In a new white paper, RPS Energy's senior specialist, Simon Telling, looks at the current political unrest in the Middle East and its potential impact on the global energy markets.
The study explores the ongoing troubles in North Africa and unrest elsewhere in the Middle East, the possible significant consequences for all global economies and the energy sector in particular. Most importantly, the countries that are, or could become, potentially involved hold nearly 62% of the world’s oil reserves, generate 33% of current crude production and supply some 50% of all crude oil exports.
The report examines the geographical location of these countries to a number of key oil transit chokepoints which could affect oil supplies if these were closed, restricted or unpoliced and the impact of the recent changes in Tunisia and Egypt, and possibly in Libya, Bahrain and Yemen, on the surrounding oil producing countries in a “domino effect”.
Telling and the RPS Energy team argue that there is a very wide range of possible outcomes in the short to medium term, with a real potential for significant price volatility and also further rises in absolute crude prices. They also reveal some fundamental factors in energy markets that will cause prices to be bound more narrowly in the longer term.
