An FT Op-Ed written by IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol this week in which he asserted that global fossil fuel demand is set to peak before 2030 was always bound to create controversy. Opec swiftly reacted on 14 September saying that “It is an extremely risky and impractical narrative to dismiss fossil fuels, or to suggest that they are at the beginning of their end.” The group added that “this thinking on fossil fuels is ideologically driven,” with Secretary General Haitham al-Ghais stating “Such narratives only set the global energy system up to fail spectacularly. It would lead to energy chaos on a potentially unprecedented scale, with dire consequences for economies and billions of people across the world.”
Mr Birol’s statements tee up next month’s release of the IEA’s flagship World Energy Outlook (WEO), in which he notes the baseline forecast will now show demand for each of the three fossil fuels peaking before the end of the decade. This is a steep change from the 2022 WEO in which oil demand was set to peak in the 2030s. (CONTINUED - 199 WORDS)