OPEC: Fossil Fuels Will Remain A Major Part Of The World’s Energy Portfolio – Yesterday, OPEC, the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, predicted that fossil fuels would continue to account for 80% of the world’s energy mix in the foreseeable future. In a statement, OPEC claimed that the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) prediction that global demand for fossil fuels will peak before 2030 was not founded on solid evidence.
The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) claims that predicting the imminent demise of fossil fuels is an exceedingly dangerous and impractical story. According to OPEC, “there were often calls of peak supply and in more recent decades, calls of peak demand, but evidently neither has materialised.”
What makes such forecasts risky now is that they are frequently accompanied by recommendations to halt investment in new oil and gas projects.This viewpoint on fossil fuels is motivated more by ideology than by facts.
It also ignores the ongoing technical advancements in the business sector towards solutions that can help cut emissions. Neither does it recognise that fossil fuels still account for more than 80% of the world’s energy mix, the same as it was 30 years ago, nor does it recognise the importance of the energy security they give.
It went on to say, “Technological innovation is a key focus for OPEC, which is why Member Countries are investing heavily in hydrogen projects, carbon capture utilisation and storage facilities, the circular carbon economy, and renewables too.”
“While some may argue that a number of these oil-focused technologies are still in their infancy, they ignore the fact that many technologies referred to in net-zero scenarios are in their infancy, experimental, or even theoretical stage.”
The OPEC also cited Haitham al Ghais, the organization’s secretary general, who warned that predicting the end of fossil fuels would cause the world’s energy system to crash and burn in a way that could be unprecedented, with devastating effects for economies and billions of people.