La biomasse, activité alternative au développement des zones rurales

b) The modesty of the Community resources

In spite of considerable progress of their exploitation, the European conventional reserves remain very weak and their expensive extraction. In the future, a fast trend fall of the domestic fossil energy resources is foreseeable.

There are many uncertainties concerning the production of hydrocarbon in Europe. The oil reserves are very inequitably distributed on a worldwide scale. The European Union is equipped particularly little with it. One considers the reserves Community proven at eight years of consumption at the current level (unchanged consumption and performances). The Union produced, thanks to the exploitation at sea of North (primarily the United Kingdom), 158,3 million tons oil equivalent (1997) that is to say hardly 4,4% of the world production. Today, the costs of extraction of the European production turn goshawks from 7 to 11$ the barrel against 1 to 3$ to the Middle East. The natural gas reserves are distributed relatively better world-wide, but the European Union has hardly 2% of the reserves of the sphere, that is to say twenty years at the current rate/rhythm of consumption. The Union extracted 223,2 million tons oil equivalent in 1997 (12% of the world production). The principal reserves are at the Netherlands (56%) and in Great Britain (24%). ^12(*)

The rate/rhythm of exhaustion of the Community resources depends on the reserves proven but also on the price of hydrocarbons on the international market and technological progress. If the current prices of natural gas and oil were to be maintained on the international market (goshawks of 30$ in 2000) the exploitation of important reserves would be committed. However, whatever the uncertainty related to the international economic situation, within twenty-five years, at the current rate/rhythm of production, the layers of gas and oil at sea of North will become exhausted. In 1999, Norway had 1,77 thousand billion m3 reserves proven out of natural gas which at the current rate/rhythm of exploitation is enough for twenty-three years to consumption. The reserves proven out of oils are considered at 11 billion barrels, sufficient for 10 years still. Widening does not offer any prospect for improvement of the internal production.

The mining productions are also declining, in absolute terms, the world solid fuel reserves are considerable, four to five times those of oil, that is to say two hundred years of consumption. Eighty pourcents of the European reserves in conventional energy consist of solid fuels (coal, lignite, peat).

This optimistic observation must be moderated by the variability of quality of solid fuels and their production costs. The difficult geological conditions and the standards of Social Security cover of the European Union carry the average production cost of the coal to meadows from 3 to 4 times the price of the international market. In this context, the European coal is not competitive. This ditch forced the European producers to cease any production. From here a few years, the European coal-mining industry, even by taking account of widening, will not contribute any more but to one very reduced share of its energy provisioning because of its not very competitive character.

* ¹²ibid, p9