Explore our expert insights and analysis in leading energy and climate news stories.
The Center on Global Energy Policy (CGEP) at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) is thrilled to announce the selection of the second cohort of...
Get the latest as our experts share their insights on global energy policy.
Long before crowdsourcing became a worldwide phenomenon, “Harambee” (“pulling together”) was the Kenyan national motto. In postcolonial Kenya, fundraising became a way to build schools and hospitals and...
Hear in-depth conversations with the world’s top energy and climate leaders from government, business, academia, and civil society.
Geopolitics looms large over the global economy. A recent client survey by Goldman Sachs found geopolitics is the top investment risk of this year, overtaking inflation and the...
External Publications by Tim Boersma & Antoine Halff • November 27, 2018
Discussions about “peak oil demand” tend to focus on passenger vehicles, often from a US and European perspective. These discussions often ignore other markets, such as marine transport, which collectively would also need to show a reduction in demand if oil consumption were to reach an inflection point. In an article for the journal Elsevier Energy Policy, CGEP Scholars Dr. Tim Boersma and Antoine Halff explore the outlook for marine bunkers, a niche market that accounts, depending on estimates, for up to 7% of the demand barrel. They focus on the possible impact of new environmental restrictions that aim to drastically reduce sulfur oxide (SOx) emissions from ships as of January 2020, placing them against the background of past innovations that have been reshaping ships’ fuel consumption patterns and assessing their likely impact on future innovation in the sector. They conclude that the rules might paradoxically end up slowing down what might have otherwise been a more rapid transition of the shipping market away from traditional bunker fuels. The rules will, however, adversely affect simple refineries and producers of heavy, sour crude oil grades, whose prices are sometimes indexed to that of high sulfur fuel oil (HSFO).
As the world races to transition to cleaner energy sources, there exists a substantial gap between the financing required for this transition and the actual investments being made.
Full report
External Publications by Tim Boersma & Antoine Halff • November 27, 2018