IEA's Mandil welcomes Bush talk of reducing US oil 'addiction'

Paris (Platts)--14Feb2006

The head of the International Energy Agency Tuesday welcomed President
Bush's move to reduce the US "addiction" to oil and said producers need not be
worried about moves to step up energy efficiency.
     President Bush "said his country is 'addicted to oil,' which is true,
everyone knows that," the IEA's executive director, Claude Mandil, said at a
news conference. "He thinks that should be decreased. We think that it very
helpful--we applaud that."
     Producers should not be concerned about the prospect of a decrease in
demand from the US, Mandil said.         
     "It does not mean being less dependent on one country because the oil
market is a world market," he said. "I don't think producing countries should
be too anxious about it."
     The Paris-based IEA is willing to hold talks with OPEC and other
producers on the impact on oil demand should consuming nations use energy more
efficiently, Mandil said.      
     "We are prepared to continue our dialogue with our OPEC colleagues and
producing countries on what they call the roadmap, which are the scenarios and
the possibilities for oil demand if we in the producing countries are much
more efficient," he said.
     "I am still convinced that the result will be that we still need a lot of
oil from producing countries," he said.
     In his State of the Union speech last month, Bush set a goal of reducing
US imports of Middle East oil by 75% by 2025, saying that "America is addicted
to oil, which is often imported from unstable parts of the world."
--Jacinta Moran, jacinta_moran@platts.com

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