Baku, Azerbaijan, Aug.19
By Leman Zeynalova – Trend:
It is becoming clearer that natural gas has a vital economic and environmental role in sustainability and all major outlooks see significant growth to natural gas demand well into 2050, the International Gas Union (IGU) told Trend.
The future energy mix will be one that will be dominated by renewable energies and natural gas, said the organization.
“Building on consistent growth over the past decade, the global market for natural gas experienced a record-setting year in 2018, growing 4.9 percent. Through the first half of 2019 strong growth rates have also been sustained, driven in part by gas prices at key hubs reaching multi-year lows. Rapid investment in gas infrastructure is also continuing, with significant LNG liquefaction and regasification capacity coming online in the past year,” said IGU.
It said that the biggest immediate driver of demand relates to efforts to reduce the dirty and polluted air found in the mega-cities and shipping ports of the world.
“Fuel switching away from coal to clean-burning natural gas effectively eliminates PM2.5 and SOx and significantly reduces NOx, the primary contributors to air pollution. There are many examples that clearly illustrated that fuel switching to natural gas in power, industrial and domestic use significantly and quickly improve air quality. And these examples come from every continent in the world,” said the organization.
In addition, as countries implement their Nationally Determined Contributions to fight climate change, clean-burning natural gas can reduce CO2 emissions by half, depending on the application, according to IGU.
“These applications range from power generation to industrial use and feedstock, domestic heat, hot water and clean cooking, to clean and efficient transport. Natural gas is the most flexible fuel with applications across the entire energy sector. It is abundant and increasingly becoming a global commodity with significant growth in both pipeline and LNG supplies,” said the organization.
The International Gas Union (IGU) was founded in 1931. It is a worldwide non-profit organisation registered in Vevey, Switzerland with the Secretariat currently located in Barcelona, Spain.
The mission of IGU is to advocate gas as an integral part of a sustainable global energy system, and to promote the political, technical and economic progress of the gas industry. The more than 160 members of IGU are associations and corporations of the gas industry representing over 95% of the global gas market. The working organisation of IGU covers the complete value of gas chain from exploration and production, transmission via pipelines and liquefied natural gas (LNG) as well as distribution and combustion of gas at the point of use.
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