Belgium Market Research

The Belgium Market Research provides a very comprehensive study on the power and energy sector in the country. It shows that by the end of 2014, the nation will demand for 6.14% of the European regional oil. However, on the dow... view more

Belgium Market Research

The Belgium Market Research provides a very comprehensive study on the power and energy sector in the country. It shows that by the end of 2014, the nation will demand for 6.14% of the European regional oil. However, on the downside, there won’t be any sizeable contribution from Belgium towards the supply of the entire region. In developed Europe, the average consumption was 13.28bn b/d in 2009 which is expected to rise to 13.44bn b/d by the end of the forecast period ending 2014. The production level in 2001 was 6.96bn b/d which fell down to 4.73bn b/d in 2009. By the end of the forecast period of 2014, it is expected to further fall to 3.71bn b/d. The amount of imports is increasing silently since the demand is outgrowing the supply in developed Europe. But the extent of imports is not a cause of worry, as yet; the reason being that the rise is taking place very slowly. In the entire European region, by the end of 2014, Norway will be the only net exporter, while UK will primarily be a net importer.

On the natural gas front, the region of Developed Europe consumed a total of 426bn cubic meters in 2009 while it is expected to rise to 473bn cubic meters in 2014. The research shows that there is expected to be a 9.6% growth by the end of 2014. The production levels of natural gas which was 265bn cubic meters in 2009 and had an import deficit of 161bn cubic meters is expected to fall to 263bn cubic meters by 2014, which will further increase the deficit to 210bn cubic meters. In 2009, Belgium had a share of 3.99% in the consumption while having no significant contribution in the production levels. By the end of the estimate period ending in 2014, the nation’s consumption percentage would have fallen down to 3.78% with still no contribution to the production levels.

Due to the economic slowdown which affected almost the entire world, the Belgian GDP fell by 3.1% in 2009, but it is expected to rise by 1.1% by the end of 2010. Over the forecast period from 2010-2014, the average annual growth is estimated to be around 1.5%. Another effect of the crisis was that the oil demand went down in 2009 which is expected to rise to 830,000 b/d by 2013-2014. The average estimate in 2009 for gas demand was 17bcm which is expected to rise to 17.9bcm by the end of 2014. But there is no need to worry because all of the increased demand would be met by LNG imports and improved pipelines. Belgium has a political risk score of 74.7 as compared to the developed country average of 86.7 and the global average risk of 63.7. The reason why Belgium is hovering in the middle is that the country has a privatized energy sector which functions under EU guidelines, thus reducing risk factor.