International Oil Supplies and Demands

The eleventh Energy Modeling Forum (EMF) working group met four times over the 1989--1990 period to compare alternative perspectives on international oil supplies and demands through 2010 and to discuss how alternative supply and demand trends influence the world's dependence upon Middle Eastern oil. Proprietors of eleven economic models of the world oil market used their respective models to simulate a dozen scenarios using standardized assumptions. From its inception, the study was not designed to focus on the short-run impacts of disruptions on oil markets. Nor did the working group attempt to provide a forecast or just a single view of the likely future path for oil prices. The model results guided the group's thinking about many important longer-run market relationships and helped to identify differences of opinion about future oil supplies, demands, and dependence.