Demand for oil and gas to mount as green policies fall short - IEA

(Sharecast News) - Global demand for oil and gas is poised to continue growing for the next two decades, a leading think tank warned on Wednesday, as previous commitments to cutting emissions weaken. According to the Paris-based International Energy Agency's latest modelling, under current policies demand for oil could reach 113m barrels per day by 2050, up 13% on 2024.

Global energy demand will also increase, by 15% over the same period, it forecast.

Up until this year, the IEA had assumed that fossil fuel consumption would peak this decade, as investment in oil and gas waned in favour of cleaner sources of energy.

However, publishing its annual World Energy Outlook report, the IEA switched from policy pledges in favour of a current policies scenario.

It said: "There is less momentum than before behind national and international efforts to reduce emissions, yet climate risks are rising.

"2024 was the hottest year on record, and the first in which global temperatures exceeded 1.5C above pre-industrial levels."

It continued: "A pathway that mitigates the most severe risks from climate change remains feasible and there is strong momentum behind key technologies.

"But ten years on from the Paris Agreement, some formal, country-level commitments have waned."

As well as the US pulling out of the treaty, the IEA said the new round of nationally determined contributions (NDCs) announced so far this year "do little in aggregate to move the needle".

NDCs are commitments made by individual countries to cut emissions.

Under Donald Trump's second administration, the US has rowed back on energy commitments made by former incumbent Joe Biden.

A vocal critic of renewable energy, Trump has long been a supporter of fossil fuels.