Industrial Organic Chemistry
1. Various Aspects of the Energy and Raw Material Supply
The availability and price structure of energy and raw materials
have always determined the technological base and thus the
expansion and development of industrial chemistry. However,
the oil crisis was necessary before the general public once again
became aware of this relationship and its importance for the
world economy.
Coal, natural gas, and oil, formed with the help of solar energy
during the course of millions of years, presently cover not only
the energy, but also to a large extent chemical feedstock
requirements.
There is no comparable branch of industry in which there is such
a complete interplay between energy and raw materials as in the
chemical industry. Every variation in supply has a double impact
on the chemical industry as it is one of the greatest consumers of
energy. In addition to this, the non-recoverable fossil products,
which are employed as raw materials, are converted into a
spectrum of synthetic substances which we meet in everyday life.
The constantly increasing demand for raw materials and the
limited reserves point out the importance of safeguarding future
energy and raw material supplies.
All short- and medium-term efforts will have to concentrate on
the basic problem as to how the flexibility of the raw material
supply for the chemical industry on the one hand, and the energy
sector on the other hand, can be increased with the available
resources. In the long term, this double function of the fossil
fuels will be terminated in order to maintain this attractive source
of supply for the chemical industry for as long as possible.
In order to better evaluate the present situation and understand
the future consumption of primary energy sources and raw
materials, both aspects will be reviewed tog
individual energy sources.
2 I . Various Aspects of the Energy and Raw Material Supply
1.1. Present and Predictable Energy Requirements
During the last twenty-five years, the world energy demand has
more than doubled and in 1995 it reached 94.4 x 10” kwhr,
corresponding to the energy from 8.12 x lo9 tonnes of oil
(1 tonne oil =11620 kwhr = 10 x lo6 kcal = 41.8 x lo6 kJ).
The average annual increase before 1974 was about 5%, which
decreased through the end of the 198Os, as the numbers in the
adjacent table illustrate. In the 1990s, primary energy consumption
has hardly changed due to the drop in energy demand
caused by the economic recession following the radical changes
in the former East Bloc.
However, according to the latest prediction of the International
Energy Agency (IEA), global population will grow from the
current 5.6 to 7 x lo9 people by the year 2010, causing the
world energy demand to increase to 130 x 10l2 kwhr.
In 1989, the consumption of primary energy in the OECD
(Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development)
countries was distributed as follows :
31 To for transport
34% for industrial use
35% for domestic and agricultural use, and other sectors
The chemical industry accounts for 6% of the total energy
consumption and thereby assumes second place in the energy
consumption scale after the iron processing industry.
Between 1950 and 1995, the worldwide pattern of primary
energy consumption changed drastically. Coal’s share decreased
from ca. 60% in 1950 to the values shown in the accompanying
table. In China and some of the former Eastern Bloc countries,
40% of the energy used still comes from coal. Oil’s share
amounted to just 25% of world energy consumption in 1950,
and reached a maximum of nearly 50% in the early 1970s.
Today it has stabilized at ca. 38%, and is expected to decrease
slightly to 3770 by 2000.
The reasons for this energy source structure lie with the ready
economic recovery of oil and natural gas and their versatile
applicability as well as lower transportation and distribution
costs.
In the following decades, the forecast calls for a slight decrease
in the relative amounts of energy from oil and natural gas, but
a small increase for coal and nuclear energy. An eventual transition
to carbon-free and inexhaustible energy sources is
desirable, but this development will be influenced by many factors.
In any event, oil and natural gas will remain the main energy
sources in predictions for decades, as technological reorientation
will take a long time due to the complexity of the problem.
1.2. Availability of Individual Sources
1.2.1. Oil
New data show that the proven and probable, i. e., supplementary,
recoverable world oil reserves are higher than the roughly
520 x lo9 tonnes, or 6040 x 10l2 kwhr, estimated in recent
years. Of the proven reserves (1996), 66% are found in the
Middle East, 13% in South America, 3% in North America,
2% in Western Europe and the remainder in other regions. With
about 26% of the proven oil reserves, Saudi Arabia has the
greatest share, leading Iraq, Kuwait and other countries principally
in the Near East. In 1996, the OPEC countries accounted
for ca. 77 wt% of worldwide oil production. Countries with
the largest production in 1994 were Saudi Arabia and the USA.
A further crude oil supply which amounts to ten times the abovementioned
petroleum reserves is found in oil shale, tar sand, and
oil sand. This source, presumed to be the same order of
magnitude as mineral oil only a few years ago, far surpasses it.
There is a great incentive for the exploitation of oil shale and oil
sand. To this end, extraction and pyrolysis processes have been
developed which, under favorable local conditions, are already
economically feasible. Large commercial plants are being run in
Canada, with a significant annual increase (for example, production
in 1994 was 17% greater than in 1993), and the CIS.
Although numerous pilot plants have been shut down, for
instance in the USA, new ones are planned in places such as
Australia. In China, oil is extracted from kerogen-containing
rock strata. An additional plant with a capacity of
0.12 x lo6 tonnes per year was in the last phase of construction
in 1994.
At current rates of consumption, proven crude oil reserves will
last an estimated 43 years (1996). If the additional supply from
oil shale/oil sands is included, the supply will last for more than100 years.
4 1. Various Aspects of the Energy and Raw Material Supply
However, the following factors will probably help ensure an oil
supply well beyond that point: better utilization of known
deposits which at present are exploited only to about 30% with
conventional technology, intensified exploration activity, recovery
of difficult-to-obtain reserves, the opening up of oil fields
under the seabed as well as a restructuring of energy and raw
material consumption.
1.2.2. Natural Gas
The proben and probable world natural gas reserves are
somewhat larger than the oil reserves, and are currently
estimated at 368 x 1012 m3, or 3390 x 1012 kwhr. Proven reserves
amount to 1380 x 1012 kwhr.
In 1995, 39% of these reserves were located in the CIS, 14% in
Iran, 5% in Qatar, 4% in each of Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia,
and 3% in the USA. The remaining 31% is distributed among
all other natural gas-producing countries.
Based on the natural gas output for 1995 (25.2 x 10” kwhr),
the proven worldwide reserves should last for almost 55 years.
In 1995, North America and Eastern Europe were the largest
producers, supplying 32 and 29%, respectively, of the natural
gas worldwide.
Natural gas consumption has steadily increased during the last
two decades. Up until now, natural gas could only be used where
the corresponding industrial infrastructure was available or
where the distance to the consumer could be bridged by means
of pipelines. In the meantime, gas transportation over great
distances from the source of supply to the most important
consumption areas can be overcome by liquefaction of natural
gas (LNG = liquefied natural gas) and transportation in
specially built ships as is done for example in Japan, which supplies
itself almost entirely by importing LNG. In the future,
natural gas could possibly be transported by first converting it
into methanol - via synthesis gas - necessitating, of course,
additional expenditure.
The dependence on imports, as with oil, in countries with little
or no natural gas reserves is therefore resolvable. However, this
situation will only fundamentally change when synthesis gas
technology - based on brown (lignite) and hard coal - is
established and developed. This will probably take place on a
larger scale only in the distant future.
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