PETER CHRISTIE, the 61-year-old managing director of specialist glassmaker Stolzle Flaconnage, sat in his office in Knottingley, West Yorkshire, on Friday afternoon chatting with factory manager Stephen Clayton about the heat of the day and the price of oil.

The heat was manageable. “Our furnace burns at 1350C, so even when there’s snow on the ground, it’s hot,” Christie said. “But I’ve been here 34 years and I love making glass.”

The oil price was different. Explaining why it spiked to a record high last week, the Yorkshireman faltered. “I don’t know. I’m not in London,” he said.

Even if the spike was a mystery, Christie understands it’s a threat. Energy is Stolzle Flaconnage’s second-highest cost after the wage bill for its 300 employees.

The Austrian-owned company, which turns over £20m a year by selling 120m containers to perfume makers such as Yves Saint Laurent and distillers including Gilbey’s and Macallan, is negotiating new electricity and gas contracts from October 1.

“The best quotes we have show a 51% increase in electricity and 34% on gas,” Christie said. “This equates to a cost increase of £600,000, which is over half our annual profit prior to interest and tax.”

Up and down the country, manufacturers have similar stories to tell, according to the Energy Intensive Users Group.

Jeremy Nicholson, director of the trade group, said: “Energy prices are moving into very dangerous territory and this plainly has implications for the economy.”

The question frightening Christie and others is where oil prices go from here. The answer from experts is — higher. “The balance between supply and demand is precariously tight,” said Jeff Currie, head of commodity research at the US investment bank Goldman Sachs. “This means there’s significant upside risk. Oil could go to $50 a barrel, given further disruptions.”

The roots of last week’s oil-price spike date back more than 20 years, according to Currie. In the early 1980s, governments phased out subsidies for commodities, including subsidies for petroleum exploration and production.

Capital migrated from the energy industry to Silicon Valley and other high-tech centres. As a result, the relative sums spent on oil exploration and construction, including the building of refineries, declined. This slowed the growth of energy supplies. “Call the oil-price rise the revenge of the old economy,” Currie said.

As energy became a scarce commodity, oil, natural gas and coal prices all have become closely linked. Twenty years ago, headlines about oil prices might have made little difference to Stolzle Flaconnage. Now they do. Today, the world consumes about 81m barrels of crude a day, according to the Paris-based International Energy Agency. Since 2000, oil-market spare capacity has averaged 5m barrels a day.

But the economies of China, India and other Asian countries are growing faster than economic forecasters, such as the International Monetary Fund, predicted. Asian growth has revved up world economic growth since the end of the global downturn in spring 2003. “It’s fair to say many of us have been surprised by China,” a BP spokesman said.