No Drop in Oil Demand Seen (Birol)

Oil prices pushing well past $100 a barrel will do little to stop worldwide demand, said the economics chief of the International Energy Agency, which advises 27 member countries.

Subsidies in China, India and oil-producing countries will combine with strong economic growth in those areas to support demand even with prices rising, Fatih Birol of the IEA told a panel at the energy industry’s Offshore Technology Conference in Houston. That prospect runs counter to history, he said.
“We shouldn’t expect too much from the price, in terms of bringing demand down,” he said. “China and India are transforming the energy markets by the sheer size of their populations.”

Washington Post