For over 70 years, international oil major BP has published an annual review of the world’s energy system. First published in 1952, it covered the then main oil producing regions and was limited to a single page. Much has changed since then. It has grown to become a comprehensive report spanning 60 pages and covering all aspects of energy, from primary energy resources through to energy conversion and consumption.

The advent of the internet brought it to a global audience and, for the first time, gave users direct access to the datasets and allowed them to interact with the data through dynamic online charting tools as well as consume information on the move via a mobile app.

Published each year towards the end of June, the Statistical Review (SR) is invariably the first comprehensive overview of the previous year’s annual global energy data to be published. The tone of the report has always been neutral and objective, which has helped cement its reputation as a trusted and widely quoted source of energy information.  

In late 2022, BP announced its intention to bring production of the SR to a close. Recognising its importance to the wider global community, the EI approached BP with a view to assuming custodianship, a move that triggered a process to transition it to its new home.

Published on 26 June 2023, this year’s publication represents the first under the EI’s ownership. To produce such a complex piece of analysis requires significant resources. For instance, the final published product consists of close to 300,000 individual data items. Behind this sits a much larger dataset consisting of unpublished and archive items from previous reports that top 169 gigabytes of storage.

As well working with BP to manage the transition, the EI has taken over the relationship with the Centre for Energy Economics Research and Policy (CEERP) at Heriot Watt University, based in Edinburgh, which has been involved in the SR’s production since 2007. In addition, in 2023 sponsors Kearney and KPMG joined the partnership. As well as providing funding critical to ensuring the SR’s continuation, they both provide analytical resources to assist with the sourcing, validation, analysis and production of content in the lead up to the annual publication.

Published each year towards the end of June, the Statistical Review (SR) is invariably the first comprehensive overview of the previous year’s annual global energy data to be published.
 

The process
The whole production directly involves around 30 analysts, academics and researchers spread across the partner organisations. Each year, the process starts in February with correspondence to around 55 government agencies and key information bodies – requesting the latest country level data, together with any previous year updates.

In parallel to this, work begins on setting up, cleansing, updating and checking the databases that house data going back to 1965.

As well as the requested Returns Forms, open-source information from government agencies and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) is collated and often supplemented by paid-for content from data providers happy to support the SR knowing that their data will appear in an aggregated form. For countries where data is harder to source or simply non-existent, forensic level searches are made to find announcements or statements that give indicators to likely events in the previous year.

Activity starts to ramp up around April when the flows of data rapidly increase and the painstaking processes of updating, converting, validating and cross checking it can begin. The weeks leading up to publication are the most intense, with content and presentations to be produced and proofread.

An additional challenge for the EI was to build from scratch a new website to host the SR and assume ownership from BP of the complex online charting tool and mobile apps. To achieve this, the EI’s Digital team recruited a specialist web developer dedicated to the project.

A challenging year
While 2022 was a particularly tumultuous year for energy with the conflict in Ukraine shifting concerns from energy demand to energy supply, an additional consequence, and one that challenged the SR researchers, was access to some data, particularly customs data for Russia and China that was previously publicly available. Significant time and effort was spent sourcing alternate, equally credible, data.  

The focus of the EI this year has been to manage the transfer of the SR and onboard and integrate its partners effectively to maintain the production standards of BP. Its intent is to remain true to the ethos of the SR that it is a global resource made publicly and freely available.

In much the same way that the world’s energy system is undergoing transition as it strives to meet 2050 net zero targets, the EI is keen to ensure that the SR itself continues to evolve to remain relevant to allow the world to track progress to 2050 and continue to hold nations to account for their actions.

For more information and to interact with this year’s statistics, please visit  EI Statistical Review of World Energy.

To read more about the key findings of the SR, click here.