MOSCOW (MRC) -- BP published the second edition of the BP Technology Outlook. The report explores five areas where BP believes technology can play a game-changing role: Energy efficiency; digital; renewable power; energy storage; and decarbonized gas, Hydrocarbonprocessing.
In order to meet demand, the energy industry uses technology to find, produce and convert primary energy resources including oil, natural gas, coal, uranium for nuclear power, biomass, solar and wind.
From the earliest oil wells to the latest wind turbines, technology developments have driven advances in the way that energy is discovered and produced – and many more developments are anticipated in the decades ahead.
Around 55 trillion barrels of oil and gas (measured in trillions of barrels of oil equivalent or Tboe) have been discovered around the world. Of these, we estimate that around one-tenth, or 4.9 Tboe, could be recovered using today’s technology. By applying evolving technology through to 2050, these recoverable volumes could be increased by more than one-third to around 7.3 Tboe. This volume is more than enough to meet the world’s projected demand to 2050 – estimated at 1.8 to 2.5 Tboe. However, exploration and technology development remains important in this sector to provide resource options that are more economical or have lower environmental footprints than some of the discovered resources. Oil and gas production from a reservoir declines naturally over its lifetime and our analysis supports the International Energy Agency’s estimate that investment of around $600 billion per year industry-wide could still be needed to produce sufficient oil and gas to satisfy demand – a figure which allows for impacts to oil and gas production from announced policies and pledges toward achieving the Paris Agreement.
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