The global energy crisis stemming from the war in Iran is worse than the global oil shocks of the 1970s, according to the executive director of the International Energy Agency.
In each of the two oil crises of 1973 and 1979, the world lost about 5 million barrels of oil a day, causing major global economic downturns, Fatih Birol told the National Press Club of Australia in Canberra.
“Today — only as of today — we lost 11 million barrels per day, so more than two major oil shocks put together,” he said.
Birol said the other current energy crisis, involving natural gas, is worse than Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, which cost the world 75 billion cubic meters of gas per day compared with the 140 billion cubic meters being lost daily now.
The current situation is like “two oil crises and one gas crisis put all together,” he said, adding that it goes beyond those two fuels to include “vital arteries of the global economy” such as petrochemicals, fertilizer, sulfur and helium.
“Their trade is all interrupted, which would have serious consequences for the global economy,” he said, with food prices likely to soon be affected if shipments of fertilizer are disrupted for too long.
Birol said at least 40 energy assets in nine countries had been “severely or very severely damaged,” and that it would take time for them to return to normal capacity.
“No country will be immune to the the effects of this crisis if it continues to go in this direction,” he said.
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