It has accounted for two-thirds of the increase in world energy demand since 2000.
And the reason is, is because oil is bought and sold on the world energy market.
At the moment, of course, renewables are still a tiny share of world energy.
In a world of good economic growth, even with greater conservation, world energy demand grows by 75%.
Last year Russian GDP plummeted nearly 8%, driven downward by a 77% decline in world energy prices.
Their share of world energy supply has stayed barely changed over the past three decades, at around 11%.
This makes Africa a central piece in the world energy matrix, and the area is getting some major attention.
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Yemen is adjacent to Saudi Arabia, and chaos in Yemen could disrupt oil supplies and upset world energy markets.
Natural gas has upped its share of world energy supply to one-fifth (2.3 Btoe), from one-sixth (1 Btoe) in 1973.
To put the cost into context, the current world energy market is about three trillion US dollars a year and growing.
This was the topic of a presentation we gave at the World Energy Technologies Summit in New York City last month.
In the past decade, world energy use has increased by an amount equal to adding one United States worth of demand.
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Every day the global economy requires 86 million barrels of oil per day, and that is only 40% of the total daily world energy consumption.
Given the size of the world energy markets, a speculator would have to make George Soros look like a pauper to successfully drive prices up.
Energy Secretary Chris Huhne, however, believed that, while the government was also forecasting an increase in world energy prices, UK price rises were not inevitable.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) has published its annual World Energy Outlook, and it's hard to think of any time when there's been more change under way.
For the first time since 1982, overall world energy demand fell. (The drop in natural gas use set a record.) In China, however, consumption is way up.
However, the International Energy Agency (IEA), a rich-world energy consumers' club, says that European customers have already stopped buying Iranian crude and that Asian buyers are looking elsewhere.
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Overall, world energy demand will grow 30% to 2030, from the equivalent of 240 million barrels of oil per day now (including oil, gas, coal, wind, etc.) to 300 million boe.
Now the International Energy Agency (IEA World Energy Outlook 2012) joins a growing chorus of forecasters that have noticed the tech-driven hydrocarbon revolution that is under way in America.
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"Given that world energy demand, and more particularly electricity demand, is increasing strongly, we need sources of electricity supply that are safe, affordable, with abundant fuel and are environmental benign, " he said.
The IEA states in its most recent World Energy Outlook that there are many sources of uncertainty surrounding future oil supplies, but the size of the resource base is not one of them.
The International Energy Agency has today published its World Energy Outlook and, according to the IEA, the United States is on track to become the number one oil producer in the world by 2020.
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Before Fukushima, a "nuclear renaissance" -- as it was termed in the press -- seemed well underway, except for this point: Nuclear power, as a total of world energy supply, has been in steady decline for the past decade.
"The pace and the extent of the return of Iraqi crude to the market remain unclear at the present time, as this country, with its proud OPEC heritage, seeks to reestablish itself on the world energy scene, " is how Abdullah put it.
Holman talked about the technology and projects underway in Africa to reduce malaria through the creation of a Photonic Fence as well as ways to tackle the world energy crisis by addressing nuclear energy via TerraPower. (See a full list of the projects at Intellectual Ventures here).
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Russia is one of the world's biggest energy producers, and China is the world's top energy consumer.
If past is prologue, the country that leads the world in clean energy innovation will likely lead the clean energy sector world-wide.
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