Stop Demanding An Immediate End to Fossil Fuels

It is nonsense and devoid of any understanding of today's energy systems. Stop it, please.

Climate activists, media pundits, and many politicians are increasingly angry that governments and industry aren’t reducing greenhouse gas emissions fast enough and aren’t accelerating the pace of the clean energy transition. Some are gluing themselves to major highways and airports, throwing paint on art masterpieces, and demanding an immediate end to fossil fuels use.

They argue that without the immediate end of fossil fuels the world will face apocalyptic climate change threatening the viability of the human race. The constant gnashing of teeth and rending of garments can be understood if you believe we are speeding headlong towards extinction and only the reduction of carbon (don’t forget about methane) can save us. Especially when you see the constant growth of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere since 1960:

Source: from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) climate.gov site.

But the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) 6th Assessment Report — the Science — doesn’t actually claim the end of the world is nigh. There are a number of great substacks on this — check out The Honest Broker, as well as recent books like Steve Koonin’s Unsettled. Human induced climate change is real, it needs to be addressed, and we can mitigate and adapt — but it alone will not bring about the apocalypse. The world’s climate is an extremely complicated system and history has shown it has a tendency to undergo major, dangerous climate changes well before humans started using fossil fuels. And chances are, it will do so again in the future. Nature is not a benign, peaceful, static system.

Calling for an end to fossil fuels use immediately is an impossible and dangerous demand, and the increasing calls for it only distract from concrete solutions and real progress. This approach to climate and energy policy has resulted in the current political leadership in the West tying themselves into knots whether or not they should finance international fossil fuels projects. And Western policymakers have painted themselves into a corner by going along with this demand — they have pandered to the loudest, most radical activists and are publicly shouted down if any fossil fuels project is supported anywhere in the world. This does not support a sustainable, pragmatic policy environment.

Notwithstanding the more aggressive push by activists, politicians, and the media, global fossil fuel use is rising across all fronts. Fossil fuels are reliable, abundant, and highly energy dense compared to most other options (nuclear is very energy dense…renewables, not so much). Coal use in 2022 reached historical levels of 8.3 billion tons with Asian demand supporting most growth. As Daniel Yergin pointed out, its been more than 100 years since the ushering in of the age of oil when Churchill decided to transition the Royal Navy’s fuel in 1911, and it wasn’t until the 1960s (and the proliferation of personal automobile ownership) that oil surpassed coal in global use.

This is telling. Yergin argues that past energy transitions were additive in nature, meaning new energy sources were deployed on top of traditional energy sources to meet the growing demand across developing and developed markets. Coal has been used at scale since the Industrial Revolution. Two hundred years on and coal just hit its record annual global use.

Oil demand tells a similar story of forecasted sustained growth for years to come (some governments are attempting to introduce an international ambition to ensure peak oil consumption by the middle of this decade — good luck with that!). The most recent International Energy Agency (IEA) Oil Market Report forecasts 2023 will see a 2.3 million barrels per day rise in demand, reaching more than 102 million barrels per day worldwide. Global oil demand rose by the same amount in 2021 — and there doesn’t appear to be a slowdown in the near future.

Natural gas demand is also expected to grow, due in large part to increased demand from the developing world, but also due to onshoring of good paying manufacturing jobs in economies like the United States. U.S. natural gas production remains at all-time highs and isn’t expected to decline anytime soon. Referencing the IEA again, the world’s natural gas demand is expected to grow by 140 billion cubic meters between 2021-2025. That is roughly equivalent to the amount of Russian pipeline gas that was imported into Europe prior to the war in Ukraine. It is a lot of natural gas.

Today, fossil fuels account for 80% of total global energy use. Let that sit in for a minute. The growing chorus to end fossil fuels by climate activists and most of the media expects to replace 80% of today’s current energy supplies in just a handful of years (or by tomorrow if you agree with Extinction Rebellion and Just Stop Oil types).

Today’s global energy system only supports a little more than one billion people in developed economies, out of 8 billion people on earth. Seven billion people need more energy that is abundant, consistent in its supply, affordable, and reliable. More than 700 million don’t even have access to electricity! Wind and solar won’t cut it. Hydrogen is a pipe dream today (it reminds me of the huge push on biofuels in the early 2000s…where is that market now?). And current batteries and energy storage technologies are not viable at the scale needed to bring the developing economies up to developed economy’s living standards.

The clean energy transition has to be additive, will take decades, and will inevitably result in significant fossil fuel use well into the middle of this century, and likely far beyond. Full stop, no exceptions (unless fusion energy or some other game changing technology is commercialized…then maybe things will move faster!).

Many Western governments and climate industry participants try to thread the fossil fuels policy needle by aiming for an end to “unabated” fossil fuels use in the coming years, meaning only fossil fuels use with carbon capture technologies and/or direct air capture of carbon dioxide. Carbon capture, utilization, and sequestration (CCUS) is not currently a commercially viable option at significant scale; some governments don’t allow carbon injection into storage sites due to environmental concerns; and, climate activists and a growing number of public officials argue that CCUS further locks in fossil fuels use long into the future, and therefore they don’t support it.

If you don’t support abated fossil fuels use (this usually goes hand-in-hand with anti-nuclear power sentiments), what do you posit for a viable solution to not only provide reliable, affordable, and secure energy to the developed economies who’s citizens expect a certain lifestyle and comforts, but to the 88% of the rest of humanity who are yearning to get to the same levels of comfort?

Ending fossil fuel use, without an equivalent substitute, will result in terrible outcomes for the global economy. Societal upheaval, increased poverty and violence, bankrupt retirement funds, impacts to a wide variety of goods and services across sectors such as transportation, healthcare, agriculture, fashion, heating, electricity, computing, etc. The outcomes would be catastrophic. Yet political leaders won’t have a frank conversation with citizens. Instead, they continue to pander to those shrieking about ending fossil fuels immediately.

Geopolitically, ending fossil fuels use now (or say, by the end of the decade) would be terrible to say the least. Major oil and gas producing nations, many of whom are developing economies with barely stable societies, would likely fall into choas and civil strife. Consuming nations would suffer catastrophic shortages. Military readiness would be negatively impacted. Industry would grind to a halt, affecting all levels of employment across all sectors. Global supply chains would collapse, economies crumble, and scenes from Hollywood apocalypse movies would become reality. The poorest would suffer the most.

Even if the world was able to transition to renewable power and electric vehicles and hydrogen storage, the global energy systems would still experience volatility, supply chain shocks, commodity and labor price spikes, etc. Take a look at what is happening in the wind industry today. It is experiencing commodity price shocks, supply chain problems, manufacturing challenges, and volatile markets. We have not even begun to grasp the magnitude required from critical minerals to support the renewable energy/electrified transportation/electrified heating push. Renewable energy deployment will not eradicate energy security and supply risks — it will just shift them to different geographies, variables, and timelines.

If we really want to make a difference to our global emissions pathway and reduce greenhouse gas emissions (which I agree we should), we have to have an honest and pragmatic discussion with one another about viable, equitable pathways forward. We can’t say no to fossil fuels, no to nuclear power, and only yes to solar and wind power (don’t forget about hydrogen!). It is not a viable pathway.

So please stop it. Stop gluing yourselves to highways and runways. Stop destroying beautiful works of art. Stop making ridiculous assertions about how current renewables and electric vehicles and energy storage can replace fossil fuels one-to-one. Be honest, be fair, and be truthful. Recognize the energy transition will be hard, long, and additive in nature. Focus more effort on energy efficiency gains. Prioritize research and development everywhere. Acknowledge that sustained investments in fossil fuels is necessary. Continue to support the responsible deployment of all forms of energy supplies, and focus on cleaning up the energy sector in smart ways, not ill-informed cries for things that are impossible. Perhaps then we can actually make progress in our efforts to affect a truly clean(er) energy transition.