据国际能源署（International Energy Agency）的最新数据，中国已超过美国，成为全球最大的能源消费国。
这一里程碑反映中国十年来经济强劲发展，以及作为 工业大国快速扩张的未来需求。国际能源署表示，去年中国消费了22.52亿吨油当量，较美国高出约4%，美国消费了21.70亿吨油当量。油当量代表消费 的所有形式的能源，其中包括原油、核电、煤炭、天然气以及水力发电等再生资源。
数据部分显示，全球经济衰退对美国的打击力度较中国更加严 重，并损及美国工业活动和能源使用。多年来中国总体能源消费呈两位数年率增长，因中国工业基础庞大。10年前中国总体能源消费仅是美国的一半，当前数据说 明中国能源需求增长有多快。
国际能源署首席经济学家比罗尔（Fatih Birol）在接受采访时说，中国超过美国成为全球最大的能源消费国，标志着能源史上新时代的开始。
他说，二十世纪初以来，美国一直是全 球最大的整体能源消费国。国际能源署是向世界多数最大经济体提供能源顾问的机构。
中国经济崛起需要大量能源，尤其是因为2000年以来的 10年经济成长不是像美国那样是由消费者需求带动的，而是由能源密集型的重工业和基础建设推动的。
中国经济增长改变了全球能源市场，并使 中国消费的每样能源，从石油到铀再到其他自然资源的价格居高不下。中国一度曾是石油和煤炭的主要出口国。中国更加依赖进口提升了全球能源价格，并支持了非 洲、中东和澳大利亚资源部门的繁荣。
目前中国对能源快速增加的需求肯定有重大地缘政治意义，因其寻求各种方式满足能源需求。中国进口不断 增加已改变了全球地缘政治格局。中国石油和煤炭企业是首先向海外寻求能源供应的行业，它们将中国旗帜插在了苏丹等地区，而苏丹是西方企业基于国际压力已大 致放弃的国家。
最雄心勃勃的希望获得海外能源供应的努力是2005年中国海洋石油有限公司（简称：中海油）企图收购加州的优尼科 （Unocal Corp.），但政治家和竞争对手雪佛龙公司（Chevron Corp.）以更高出价180亿美元，使中海油空手而归。但中国企业不断成功向海外扩张，在中亚、非洲、南美和加拿大买入资产，甚至在墨西哥湾买入少量股 权。尽管相较于大型国际石油公司，中国企业的总体海外版图较小，但他们成长迅速，而且能通过中国国有银行获得低息贷款。
中国庞大的能源需 求帮助解释了中国为什么在2007年超过美国，成为全球二氧化碳和其他温室气体排放最多的国家。中国多数电力来自煤炭，煤炭是矿物燃料中最不清洁的能源。
比 罗尔说，美国仍高居人均能源消耗的榜首，普通美国人每年消耗的能源为普通中国人的五倍。比罗尔从事现在的工作已经有六年时间了。美国也绝对是世界上最大的 石油消费国，每天平均约消耗1,900万桶石油，而中国每天只消耗约920万桶，远远地排在第二位。不过，很多石油分析人士认为，由于美国能源利用率的提 高和更严格的汽车节油规定，美国的原油需求已经达到了最高点，在今后不太可能增长太多。
中国的崛起也帮助转移了石油输出国组织 （OPEC，简称：欧佩克）成员国的关注点。多年来，主要欧佩克成员国都把美国的石油消费作为增加产量的理由。不过，随着近年来美国石油需求持续下滑，沙 特阿拉伯和阿拉伯联合酋长国等欧佩克成员国在亚洲已经建成或正在建造新的炼油厂和储油设施，以便满足中国不断增长的能源需求。世界上最大的原油出口国沙特 阿拉伯目前出口中国的石油比出口美国的石油多。
在衰退发生前，人们一直预期中国会在大约五年内成为全球最大的能源消费国。不过比罗尔说， 美国的经济低迷和节能计划把这一里程碑的时间提前了。
美国经济单位GDP能耗的降低是通用电气公司(General Electric Co.)等投资者越来越多地把中国作为未来增长引擎的一个重要原因。比罗尔说，未来20年内中国需要在能源领域共投资约4万亿美元，以便为经济提供动力， 避免发生停电和燃料短缺。
比罗尔曾是欧佩克的一位经济学家。他说，预计未来15年中，中国将新建约10亿千瓦装机容量。这约相当于美国现 在的总发电量；而美国的发电量是用数十年才建立起来的。
在上世纪八、九十年代中国经济增长的第一阶段，由于制造业不发达，中国的单位 GDP能耗实际上是下滑了。不过，九十年代初，情况开始发生变化──由于中国的石油需求超过国内供应量，中国首次成为石油净进口国。2001年，中国加入 世界贸易组织(World Trade Organization)后，能源需求再次激增。
据能源分析人士罗森(Daniel Rosen)和豪瑟(Trevor Houser)说，2001年后，能源需求增速上升到13%。在中国加入世贸组织之前，包括国际能源署在内的大部分国际机构预测，2000年至2010 年，中国的能源需求将增长3%至4%。然而，能源需求的增速却比预测的增速高出了四倍。
中国的单位GDP能耗可能会放缓，就像其他发达国 家发生的情况一样。几年后，不会有太多的基础设施需要建设。城市化将继续，不过步伐会放缓。高能耗的重型工厂工作可能会开始转移到其他国家，部分原因是中 国的工人要求改善工作条件和提高工资。不过，可能会将工厂工作转移到其他国家的力量──不断提高的收入──也可能会带来更大的能源需求，因为更富裕的中国 人开始消耗更多的能源。问题是，中国是将效仿日本和欧洲等地走低能耗道路，还是将效仿美国的住大房子、开高油耗车的高能耗生活方式。
China has passed the U.S. to become the world's biggest energy consumer, according to new data from the International Energy Agency.
The milestone reflects China's decade-long burst of economic growth and its rapidly expanding future needs as an industrial powerhouse. The Paris-based agency said China devoured 2,252 million tons of oil equivalent last year, or about 4% more than the U.S., which burned through 2,170 million tons of oil equivalent. The oil-equivalent metric represents all forms of energy consumed, including crude oil, nuclear power, coal, natural gas and renewables sources such as hydropower.
The figures reflect, in part, how the global recession hit the U.S. more severely than China and hurt U.S. industrial activity and energy use. Still, China's total energy consumption has clocked annual double-digit growth rates for many years, driven by the country's big industrial base. Highlighting how quickly its energy demand has increased, China's total energy consumption was just half the size of the U.S. 10 years ago.
'The fact that China overtook the U.S. as the world's largest energy consumer symbolizes the start of a new age in the history of energy,' IEA chief economist Fatih Birol said in an interview.
The U.S. had been the biggest overall energy consumer since the early 1900s, he said. The IEA is an energy adviser to most of the world's biggest economies.
China's economic rise has required enormous amounts of energy-especially because much of the past decade's growth was fueled not by consumer demand, as in the U.S, but from energy-intense heavy industry and infrastructure building.
That growth has transformed global energy markets and sustained higher prices for everything from oil to uranium and other natural resources that China has been consuming. China was once a major exporter of both oil and coal. Its increasing reliance on imports has lifted energy prices world-wide and underpinned a resource boom in Africa, the Middle East and Australia.
Now, China's rapidly expanding need for energy promises to have major geopolitical implications as it hunts for ways to satisfy its needs. Already, China's rising imports have changed global geopolitics. Chinese oil and coal companies were among the first to look overseas in their quest for energy supplies, pitching the Chinese flag in places like Sudan, which Western companies had largely abandoned under international pressure.
The most ambitious effort to secure overseas energy supplies was the failed 2005 attempt by Cnooc Ltd. to take over California-based Unocal Corp. in an $18 billion bid trumped by politics and rival Chevron Corp. But Chinese companies have successfully expanded overseas, buying assets in Central Asia, Africa, South America and Canada, and even small stakes in the Gulf of Mexico. While their overall overseas footprint is small compared with big international oil companies, they are growing fast and have access to cheap credit through China's state-owned banked.
China's voracious energy demand also helps explain why the country-which gets most of its electricity from coal, the dirtiest of fossil-fuel resources--passed the U.S. in 2007 as the world's largest emitter of carbon-dioxide emissions and other greenhouse gases.
The U.S. is still by far the biggest energy consumer per capita, with the average American burning five times as much energy annually as the average Chinese citizen, said Mr. Birol, who has been in his current role for six years. The U.S. also is the biggest oil consumer by a wide margin, going through on average roughly 19 million barrels a day-with China a distant second at about 9.2 million barrels a day. But many oil analysts believe U.S. crude demand has peaked, or is unlikely to grow very much in coming years. because of improved energy efficiency and more stringent vehicle fuel-efficiency regulations
China's rise also is helping shift the focus for oil producers in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. For years, key OPEC states looked to U.S. oil consumption as justification for adding new pumping capacity. But with U.S. oil demand declining in recent years, OPEC states such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have built, or are building, new refineries and storage facilities in Asia to cater to China's rising energy needs. Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest crude exporter, now ships more to China than to the US.
PPrior to the recession, China had been expected to become the biggest energy consumer in about five years. But the economic malaise and energy-efficiency programs in the U.S. brought forward the date of the milestone, Mr. Birol said.
The decreased energy 'intensity' of the U.S. economy is a key reason investors, such as General Electric Co., have increasingly looked to China as a driver of future growth. Mr. Birol said China requires total energy investments of some $4 trillion over the next 20 years to keep feeding its economy and to avoid power blackouts and fuel shortages.
Mr. Birol, previously an economist at OPEC, said China is expected to build over the next 15 years some 1,000 gigawatts of new power-generation capacity. That is about the total amount of electricity-generation capacity in the U.S. currently; the construction of all those gigawatts occurred over severaldecades.
China's energy intensity actually fell during the first phase of economic growth in the 1980s and 1990s, driven by light manufacturing. But that began to change in the early 1990s, when China became a net oil importer for the first time as its demand outpaced domestic supplies. China's energy demand surged again after it joined the World Trade Organization in 2001.
After 2001, energy demand growth rose to 13%, according energy analysts Daniel Rosen and Trevor Houser. Before China joined the WTO, most international prognosticators, including the International Energy Agency, predicted energy demand would increase 3% to 4% from 2000 to 2010. Instead, energy demand grew four times faster than predicted.
There is a chance China's energy intensity may slow, as it has in other developed countries. In a few years, there won't be much infrastructure left to build. Urbanization will continue but at a slower pace. And the heavy factory jobs that consume huge amounts of energy may start to shift away to other countries, partly as China's workers demand better conditions and higher salaries.But the same force that could be moving factory jobs away-rising incomes-could also underpin even greater energy needs as richer Chinese start consuming more.The question is whether China will adopt a low-energy pathway pioneered by places like Japan and Europe or follow a high-energy life-style of big houses and big cars pioneered by the U.S.