How big is the oil market? Bigger than all raw metal markets combined…
While the amount of uses in one barrel of oil is quite incredible, we still need a mind-boggling amount of the natural resource each year to sustain consumption.
Oil production per year: 34 billion barrels (incl. other liquids)
Oil market size at current prices: $1.7 trillion per year
To consider how big this actually is, we compare the annual market sizes of all major metals and minerals that are mined throughout the world:
- Gold: $170 billion
- Iron: $115 billion
- Copper: $91 billion
- Aluminum: $90 billion
- Zinc: $34 billion
- Manganese: $30 billion
- Nickel: $21 billion
- Silver: $20 billion
- Other metals: $67 billion (Including platinum, palladium, titanium, tin, moly, uranium, and more)
The total amount works out to $660 billion – just a tiny fraction of the size of the oil market.