**2. Global trends of fossil fuel reserves**

United States, Russia and China are leading producers and consumers of World Energy. These three countries together produced 31% and consumed 41% world total energy as per International Energy Agency (IEA) 1999. United Sates consumed three times the energy than China, the second largest consumer of World. Fossil fuels will remain the most important energy source, at least until 2030, and the use of oil, gas and coal is expected to grow in volume (IEA, 2009) over this period. Coal is not scarce, but is problematic for pollution and climate change reasons. The production costs of oil continue to rise with the expansion of the share of deepwater exploration in the supply (IEA, 2008). Although coal and gas are abundantly available, environmental and logistical reasons prevent a substantial shift away from oil to these energy sources.

Fossil fuel reserves are concentrated in a small number of countries. 80 % of the coal reserves are located in just six countries; the European Union (EU) has 4 % of the global stock. The EU share of the world's gas reserves decreased from 4.6 % in 1980 to 1.3 % in 2009. These reserves are expected to be exhausted before 2030. More than half of the global stock is found in only three countries: Iran, Qatar and Russia (24 % in 2009), which is a major gas supplier for the EU. Ten countries (of which eight are OPEC members) have 80 % of the world's oil reserves. Some of these countries may exercise their power to restrict supply or influence the price (NIC, 2008). EU dependence on imported fossil fuels is slowly rising and presently amounts to about 55 %. Some EU countries (for instance Estonia, Italy, France and Sweden) have sizeable oil shale stocks. Reduced foreign supply may encourage them to exploit these sources. The Arctic region is expected to contain a substantial amount of oil, probably up to 90 billion barrels (EU: about 12 billion barrels).
