The future of the global market for natural gas

Abstract

The author presents an analysis of the current state of the global market for natural gas and the forecast for its long-term development. In the article re-gional and sectoral aspects of gas production and consumption are considered, with particular attention paid to the development priorities of the gas industry in the countries of East and South Asia. During the periods of economic slowdown, the imbalance between supply and demand in the global hydrocarbon market leads to destabilization. To predict such situations in advance, specialists from international and Russian organi-zations (International Energy Agency, BP plc, Institute of Energy Research of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Energy Economics of Japan) and consulting companies (IHS Markit) regularly prepare works on the evolution of world energy markets and the implications for Russia. Almost all authors are not yet ready to specify in the foreseeable future the period of peak gas demand even for the world's largest economies (with the exception of the Eu-ropean Union and developed countries of Asia), which gives reason to call the 21st century a “natural gas century”.