*As the world needs 20mb/d next 5 years to counter loss
Opeoluwani Akintayo
10 July 2017, 2017, Sweetcrude, Lagos — The global oil & gas sector has lost $1 trillion worth of investment since 2014 due to low oil price.
Saudi Arabia’s state oil company, Saudi Aramco made the revelation on Monday, warning that the losses would increase if the oil and gas industry does not start investing again.
According to SA CEO, Amin Nasser, the global oil supply/demand curve will reach a turning point in “a couple of years,”.
“About $1 trillion in investments have already been lost since the current downturn began,” Nasser said in at the World Petroleum Congress in Istanbul today.
Shortly after, he told CNBC that “A lack of investment is definitely not helping, so if that continues over the next couple of years there will be an inflection point.”
While analysts and investors are currently worried that OPEC and Saudi Arabia are not doing “whatever it takes” to balance the oversupplied market, Aramco’s chief executive was speaking of the long-term supply/demand dynamics, reiterating his stance that peak oil demand is nowhere in sight and “the world can’t prematurely disengage from proven and reliable energy sources like oil and gas.”
The US$1 trillion worth of investments that were never made due to the downturn is a “cause for concern to global energy security,” according to Nasser.
“About $1 trillion in investments has been lost in the current downturn, concurrent to growing oil demand and the natural decline of developed fields. Conservative estimates suggest we need about 20 million [additional] barrels per day over the next five years to counter these effects,” he said.