The head of the French energy multinational is sceptical that the global oil industry can raise output from current levels of 85 million bpd to meet demand forecasts by the International Energy Agency of 120 million bpd by 2030.

Total is expecting a return to oil production growth after a setback in this year’s second quarter, when civil disturbance in Nigeria and unplanned maintenance shutdowns caused an 8.6 per cent fall in output.

The company is investing an extra $1 billion (£533 million) a year in repairing platforms, pipelines and infrastructure. M Desmarest said that the situation in Prudhoe Bay, where BP had to shut down production, was “emblematic” of wider problems in the industry.

He said: “It is clear a lot of fields were developed 20 to 30 years ago with a view that production would last for 15 years. However, the evolution of the oil price has justified efforts to catch the last drop [of oil].”

The problem has been exacerbated, he said, because the need to repair and replace old infrastructure is occurring when oil service companies are working flat out to develop new oilfields.

M Desmarest reckons that Total will produce 7 per cent more barrels in 2007, but he is doubtful about the industry’s ability to continue to meet long-term projections of rising demand. “The opinon of our geologists is we can go a bit beyond 100 million bpd, but not to 120 million,” he said.

The French oil major has broken ranks with some peers in its scepticism that the industry can continue to both replenish and substantially increase the size of the gobal petrol tank.

Rivals, such as ExxonMobil and BP, have preferred to avoid discussions of peak oil and point to three trillion barrels of global proven reserves. The optimists believe that improvements in technology, which let companies recover a greater proportion of oil in a reservoir, will reduce the gap between finite reserves and rising demand.

However, concern is growing that nationalist politics in oil-producing nations may hinder investment. Even then, a shortage of resources, such as engineering procurement contractors and skilled workers, is already causing delays to vital oil and gas infrastructure projects. There is an acute shortage of deep-water drilling rigs an costs have risen to $500,000 a day.

Christophe de Margerie, Total’s exploration chief, who has been appointed M Desmarest’s successor, recently said that the problem of peak oil was not one of reserves but of supplies of engineers and infrastructure.

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