Commodities and Energy Market Organization in the Energy Transition Context [EM 2018]

The energy industry is facing significant challenges: commodity markets are evolving rapidly and the various players have to deal with uncertainties surrounding additional investment requirements and new technological solutions, both in line with environmental policies and the energy transition process around the world. Companies need to develop a strategic view of energy issues and they are reinventing their roles in increasingly interlinked markets. The high prices observed in the energy and non-ferrous metals markets during the last decade have been replaced by low prices and uncertainty. The peak oil debate has given way to developments related to peak demand. Rare earth and lithium prices are increasingly at the center of the environmental policy debate. In the gas and power industries, there is a pressing need to design the market rules capable to jointly support flexibility, meet the consumer needs, deliver a secure system and foster market integration. Recent events have generated additional uncertainty in the already complex and rapidly evolving global energy environment in which new actors and emerging economies are playing a leading role. Political developments around the globe are reshaping the geopolitical situation: market rules need to be reconsidered, as do the energy policies of governments at local, national and international level.

It is against this background that IFPEN has proposed a conference on the organization of the commodity and energy markets (EM 2018).