Room for all energy sources as global demand increases

The message emerged during a discussion between representatives of two of the sector’s most influential organisations, under the panel title “Can renewable energy alone meet the needs of growing power and equity demands?” As the share of renewables grows, some countries require something more they tackle their electrification goals and support the energy transition.

“We in OPEC refer to it as a journey of evolution of the global energy mix,” said the organisation’s Dr Ayed Al-Qahtani, Director, Research Division.

“To come up with something that is robust as well as consistent, we look into multiple factors, including economic development and evolution going forward over the next 25 years.” With another 1.7 billion people set to join the global population between now and 2050 - most from developing regions - more energy is needed.

“We see the global economy doubling at least between now and 2050 - a lot of this economic growth will require a lot of energy,” said Dr Al-Qahtani. 

“Doubling the economic growth, you will need at least 23% more energy. Where do we see this energy coming from? From all sources. “The energy mix will not be so much different from what we have today. We would still need oil, gas, coal, renewables, bio, nuclear, all of it. We don’t marginalise a source over another. The key words are diversification and inclusivity.”

Nobuo Tanaka, Executive Director Emeritus, International Energy Agency (IEA) said his organisation and OPEC were portrayed as rivals, but find common ground in the energy debate. “We are working very closely together and for the sake of renewables, for the sake of decarbonisation, we have to continue,” he said. “The developing world or developed world depends on energy security and sustainability together, so we have to solve these global issues together. Without global collaboration, there’s no solution.” However, Dr Al-Qahtani spoke of wasted opportunities from the push into some renewable areas “that ended up costing us a whole lot.”

He said: “Premature transitioning has proved to be inefficient, and that’s why we see a lot of U-turns around Europe, primarily the US and the executive orders.” “So it has to make sense when it comes to cost, because what hits the consumer at the end is the cost, and what justifies the use of a source of energy or a technology, is a cost at the end of the day.” He continued: “Ignoring facts and then deductively drawing a scenario that doesn’t make sense at the end of the day, that ends up costing a lot of nations a lot of capital that otherwise could have been deployed into a better use.”

“I always wonder from my technical side, the money spent on these cost prohibitive technologies, had we invested them in making the current fossil fuel complex or energy mix more friendly when it comes to the environment, I think we would have, as humanity, benefited. We have the technology to make all these fuels environmentally responsible.” Touching on energy poverty, he said millions in Africa still don’t have access to electricity and await a “transition from nothing to something”. He added: “They are still living in the dark, dreaming of a light bulb they can read a book by.”

“The global energy mix is maybe changing slightly in the power generation…tilting towards solar and wind, but we will still use a lot of oil for everything else.” With intermittency issues, technology gaps and storage capacity shortfalls still in surrounding renewables, Tanaka highlighted the return of nuclear as an option, but added: “There’s a no silver bullet…diversification is the issue.” “The end stage is always very much of a kind of dream, and sometimes we have to keep the reality and dream in balance.”