China beats US as world's top energy consumer
13 Oct 2010
China has overtaken the United States to become the world's largest energy consumer, the head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Tuesday.
"China is now the largest energy consumer by our definition," Nobuo Tanaka, executive director of the IEA, said at an industry conference.
He said, perhaps, nearly half of the incremental global demand for oil comes from China. This is expected to continue for sometime now "Nobody knows when it slows down," he said.
China used more energy than any other country last year, for the first time. China consumed 2,252 million tonnes of "oil equivalent" in 2009, about 4 per cent more than the US, the Paris-based energy agency said.
But, in terms of per capita energy consumption, the US is still the leader. US has a 300 million population against China's 1.3 billion. The US thus beats China by a near 75 per cent margin in per capita energy consumption.
US energy consumption, even post recession, continues to grow at the same pace seen in the 80s and the 90s and any slow-down in demand would only come from a more efficient use of energy.
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