The bars here are daily new Covid-19 cases, the line is Apple’s driving mobility indicator, based on requests for directions on its Maps app. ![]() Mobility data show that even as the Delta variant of Covid-19 caused a surge in US infections, people kept driving. Gasoline consumption since July has been only about 2% below its 2019 level. In the US, petroleum product demand over the summer has been approaching its all-time highs at about 21 million b/d. Countries where vaccination rates are relatively high and fatalities have dropped sharply are generally seeing stronger recoveries than lower-income countries that face greater difficulties in protecting their populations. The pace of the recovery across products and across countries is still uneven, however, as a recent Wood Mackenzie insight explained. By the third quarter of 2022, Wood Mackenzie projects, world oil demand will be back to pre-pandemic levels. That demand growth, coupled with the OPEC+ group’s decision to stick to its previously agreed scheduled for increasing supply, has driven prices higher, leaving Brent crude at about $82 a barrel on Thursday and WTI at about $78. World oil consumption ran at about 97 million barrels per day in the third quarter of 2021, up 6% from the same quarter of 2020, and Wood Mackenzie expects it to rise again to about 99 million b/d in the fourth quarter. ![]() For oil, too, demand has been rebounding. Resurgent demand has been a key factor in the record high gas and coal prices recorded in Europe and Asia in recent weeks. But although the pandemic is still with us, its impact on the world economy and on energy demand is fading.
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