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By Andrew Callus
LONDON, Jan 16 (Reuters) - Accelerating global energyefficiency means fuel use is rising far slower than prosperity,largely because Chinese industrial development is increasinglyenergy efficient, a study by oil company BP Plc found.
In its annual Outlook 2030 report, BP predicts a 36 percentincrease in energy use between 2011 and 2030. That outstripsforecast population growth of 18.5 percent to 8.3 billion butcomes as world income is expected to roughly double in realterms.
The reduction in so-called energy intensity - energy use perunit of gross domestic product (GDP) - is bringing the measureback down to levels not seen since the late 19th Century.
The trend, along with a strongly rising market share ofnon-fossil fuels, will not be enough to keep greenhouse gasemissions below the International Energy Agency (IEA) centraltarget of 450 parts per million (ppm) of carbon-dioxideequivalent.
But the pace at which Chinese industrialisation inparticular is moving towards a more energy-efficient stage hassurprised economic forecasters at BP, one of the world's biggestoil companies.
BP's chief economist Christof Ruhl says China is movingsurprisingly quickly along the industrialisation cycle, wherepeople and production move from energy-intensive industry intoservices and lighter manufacturing.
"That pattern is kicking in big time," Ruhl said, citingslower growth in coal use by China after 2020 as a key factor inhis statistics.
"Globalisation means we are able to trade every fuel acrossalmost every border as standardisation and energy consumptionand production is everywhere, technologies are shared very veryquickly," Ruhl said.
"The differences between countries in energy intensitieshave never been as small as they are today since the beginningof the industrial revolution and we see that trend continuing,"he said. "We live in the most efficient world for the last 140years I think."
BP expects energy use to grow 1.6 percent a year between2011 and 2030 - in line with the highest of three growthscenario pictured by the IEA for a similar period, between 2009to 2035.
But its projected energy use growth rate declines from 2.5percent in the decade up to 2010, to 2.1 percent for the 10years to 2020, and then slides more dramatically to 1.3 percenta year in 2020 through 2030.
It sees global energy intensity in 2030 being 31 percentlower than in 2011, with the decline taking place in all regionsand accelerating from just 1 percent in 2000-2010 to 2.2 percentin 2020 to 2030.
Although it is losing touch with the pace of economicgrowth, a 36 percent increase in energy consumption would stillbe bad news for greenhouse gas emissions targets and the IEA's450 ppm target.
By 2030, BP says, "emissions remain well above the requiredpath to stabilise the concentration of greenhouse gases at the(450 ppm) level recommended."
