Aramco: Europe’s energy crisis plans are only a short-run solution

The head of Saudi state oil giant Aramco stated on Tuesday Europe’s plans to cap energy bills for consumers and tax energy companies were not short-run or helpful solutions for the global energy crisis.

“Freezing or capping energy bills might help consumers in the short term, but it does not address the real causes and is not the long-term solution,” Chief Executive Amin Nasser said in forum in Switzerland.

“And taxing companies when you want them to increase production is clearly not helpful.”

Governments throughout Europe have plowed hundreds of billions of euros into tax cuts, handouts, and subsidies to deal with an energy crisis that is driving up inflation, forcing industries to shut production and hiking bills ahead of winter.

Within EU plans announced last week, excessive profits from energy companies would be taken out and redistributed to ease the burden on consumers.

Nasser on Tuesday stated that continuing underinvestment in the hydrocarbons sector at a time when alternatives to fossil fuels were still not readily available was among the root causes of the problem.

“The conflict in Ukraine has certainly intensified the effects of the energy crisis, but it is not the root cause,” he pointed.

“Sadly, even if the conflict stopped today as we all wish, the crisis would not end,” he said.

Aramco has been investing to boost the kingdom’s oil capacity to 13 million barrels per day (bpd) by 2027, but Nasser warned that globally investments in hydrocarbons were still, “too little, too late, too short term.”

The lack of investments comes at a time when spare capacity is thin and demand is fairly healthy despite strong economic headwinds.

“When the global economy recovers, we can expect demand to rebound further, eliminating the little spare oil production capacity out there,” Nasser highlighted.

“That is why I am seriously concerned.”