IEA chief urges gov’ts to cut oil use as Hormuz crisis deepens

Sefer Levent – ISTANBUL

The head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) has called on governments to immediately slash oil and gas consumption through emergency conservation measures, warning that the ongoing closure of the Strait of Hormuz has triggered the worst energy security crisis in recorded history.

Fatih Birol, the IEA's executive director, urged nations to adopt a sweeping set of demand-reduction steps, including work-from-home mandates, lower highway speed limits, cheaper public transit and grounded private jets, framing the push as a wartime-style mobilization comparable to pandemic-era restrictions.

"The main solution for markets and prices to return to normal levels is the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz," Birol told daily Hürriyet in an interview.

"Our efforts will only ease the economic pain. But if the strait remains closed for a long time, economic damage around the world could increase rapidly."

Birol said daily oil production losses from the disruption have reached 11 million barrels, surpassing the combined losses of both the 1973 and 1979 oil shocks, which together cost the world 10 million barrels per day.

The natural gas toll is similarly staggering. Birol said 140 billion cubic meters of gas supply have been disrupted, nearly double the losses sustained during the Russia-Ukraine war, as exports from Qatar and the United Arab Emirates have been cut off.

"The crisis we are experiencing now is bigger than the sum of the two oil crises of the 1970s and the gas crisis of the Russia-Ukraine war, bigger than all three combined," he said.

Birol cautioned that the crisis extends well beyond fuel.

"More than a third of the world’s fertilizer passes through the Strait of Hormuz, and if this continues, it will both impact the agricultural sector and potentially lead to a steady rise in food prices,” he said.

“Additionally, a quarter of petrochemical products also pass through the strait. The petroleum products that serve as the raw materials for the petrochemical industry pass through there as well. There is sulfur, there is helium, and there are certain substances that are especially essential in the medical field. When we put all of this together, we are facing the greatest energy security threat the world has ever confronted."

If the disruption persists, Birol said the consequences could be severe and lasting. Sustained high energy prices would stoke inflation, widen current account deficits in energy-importing nations and slow economic growth, potentially pushing vulnerable economies into a debt spiral reminiscent of the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Proposed measures

With reopening the Strait of Hormuz beyond its direct control, Birol said the IEA is pressing governments hard on the demand side, urging them to expand remote work, reduce highway speed limits by at least 10 kilometers per hour, cut public transit fares, implement license plate rotation systems and promote carpooling. The agency is also calling on countries to optimize freight logistics, ground private and corporate jets, shift dual-fuel vehicles from LPG to gasoline to preserve the fuel for cooking, encourage electric cooking alternatives and improve operational efficiency across the petrochemical sector.