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“For the first time, oil companies have to think seriously about the future,” Alastair Syme, an oil analyst at Citigroup Inc. in London, said by phone. Drillers that even a couple of years ago believed “every molecule of oil we produce will have a market,” have come to realize they “can afford to bring on only the most competitive assets.”

Gas, Biofuels

Shell will be in business for “many decades to come” because it is focusing more on natural gas and expanding its new-energy businesses including biofuels and hydrogen, Henry said.

“Even if oil demand declines, its replacements will be in products that we are very well placed to supply one way or the other, so we need to be the energy major of the 2050s,” Henry said. “That underpins our strategic thinking. It’s part of the switch to gas, it’s part of what we do in biofuels, both now and in the future.”

Shell sees “oil and gas as being part of the energy mix for many decades to come,” it said in a statement Wednesday.

The Anglo-Dutch company bought BG Group Plc for $54 billion this year in a move it said was partly aimed at increasing its gas business. Gas made up about 48 per cent of the company’s total production in the third quarter ended Sept. 30, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. U.K. competitor BP Plc had 38 per cent gas, including from units, in the period.

The anticipated increase in oil demand of about 20 million barrels a day over the next two decades will probably be big enough to overwhelm the impact of the electric car, Spencer Dale, chief economist for BP, said Oct. 11. Those vehicles will have a bigger impact in 30 to 50 years, although there’s a chance it could happen sooner, he said.