Some Sidelights in Petroleum's Economic Progress

This discussion concerns what might be considered the by-product developments and trends, or parts of the whole, within the oil industry which come to the attention of an editor in connection with his daily and weekly tasks. Future Demands Predicting yearly petroleum demands has become a somewhat hazardous undertaking in this country since World War II. In some years the projections have varied so widely from actual demands as they have materialized that they have lost much of their value as a guide to operators. For example. most of the projections of a year ago called for an increase in 1954 U. S. demands of 4 to 4 1/2 per cent over 1953. The increase was less than 1 per cent. This means that the actual demand was around 250,000 B/D less than the anticipated level of operation, and that fact accounts for some of the unwanted oil developments of the past year. It is true, however, that the good years tend to offset the poor ones so that the five and 10-year periods work out, as regards demands, more in line with predictions. With this situation in mind some economists are predicting more than average gains for 1955. Keeping in mind that in these days of surpluses it is easier and less painful to expand operations than it is to contract them, a gain of 5% per cent domestic appears reasonable at this time. With a further decrease in exports in prospect we end Lip with a 4.8 per cent gain in over-all demands. This will total an estimated 8,483,560 B/D in this country for this year or a gain of 388,560 B/D over the year that has just closed. Of this total gain of 141,824,400 bbl for the entire year it is estimated that 78 per cent will come from domestic crude oil producers, 12 1/2 per cent from imports. and 8 1/2 per cent from natural gas liquids.