The petroleum shocks more efficient than energy policies

The international energy agency has published a study about the last thirty years of energy consumption. The first lesson to infer is that the two petroleum shocks of 1970 have had a more important influence on the energy consumption reduction than any energy policy positioned since 1990. The study covers eleven countries that represents 80% of the energy consumption. Improvement of energy efficiency between 1973 and 1990 but it slowed down since 1990. The Iea proposes three actions to improve the energy efficiency: to take into account the cost of environmental consequences, to put in place norms and standards, to develop the research to valid the technologies improving the energy efficiency. (N.C.)