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July 11th, 2013 
Peter Nolan
GLOBAL economic recovery and emerging markets led by China will boost growth of oil demand to a record high total next year, the IEA forecasts.
Next year, consumption by emerging markets will dominate demand overall, a position “they should hold in perpetuity”, the International Energy Agency said.
But the overall tone of the IEA monthly report stressed that the oil market is heading into a sea of “many uncertainties”, partly because oil production in the United States is “set to grow strongly”.
Supply from other countries outside the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), notably Brazil, Kazakhstan and South Sudan, would also rise, the agency forecast.
For this year, because unseasonally cold weather had caused a big increase in demand for heating oil in the northern hemisphere in the second quarter, the agency raised its estimate for global demand by 215,000 barrels per day (bd).
This took the overall estimated annual growth to 930,000 bd, and total consumption to 90.8 million barrels per day (mbd).
The IEA estimates show demand rising by a further 1.2 million bd next year to 92.0 million bd, a new record after record demand also this year.
In London, the price of benchmark West Texas Intermediate oil fell 24 US cents from the closing price on Wednesday to $US106.28, partly in response to the report but also due to comments on monetary policy from the US Federal Reserve, traders said.
Regarding supply, “upheaval in the Middle East and North Africa remains an overarching concern,” the IEA warned.
“Emerging markets and developing economies are forecast to lead demand growth in 2014,” the IEA said.
The growth of demand from countries outside the 34-member OECD had slowed “from the heady pace of recent years” but would “climb above total OECD demand in the second quarter of 2014,” the agency said.
Against a background of the boom in production of shale oil in North America, the IEA said that the United States would play a role in “an expected steep increase in global refining activity in the third quarter of 2013”.
Demand from countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development would shrink at a much slower pace than it had since the financial crisis began in 2008.
OECD demand would fall by 0.8 per cent this year and 0.4 per cent in 2014, on the basis that “OECD economies will on average return to growth in 2014”.
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