PARIS, April 22 - The immediate drop in global natural gas demand linked to the Iran war risks becoming a permanent shift if the conflict continues, the secretary general of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum warned on Wednesday.
Philip Mshelbila, who leads the organisation representing about a dozen member states that together hold roughly 70% of the world's proven natural gas reserves, addressed delegates at the Invest in African Energy conference in Paris. He described current adjustments by gas-importing nations as short-term responses that could harden into lasting change.
"If the conflict ended today, the world would recover in six months to a year. But if it lasts six months, those knee-jerk changes we are seeing could become structural," Mshelbila said.
Mshelbila echoed data showing the scale of the disruption. Since the Middle East crisis began at the end of February, more than 500 million barrels of crude and condensate have been removed from the global market, according to Kpler figures. That loss has been described as the largest energy supply disruption of the modern era.
In response, countries that depend on Gulf supplies have increasingly turned to coal and have expedited plans to expand renewable generation. Those actions are now providing an alternative to gas that, if maintained, could lower long-term gas consumption.
Looking ahead to 2026, Mshelbila said the sector had been preparing for a turning point: a tight global gas market expected to swing into oversupply. The ongoing conflict, he said, has introduced uncertainty into that outlook.
"Clearly this conflict has done something to that, and it's not yet clear whether it's just a delay, or whether in fact that glut will ever come," he said.
Addressing an audience that included African energy ministers, Mshelbila said resource-rich countries on the continent were missing a commercial opening to replace supplies lost to Middle East outages and constrained shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
He noted that while some African nations have spare capacity in both liquefied natural gas and pipeline gas, most are not producing at full capacity. "If you look at the export pipelines to Europe, from Algeria or from Libya, not one of them is full," he said.
As a consequence of underutilised African upstream capacity, Mshelbila said North American producers are stepping into European and Asian markets. "Normally in a situation of crisis this is an opportunity: Fill it up! Seize the market! Unfortunately we are missing out, because we don't have the upstream molecules to fill the infrastructure," he added. "The reserves are there, but they are still in the ground."
The remarks framed three interlinked dynamics: major immediate supply losses tied to the Middle East crisis; demand-side shifts toward coal and renewables among importers; and a potential commercial opportunity for African producers that is not being realised because of constrained output. How these dynamics evolve will determine whether current demand destruction remains temporary or becomes structural.