Global Energy Perspective 2021 – McKinsey&Company

Editor’s note

We publish this long-term energy outlook at the start of 2021, after a year that has brought extraordinary challenges. Economies worldwide have experienced profound effects of the global health crisis, triggered by widespread public-health responses aiming to control the virus.

Energy markets have reflected the uncertainty and shown exceptional movements. At the beginning of the crisis, plunging fuel demand in many key markets was reflected by prices: by the end of March 2020, the price of gas hit a 30-year low, whereas the price of oil, also affected by supply shocks, showed the largest single-day decline in the past 22 years. As economies have reopened, energy commodities have shown a partial rebound: for example, by the end of third quarter 2020, oil demand in China was back at pre-COVID-19 levels, and 50 percent of the decline was recovered in Europe and North America.