Exxon Corp chairman Lawrence Rawl said total world energy consumption will continue to grow but added new oil discoveries worldwide are slowing down and can not offset annual production. In a speech at the World Petroleum Congress here Rawl said oil companies would increasingly be forced to turn to enhanced recovery techniques very heavy oil and synthetics to compensate for substantial declines in conventional oil production. What our current outlook suggests is that total world energy consumption will continue to grow steadily in an ever more energy efficient world Rawl said. But he added Exxon projects that despite todays ample supplies the world will also be facing up to inherent limitations on the availability of oil and gas which currently supplies more than half of the worlds energy needs. The Exxon chairman told some 1500 oil executives from around the world that some synthetics projects could become practical when oil reaches 30 dlrs to 40 dlrs a barrel range in real terms. The question is when and how this will happen he said. I believe that synthetic projects will not only re-emerge but will become commercial well below those we were thinking about the last time oil prices moved substantially higher. Rawl said synthetic fuel would become economic at lower prices because companies are investigating a new generation of ideas that promise substantially lower costs and projects begun in the late 1970s which have since been suspended. Rawl also said companies must find new and more effective ways of enhanced recovery from existing oil fields. It would be my view that new oil discoveries even with advanced technology are likely to slow down - not reverse - the decline in worldwide oil discoveries he said. So it is essential to find a better way to recover more of the discovered oil from producing fields using chemicals solvents heat and other techniques. Rawl emphasized that private oil companies need some assistance from government in developing synfuels technology. More importantly they need to provide a political and economic environment that is stable enough to allow the developmental process to function effectively he said. Rawl also said stable energy markets serve the best interest of producing and consuming nations by allowing both groups to plan for steady economic growth. He did not make any oil price prediction saying only that the economic goals of the U.S. and other nations can only be achieved if world oil prices stabilize within a reasonable range. Prices must be high enough to meet realistic aspirations for income and encourage resource development in the producing countries but not so high as to inhibit economic growth in consuming nations he said. The Exxon chairman also criticized the occasional attempt of consuming nations to try to control domestic oil prices calling such protectionist measures disruptive to the world oil market.
EXXON <XON> SEES DROP IN NEW OIL DISCOVERIES