energy producer.

“We should not underestimate the impact of China growing at more than 8 per cent a year for more than 20 years,” James said.


On a personal note: I feel that Australia will rapidly move up the ranks of energy exporting countries as we bring on board our unique combination of natural and renewable resources: as we are on the verge of commercializing our vast geothermal resources and very deep coal seams via our emerging UCG-GTL programs. Thus Australia will have a vast surplus of energy in the form of oil, gas, coal and uranium to export to ASIA and beyond.

Australia the lucky energy country!