¿Por qué es tan difícil sustituir el petróleo?

«Debemos sustituir el petróleo, porque es un energético altamente nocivo para el desarrollo humano”, es una propuesta que ha surgido desde diversos sectores como una gran solución a los problemas que se derivan del uso de combustibles fósiles. ¿Pero es eso posible? ¿Bastaría una decisión de Estado para realizar la transición hacia energéticos más limpios?  

Por: ERIK GIOVANY MONTES PÁEZ*

27 de agosto de 2021.   Desde hace algunos años he tenido la oportunidad de participar como conferencista en el Programa de Formación de Líderes Energéticos del WEC Colombia, y la conferencia que he ofrecido en varias ocasiones la he llamado precisamente como el título de esta columna: ¿Por qué es tan difícil sustituir el petróleo?

La necesidad de petróleo que tiene nuestra sociedad debe analizarse desde diferentes puntos de vista, no solamente pensando en el petróleo como fuente de energía, sino como materia prima de una enorme cantidad de productos que usamos a diario, y como un fuerte motor de la economía nacional, pues la sustitución del crudo implica retos que van desde lo tecnológico hasta lo social.
La canasta energética colombiana de 2020, según cifras publicadas en el “BP Statistical Review 2021”, esta conformada por un 31% de petróleo, 28% de gas natural, 22% de hidroelectricidad, 15% de carbón y 3% de energías renovables.

Es importante destacar que el petróleo ocupa el primer renglón, pero que registró una disminución con respecto a valores de años anteriores. Sin ir más lejos, entre el 2017 y el 2019 tuvo una participación sostenida del 35% de la canasta energética nacional. ¿Significa esto que se está dando un reemplazo del crudo en Colombia? Lo cierto es que no, pues la pandemia conllevó una disminución del consumo mundial de petróleo en torno al 10%, relacionada principalmente con una reducción del 39% en el consumo de combustible para aviones. Pero en el 2021 se espera una recuperación del consumo, motivada por la reapertura de fronteras y diversos sectores de la economía. 

Colombia produjo, en promedio, 781.352 barriles de petróleo al día durante 2020, pero tuvo un consumo diario de 347.642 barriles. Consumo que se da fundamentalmente en la carga de las refinerías de Barrancabermeja y Cartagena, donde se producen combustibles para el abastecimiento nacional. Es decir que menos de la mitad del crudo que se produce en nuestro país se destina al consumo interno, por lo cual no es de extrañarse que las exportaciones de petróleo sean un agente dinamizador de la economía colombiana.

De acuerdo con cifras del DANE, de los 31.055 millones de dólares que exportó Colombia en el año 2020, 8.754 millones de dólares ingresaron por exportaciones del petróleo, siendo éste el primer renglón en las estadísticas nacionales, seguido del carbón (4.165 millones) y el café (2.446 millones). Para Colombia, por lo tanto, el petróleo es más un commodity que un energético. De hecho, hemos apreciado en muchos momentos que una crisis en el sector de los hidrocarburos se refleja fuertemente en la economía nacional. 

Surge, por supuesto, un primer e importante reto para el país: diversificar las exportaciones, aspirando a superar esa fuerte dependencia económica del petróleo. Para esto se hace necesaria la inversión en tecnología e infraestructura, permitiendo que muchos de los procesos productivos del país puedan devenir en grandes operaciones de exportación de bienes y servicios.

Entonces, si ocurre una diversificación de las exportaciones, ¿ocurrirá la sustitución del petróleo? Aún no, pues falta superar otro gigantesco desafío, y en este caso, un desafío mundial: el del petróleo como materia prima.
Cuando se habla de “derivados del petróleo” se piensa inicialmente en combustibles. Pero, al tratar de profundizar un poco en el terreno de la petroquímica, surgen centenares de productos que actualmente se obtienen exclusivamente del petróleo. 

Solo por mencionar algunos: asfaltos, fibras sintéticas (poliéster, nylon), detergentes, cauchos, plásticos, lubricantes, velas, aislantes eléctricos, fertilizantes, grasas, aceites, solventes, acrílicos, bases de perfumes, chicle, cosméticos y hasta suplementos vitamínicos, son ejemplos de productos de uso diario que se obtienen a partir del petróleo.

¿De dónde más los podemos obtener? Ahí aparece un segundo reto que, considero, tiene unas dimensiones mayores que el primero. Pues no se trata de la adopción de tecnologías existentes para diversificar la economía de Colombia, sino de un reto mundial que necesita de descubrimientos que permitan seguir produciendo, de forma rentable y con un menor impacto, elementos habituales en la sociedad actual.

La fiebre del caucho, que tan gratamente describía José Eustasio Rivera en “La Vorágine”, conllevó procesos de devastación masiva de árboles de caucho en la Amazonía. Pero la tecnología ofreció una alternativa: la obtención del látex de forma sintética, a partir del petróleo. La matanza de ballenas era una de las opciones de antaño para la obtención de grasas, velas o jabones, pero también hubo la necesidad de hallar alternativas que permitieran preservar a estos inmensos mamíferos marinos.

En su momento, la revolución tecnológica se centró en la petroquímica. Y ahora, la enorme cantidad de productos sintéticos ha producido nuevamente problemas ambientales, sobre todo relacionados con los plásticos.

Según cifras de la Organización de las Naciones Unidas, cerca del 90% de los plásticos que se consumen en el mundo provienen del petróleo, y más de 8 millones de toneladas de plástico terminan en los océanos cada año. La idea era evitar la devastación de las especies marítimas dejando de cazar ballenas, pero la solución momentánea ahora está acabando con su hábitat. 

El reto es enorme y requiere de una mezcla de elementos que hoy apenas se vislumbran: voluntad política para tomar decisiones, investigación y desarrollo de nuevas alternativas tecnológicas, consciencia social para reducir nuestros impactos sobre el planeta, compromiso de jóvenes investigadores para transformar el mundo, responsabilidad empresarial en el manejo de los procesos industriales y un largo etcétera que permitirán, ahora sí, sustituir el petróleo.

El ideal es el de un mundo en el que la vida humana sea sostenible. No porque hayamos sacado a sombrerazos al crudo de nuestras vidas, como si la culpa de todo fuera de los que un día decidimos estudiar ingeniería de petróleos, sino porque se haya dado un desarrollo tecnológico mundial, en el que los profesionales lideren procesos de transformación en todo sentido.

Por esto es que todos los análisis prospectivos muestran al petróleo como protagonista del mercado energético en los próximos 30 o 40 años. No importa que estas proyecciones sean realizadas por empresas del sector hidrocarburos (como Shell o BP) o por entidades independientes (como el World Energy Council), pues la sustitución del crudo requiere avances tecnológicos, económicos y sociales que, hasta ahora, siguen pendientes.

*Profesor Universidad Industrial de Santander
erimonpa@uis.edu.co

1.670 Comments

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