Gas industry author Robert Raper said global demand for gas is on the increase, while competition for secure markets with supplies intensifies over the coming decades. The writer said in a report with Oil Price L that Qatar maintains its position first in the world with a 22.1 percent share of LNG exports, followed by Australia with 21.6 percent, the United States with 9.8 percent and Malaysia with 8.1 percent and Malaysia with 7.2 percent.
The report adds that natural gas is the cleanest fossil fuel, and is also the fastest growing, with an average annual global growth rate of 2.6 percent over the past decade.
Global demand
The report notes that, given the global demand for energy supplies, oil demand has grown by 1.3 percent over the past decade, and global coal demand has grown by 0.8 percent. Looking to the future, natural gas is expected to be the only fossil fuel that will see significant growth in demand over the next two decades.
He adds that over the past decade, the US shale gas boom has pushed the United States to the global top among natural producers. In 2019, the United States owned a 23.1 percent share of global natural gas production, ahead of Russia with a share of 17.0 percent, and even the entire Middle East with a share of 17.4 percent, and in this regard the top 10 natural gas producers accounted for 70 percent Of the world’s natural gas supplies in 2019. American production grew 10.2 percent last year to 89.1 billion cubic feet per day, 88 percent higher than in 2005.
Annual growth
The report says that over the past decade, US natural gas production has grown at an average annual growth rate of 4.4 percent. During this time period, this proportion was lower than the average annual growth rate in Australia of 12.1 per cent, and less than the average annual growth rate in Qatar, which was 8.3 per cent, and China, which was 7.2 per cent. Given that natural gas is not transported as easily as oil, the report notes that it is only natural that there will be much overlap between natural gas producers and consumers. In this regard, the top 6 consumers of natural gas were included in the top 10 as well.
The rise in natural gas production in the United States also led to the announcement of the United States ranked first in the world in the production of natural gas liquids NGL. The United States has a global share of 40 percent of LNG production, and most LNG is directed towards refineries or petrochemical production. However, since the United States consumes most of the natural gas it produces, it differs from Qatar in the export of LNG, with Qatar ranked first globally with a 22.1 percent share of LNG exports. However, the report notes that the United States is seeing strong growth in LNG exports in the world from just five years ago it was ranked 18th in the world in LNG exports.
