According to the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), the demand for crude oil is expected to grow steadily worldwide in 2024. The report predicted that by the end of the year, the average daily demand for oil worldwide would reach 104.36 million barrels.
“Oil demand is expected to be supported by resilient global GDP growth, amid continued improvements in economic activity in China,” OPEC said in its regular monthly report on the oil market, Arab News reported.
The demand in the industrialised countries that make up the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development is predicted to rise by 0.3 million barrels per day to an average of 46.1 million barrels per day, which is still less than the record set in 2019.
Demand is expected to increase by 2 million barrels per day on average to 58.3 million barrels per day in non-OECD countries.
The predictions coincided with the first-ever explicit call at a COP global climate conference for a progressive reduction in the use of fossil fuels, the primary cause of global warming.
By science, COP28 advocates for a “transition away from fossil fuels in energy systems, in a just, orderly, and equitable manner, accelerating action in this critical decade, so as to achieve net zero by 2050.”
The Paris Agreement, which set the goal of maintaining the rise in global temperatures at 1.5C, was reached eight years after the world experienced its hottest year ever.
Meanwhile, it is anticipated that tensions will run high in the COP28 climate conference negotiations as a result of the disclosure of the contents of a leaked letter from the secretary-general of the Organisation of OPEC, requesting that its members reject any mention of doing away with fossil fuels.
All 13 OPEC members as well as a few other economies that rely heavily on fossil fuels received a letter from Secretary General Haitham Al Ghais, Reuters reported.