Energy Solution and Environtmental Info

The 2009 results show some remarkable changes compared to 2008. First, it was observed that the total primary energy supply, i.e. the total amount of energy used by the country to carry out all activities within their borders, decreased by 3.8% over the previous year.

Furthermore, we observed a decline in final consumption sectors, i.e. energy useful for actual applications, which reached 2.4%.

When this information is analyzed in more detail, we can see that this decline is explained mainly by decreases in consumption of industrial and mining sectors and transport, at 3.2% and 4.2% respectively. The only consumer sector showing a slight increase, showing greater resilience to the fall in economic activity is commercial, public and residential, with a positive variation of 2%, which, however, not enough to compensate the fall in consumption of the other two.

It should be noted that this drop in consumption is mainly reflected in the consumption of petroleum and coal, tools that natural gas consumption increased significantly with the coming into operation of the degasification of liquefied natural gas (LNG). Additionally, increased domestic production of primary energy by 6.8% (although less satisfying than a third of total consumption), and reduced total energy imports by 8.8%.

On this occasion, the information presents substantial improvements on previous years; it expanded both the number of surveys requested information. In particular, there was information of enterprises or production facilities to double the number of surveys conducted in previous years. Moreover, the detail of information requested grew to analyze better the penetration of certain technologies such as wind or biomass and the use made of energy.

“The changes respond to a policy outlined by the Ministry of Energy that seeks to improve the quality and coverage of the statistics generated to provide better information to citizens and to meet international requirements in this area. In particular, the country’s accession to the OECD and the recent application to the International Energy Agency (IEA), necessitate the need to build statistics with the highest standards of quality, “said Energy Minister, Ricardo Rainer.

Since October, the Ministry also started officially delivered on a regular basis (monthly and quarterly), information to the International Energy Agency (IEA) on production and consumption of oil, coal, gas, electricity and heat, as well as information prices, especially fuel. The requirements imposed by the release of this information, will require continued efforts to strengthen statistical capacity within the Ministry.