45
FUELS & LUBES INTERNATIONAL
Quarter Two 2015
THEUNCERTAINTYWOULD
seem to argue for waiting, but that
would not be wise, according to
Giovanni Di Noto, a consultant on
emerging trends at F&L Asia Ltd.
“There’s an emerging strategic and
industry-changing opportunity for
the lubes and additives sector to
capitalise on their native material
science expertise, especially in the
synthetic area,” he said.
The lube industry should
“embrace the market shift to
a pervasive smart materials
environment in coming years, and
become the prime investors and key
players of what might ultimately
challenge and put at risk their
current business model,” Di Noto
said.
There’s no clear crystal ball,
particularly when talking about a
time decades in the future when
tomorrow’s cities will be fully
functioning and populated. But
a good start is to look at current
worldwide urban trends that could
impact lubricants demand.
One is population growth,
which all things being equal should
drive up demand. The number of
people living in cities is projected to
grow from 3.9 billion today to more
than 6 billion by 2045, according to
a United Nations report published
in 2014. Some 54% of people live in
urban areas now, which will rise to
66% in 30 years.
The degree of urbanisation is
growing, but it varies by region.
Seven out of 10 Europeans today
live in cities. By 2050, that figure
will have risen to 85%, said Siim
Kallas, European Commission vice
president.
Elsewhere, urbanisation is
considerably lower. In India, for
instance, the current figure is
only 31%, Di Noto said. Because
urbanisation will grow, India has
allocated INR 70.6 billion (USD 1.13
billion) for smart cities in its 2014-
15 budget and plans to develop 100
new smart cities in coming years,
he said.
Smart cities are those where
sensors, computers and software
improve the performance of
the infrastructure. Global IT
services provider IBM touts such a
combination as a way for people to
more easily get around congested
urban areas. In describing how this
would work, Guru Banavar, IBM
vice president and chief technology
officer for the company’s Global
Public Sector, said one possibility
would be to reconfigure highway
lanes based upon traffic flow, with
the system anticipating and not
simply reacting to congestion.
It would contact drivers to take
alternate routes to avoid the
congested areas. Implementation
of this technology could potentially
minimise stressful or so-called
“stop-start” driving, which
consumes more fuel and more
LUBRICANTS
IN THE CITIES OF
TOMORROW
Tomorrow’s cities are being built today. They’re expected to
be larger, smarter and more sustainable. The implication
for the lubricants industry is still unclear. On one hand,
cities will be home to more people, as more people mi-
grate from rural to urban areas. However, future cities will
be smarter and more sustainable. The push has already
started to use less carbon-based technologies and more
sustainable materials. The advent of smart materials could
potentially drive down the need for lubricants.
By Hank Hogan
