Asian Dethroned North America as the largest petroleum consuming region in 2008.
Asian petroleum demand has risen 146% from 1980 to 2010, an increase of nearly 15 million barrels per day. North America’s petroleum consumption increased only 16% over the same time period. Petroleum consumption has increased globally 36% over this time, or around 23 millions barrels per day.
We can see in this map from the U.S. Energy Information Administration which regions have been the largest consumers.
European demand for petroleum saw a decrease of 5% from 1980 to 2010, while consumption in the Former Soviet Union dropped a staggering 55%.
