theglobaljournal.net: Latest activities of group Maria van der Hoevenhttp://www.theglobaljournal.net/group/maria-van-der-hoeven/2012-03-20T11:57:59ZWhere Will the Next Black Gold Party Be?2012-03-20T11:57:59Zhttp://www.theglobaljournal.net/article/view/342/<p><img style="vertical-align: top; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" src="/s3/cache%2F92%2F21%2F922159f45beb1af5e09c4ae856ce88d4.jpg" alt="Van der Hoeven" width="389" height="580" /></p> <blockquote> <p style="text-align: justify;">Maria van der Hoeven, a former economics minister in the Netherlands, took&nbsp;over as Executive Director of the International Energy Agency in September.&nbsp;She is taking over amid concerns that the I.E.A. is losing relevancy because&nbsp;emerging energy giants like China are not members, and following a rare&nbsp;public split in June within the OPEC about whether to raise production levels&nbsp;in response to unrest in Libya.</p> </blockquote> <p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #800000;">Where in the world do you see the greatest risks&nbsp;for energy companies and for national energy&nbsp;strategies?</span></p> <p style="text-align: justify;">The Middle East and North Africa regions are already&nbsp;responsible for around 35 percent of the world&rsquo;s oil&nbsp;output and, more importantly, they are expected to&nbsp;meet the vast bulk of predicted future growth. The&nbsp;recent turmoil has added to uncertainty about the&nbsp;pace of investment in the regions&rsquo; upstream industry&nbsp;- how quickly will production capacity expand&nbsp;and, given rising domestic energy needs, how much&nbsp;of the expected increase in supply will be available&nbsp;for export ? Our 2011 World Energy Outlook, to be&nbsp;presented on November 9th, will look at the implications&nbsp;of any possible shortfall in upstream investment&nbsp;in the Middle East and North Africa countries.&nbsp;Meanwhile the events at Fukushima this year raised&nbsp;serious questions about the longer-term prospects for&nbsp;nuclear power in Japan and elsewhere. We will also&nbsp;use our 2011 Outlook to examine the implications of &nbsp;any reduction in nuclear investment. Such a reduction&nbsp;would certainly make it more difficult for the&nbsp;world to meet the goal of stabilizing the rise in temperature&nbsp;at 2 degrees Centigrade.&nbsp;</p> <p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #800000;">What does the new energy map look like from your&nbsp;office in Paris?</span></p> <p style="text-align: justify;">I think that different countries and different regions&nbsp;will continue, quite justifiably, to vary in their energy&nbsp;balances due to differences in endowments, geography,&nbsp;economic patterns, and political and social&nbsp;values. Even in oil and gas, that geography is varied&nbsp;and regional. While U.S. shale gas may dominate the&nbsp;gas story in North America, lack of American export&nbsp;capacity means that it will not dominate the market in&nbsp;Europe, where piped conventional gas will continue&nbsp;to play a major role. Another example is the international&nbsp;oil market. It is too large to be dominated by&nbsp;one source. Increased Iraqi production, for example,&nbsp;will have to make up for declining mature fields in the industrialized world. But it will compete with other&nbsp;new conventional and unconventional production&nbsp;elsewhere.</p> <p style="text-align: right;">To read the full interview, order a copy of the <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.theglobaljournal.ch/product.php?id_product=29">magazine</a>.</p> <p style="text-align: right;"><span style="color: #999999;">By James Kanter</span></p>