Europe oil consumption peaked 2005
This is the 3rd article using data from the BP Statistical Review published in June 2015
Fig 1: Western Europe oil consumption, oil prices in $2014
Total oil consumption peaked 3 times at around 14 mb/d:
(1) In 1973, the 1st oil crisis which was triggered by the Yom Kippur war. The following OPEC embargo was successful because US oil production had peaked 3 years earlier so the US could not increase production to offset OPEC’s reduction
(2) In 1979, the 2nd oil crisis which was caused by Iranian oil production peaking in the mid seventies and the following Iranian revolution, resulting in a global recession in 1982
(3) In 2005, at the beginning of the 3rd oil crisis when global crude oil production had a peak and declined until 2007
3 main oil consumers Germany, UK and France
The oil crises in the 70s brought down consumption by 2 mb/d (oil prices increased 10-fold) through both energy conservation and a recession.
Fig 2: Oil consumption Germany, UK and France
Consumption never went back to 1973 levels but peaked in 1998 and then declined by 0.6% pa until 2006 after which consumption declined by 1.7% pa, mainly due to drops in France and UK, while Germany reduced consumption irrespective of oil prices.
Fig 3: UK became net importer in 2006
Fig 4: UK debt and GDP
http://ftalphaville.ft.com/files/2013/01/Perfect-Storm-LR.pdf
UK debt started to increase more than GDP when oil production began to decline from its peak in 1999
