Platts: IEA says global gas demand could rise more than 50% by 2035

World demand for natural gas could rise more than 50% by 2035, from 2010, the International Energy Agency said Tuesday, but only if a significant portion of the vast global resources of shale gas, tight gas and coalbed methane can be developed profitably and in an environmentally acceptable way.

The IEA said the surge in North American production of unconventional gas, thanks to technology advances, held out the prospect of further output increases in the US and Canada and "the emergence of a large-scale unconventional gas industry in other parts of the world, where sizeable resources are known to exist."

This would help bring about greater energy diversity and boost energy security and would also result in global benefits in the form of reduced energy costs, the IEA said in a special report, Golden Rules for a Golden Age of Gas.  MORE