In the past a strong demand within developing countries has been seen as representing strong economic growth. However those countries that lack these non-renewable resources must rely on importing them to meet the energy demands of their consumers. These countries will be the most vulnerable to fossil fuel price rises and competition for those resources. The map below shows those countries susceptible to oil price volatility. I have removed the high income countries as they have the policies and energy efficiency programmes in place to adjust to changes in oil price. The countries highlighted in orange are those most vulnerable to oil price fluctuations because of their high dependency on oil and oil imports.
The map below looks at countries that are major importers of fossil fuels, primarily oil. They look at the size of their fossil fuel imports and combines this with how those imports are used. This gives an indication of a countries energy security. I have again removed the high income countries as they generally have a diversity of energy that makes them less susceptible to disruptions in oil supplies. The countries highlighted in orange are those that are not only dependant on oil but also may have government institutions that are unable to cope with and adjust to variability in supply and competition for decreasing fossil fuel resources and so increase the country's overall energy security risk.
These two maps give an clear indication of the countries dependant on oil as their source of energy and where the fluctuations in price may cause problems when there are poor or weak government institutions in place to deal with them.
These individual interactive maps can be activated and edited to highlight other features that may be of interest to the reader by following the link below:
