The Ever-changing Energy Sector; We Live in Revolutionary Times

摘要

It will come as no surprise to our readers that the shale gas "revolution" continues to spread around the world, as revolutions have a habit of doing. Dubbed by Daniel Yergin and Robert Ineson as the "biggest energy innovation of the decade", its transformative effect on energy security, energy prices and the wider economy in the United States, coupled with the appeal of gas as the cleanest burning fossil fuel, has spawned imitators in a number of other countries. The United Kingdom, Poland, Ukraine, Argentina and China are currently leading the field, but others will surely follow suit, notwithstanding the ban that some countries, such-as France and Bulgaria, have put in place. The promise of cheap and plentiful indigenous gas, insulated from the political pressures of cross-border supply, is likely to be too strong to resist. Whilst the much-vaunted environmental concerns, such as drinking water pollution and seismic tremors, have little evidence of actual damage to support them to date, well-conceived regulations can be introduced without much difficulty to guard against the attendant environmental risks. The world is entering what the International Energy Agency has termed a "golden age" of natural gas, with greater energy diversity and more secure supply. Shale gas is likely to form a central part of it.