00:00Drill, baby, drill.
00:04Fossil fuels are making a comeback.
00:06OPEC's latest forecasts suggest global oil demand will keep rising.
00:11But the predictions are more politically driven than ever,
00:14and often contradict each other.
00:16So how much weight should we give them?
00:21Back in 1960, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Kuwait, and Venezuela founded OPEC.
00:29The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.
00:33The goal was clear, coordinate production, and push oil prices higher.
00:43The turning point came during the Yom Kippur War in 1973.
00:49On the holiest Jewish holiday, Egypt and Syria, backed by other Arab nations, attacked Israel.
00:56As a consequence, the Arab members of OPEC imposed an oil embargo.
01:01That was the trigger for the oil crisis, which led, among other things, to empty highways.
01:07Today, OPEC has 12 member countries.
01:10Its goals have changed little, keeping oil prices high and maximizing revenues.
01:15However, OPEC's influence has declined.
01:19That's why it cooperates with countries such as Russia, Mexico, Kazakhstan, and Oman.
01:25In that case, it's referred to as OPEC+.
01:28But let's return to the scenarios for global oil consumption.
01:34Once a year, in February, OPEC publishes its World Oil Outlook.
01:40The organization expects global crude oil demand to rise to 122.9 million barrels per day by 2050.
01:48Only in OECD countries, Western industrialized nations, such as the U.S., Germany, and Japan,
01:57is demand expected to peak in 2030, at around 46 million barrels per day.
02:04From then on, demand will decline.
02:06In China, oil demand is stagnating and will begin to decline slightly from 2045.
02:13OPEC does have a political agenda in that it seeks to be a voice for the global oil industry,
02:21and in particular, the oil producers of its membership, which are in the Global South.
02:26Jeff Colgan is director of the Climate Solutions Lab at Brown University.
02:31He researches the international order in relation to energy and the environment.
02:35Now, however, there's a lot more uncertainty around the future demand of oil,
02:44because so many of the questions that really matter are inherently political,
02:50and they depend on the choices that our political leaders make,
02:55about how fast to decarbonize their own economies.
02:59OPEC's counterpart is the International Energy Agency.
03:0432 industrialized countries are members, and 13 are associated.
03:10It was founded in November 1974 as a response by Western industrialized nations to the oil price crisis.
03:18The goal was to create a counterweight to OPEC.
03:22The International Energy Agency publishes its World Energy Outlook annually with different scenarios.
03:28According to the IEA, global oil demand will peak around 2030 at 102 million barrels per day, and then decline.
03:39That stands in sharp contrast to OPEC's forecast.
03:43The stated policy scenario is based on today's political framework,
03:48and also takes announced initiatives into account.
03:51For the global climate, this means a temperature increase of 2.5 degrees Celsius by the year 2100,
03:59compared to the pre-industrial era.
04:02To what extent is this scenario also political?
04:05The oil industry, oil and gas industry, sees the International Energy Agency as having been captured by the green movement,
04:14or the pro-renewables energy.
04:16And so these basic questions about forecasts of energy,
04:22which used to be strictly technical questions, have now become rather political.
04:27Narendra Taneja, one of India's leading energy experts, goes even further.
04:38So, International Energy Agency's job, it is their job to look at the world,
04:43look at, go for projections, make forecasts, make projections such a way
04:47that is in the best interest of the country,
04:50that a member of the International Energy, member means the founding members.
04:54India is also a associate member,
04:57but International Energy Agency essentially works for the rich countries,
05:02for the rich people, for the rich societies, not for society like mine.
05:06Forecasts change when the political agenda shifts,
05:10for example, in the United States.
05:12The most active oil basin in the world is in Lee County in the U.S. state of New Mexico.
05:18President Trump wants even more oil to be extracted there.
05:22That is why today I will also declare a national energy emergency.
05:27We will drill, baby, drill.
05:32He's issued further decrees to keep oil cheap and demand for fossil fuels high.
05:38That includes simplifying approval procedures for drilling on federal land.
05:42At the same time, he's frozen projects launched under Joe Biden,
05:46such as the Inflation Reduction Act,
05:49the largest climate protection fund in the U.S.,
05:52which earmarks $369 billion for clean energy.
05:56Offshore wind projects have already been suspended.
06:01Columbia University has documented 283 initiatives
06:05introduced by the Trump administration since January 2025
06:09that weaken or slow down climate protection.
06:14Partly, these are policy decisions,
06:16like undoing much of the Biden administration's efforts
06:19to support green industrial policy.
06:22But more fundamentally,
06:24the Trump administration has been attacking the science
06:28and the basic governance institutions in the U.S. government
06:32that have fostered climate policy.
06:35So it's really a two-pronged attack in the United States.
06:40And of course, that has implications
06:41not only for U.S. environmental policy,
06:44but really some ripple effects around the world.
06:47For example, it affects global shipping,
06:50which is particularly harmful to the climate.
06:53For now, there will be no international system
06:56for CO2 pricing and shipping.
06:58It was postponed indefinitely in October 2025,
07:02apparently after pressure from Washington
07:04on other members of the International Maritime Organization.
07:09Companies are also setting different priorities.
07:12In Rotterdam in the Netherlands,
07:14Shell had planned to build a large plant
07:16to produce sustainable aviation fuel.
07:20But the construction has been halted.
07:24Shell says the facility would not be profitable
07:26in the foreseeable future.
07:28Instead, it continues to rely on petroleum.
07:31The signs have changed.
07:37The ramp-up of alternative fuels is taking longer.
07:43Wind farm operators, too, are facing difficulties.
07:47The fact that, say, interest rates continue to be higher today
07:52than they were back in 2020 or 2021
07:56does have real implications for capital-intensive businesses
08:02like solar and wind and batteries.
08:04And so companies like the Danish wind manufacturer,
08:09Ersted, are unfortunately facing
08:12all kinds of headwinds in a negative way,
08:16not just on the political side,
08:18but also on the economics side.
08:20The IEA has responded.
08:23In its current policies scenario,
08:25oil demand continues to rise,
08:28likely even beyond 2050.
08:30The consequence for the global climate,
08:33an increase of 2.9 degrees Celsius
08:35in average global temperature by 2100.
08:39This scenario is meant to reflect current laws and regulations.
08:43It assumes these rules will remain in place until 2050
08:47and that new technologies will spread only very slowly.
08:52Scientists are criticizing the IEA for reintroducing this scenario.
08:56It's a politically motivated scenario.
08:59Rachel Cletus is an economist and senior policy director
09:02at the Union of Concerned Scientists.
09:05Now, in that scenario,
09:07there are a few things that are completely against market trends.
09:09One is, of course, the uptake of things like electric vehicles,
09:14renewable energy technologies like solar and wind,
09:17which are, frankly, the cheapest forms of energy now
09:20in most places in the world.
09:22So the market trends are already driving us
09:24towards these cleanup forms of energy use.
09:29Nevertheless, in the IEA's current policies scenario,
09:33oil demand for cars and trucks remains largely unchanged.
09:37In air travel, demand for oil is increasing.
09:41Shipping remains nearly unchanged,
09:44while petrochemicals show a significant rise in oil consumption.
09:49Oil will continue to be needed as a raw material
09:51in the chemical industry for a long time.
09:54On this point, OPEC, the IEA, and other experts agree.
09:58While the overall trajectory for oil demand is fairly stable,
10:04with a bit of growth in the next five years
10:06and then slow declines over the next couple of decades,
10:10the shift between sectors that will benefit from that demand
10:14is quite stark.
10:18You're moving away from oil utilization in the transportation sector
10:22and much more consumption for petrochemical uses.
10:27Lydia Galerati prepares oil forecasts
10:30for the analysis firm Energy Aspects.
10:33But what role does India play?
10:35One of the fastest-growing countries in the world.
10:39We're in Kashmir, in the city of Srinagar.
10:421.6 million cars are registered here.
10:45In 2008, it was less than half that number.
10:49Still, only one in five families owns a car.
10:53It looks similar in New Delhi.
10:54Across India, 5.2 million vehicles were newly registered in 2024.
11:01That's nearly 37% more than in 2019.
11:06And the vast majority of vehicles in India
11:08have internal combustion engines.
11:11India's strong growth is resulting in a huge appetite for oil.
11:16According to the International Energy Agency,
11:18India's oil demand in 2050 will reach 10.5 million barrels per day
11:24in the current policy scenario,
11:26the scenario in which today's laws remain in place indefinitely.
11:31The other scenario, the stated policy scenario, or STEPS,
11:35projects demand at just under 9 million barrels per day.
11:39This scenario also takes into account political initiatives
11:42that have been announced but not yet enacted into law.
11:46India today is actually driving the global oil market.
11:49If you look at the kind of growth
11:53and you look at the kind of hunger for oil in India,
11:56I think we probably are going to need, say, by 2050,
12:002050 in the life of a nation,
12:02direct tomorrow morning,
12:03something like 9 million barrels of oil every day.
12:07So when will global oil production reach its peak?
12:12Here's a recap.
12:14OPEC assumes that global oil demand
12:16will continue to rise even beyond 2050.
12:21The International Energy Agency,
12:24at least in its stated policy scenario,
12:26expects oil consumption to peak around 2030.
12:31Who's right?
12:33Both are wrong.
12:34You see, International Energy Agency
12:37is an agency of the developed countries.
12:42International energy projection that by 2029,
12:45demand for oil will peak is not scientific.
12:48It's motivated.
12:49So I don't buy it.
12:52However, since renewable energies
12:55have become so much cheaper in recent years,
12:57a peak in oil demand around 2030 is not unrealistic.
13:01The shift, especially towards photovoltaics,
13:05is likely to gain even more momentum soon,
13:08simply because it makes economic sense.
13:12So what do you think?
13:13you
13:14You
13:16We
13:33We
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