The energy crisis and Third World options

Abstract

The non-OPEC developing world is a cluster of 110-odd countries broadly clubbed as the 'Third World'. They present a picture of vast diversity not only in such very basic features as size, population, resources, levels of poverty and unemployment, stages of economic development and political systems of government; the diversity extends also to several aspects of energy sources and demand: a) within the Third World, there are countries such as China which have proven coal reserves of 300 billion tonnes, while India has only 23 billion and Sri Lanka's reserves are negligible. The crude petroleum reserves of Mexico are an estimated 483 million tonnes, but Morocco has none. In natural gas, China is believed to have 550 billion cubic metres and Zaire, only 2 billion cubic metres; b) in terms of energy consumption, there is Argentina with 1754 kg of coal equivalent per capita, and Bangladesh with only 28 kg (in contrast to the US with a massive I 1,000 kg); c) in some countries such as India, over 65 per cent of the electricity is consumed in industry but in Sri Lanka, the percentage is only 33; d) after the oil price increase in 1973, most of the Third World countries have woken up to the need for an energy plan; but in their priorities, again, there is diversity. While countries like Argentina and the Philippines seem to be laying great emphasis on the developmentof nuclear power, others such as India are simultaneously attempting to develop biogas at one end and nuclear power at the other. Amidst this diversity, there is, however, an underlying homogeneity which comes into focus when they are compared with the industrialised countries in terms of separate groupings. In comparison with the latter, the Third World's per capita energy consumption is indeed low. Third World countries are also relatively less urbanised, and more richly endowed with sunlight. The principal known sources of energy can be divided into two broad categories: non-commercial, which includes firewood, animal waste, vegetable waste, animal power, wind power and human physical power; and commercial, which includes coal, crude oil, natural gas, atomic energy, and electricity, both hydro