Analysis
Fossil Fuels
Our position
Humanity faces a difficult challenge. To stabilize increasing global temperatures from climate change, the world must eventually phase out fossil fuels; but in the meantime, gas and oil remain key to human development, universal energy access, and climate resilience. In developed economies, natural gas remains a fundamental bridge between coal and clean energy sources like nuclear, geothermal, or renewables. Developing economies need a backbone of flexible generation to support clean energy deployment and fossil inputs for crucial industries like fertilizers, cement, and steel. Barring fossil fuels development in poorer countries consigns their populations to continued poverty and hunger.
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Three pieces the team says to read first
Fossil Fuels work
Research, analysis and everything we have put on the record: comments, testimony, statements, letters and endorsements.
Showing 1–6 of 20
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Analysis
Caught Between Hormuz and a (Chinese) Hard Place
Nuclear Energy is Japan’s only way out
· Ted Nordhaus
Analysis
Greenwashing With Chinese Characteristics
China's "Green Electrostate" Is Neither
· Seaver Wang, Ted Nordhaus, Vijaya Ramachandran
Analysis
It’s Time to Raise the Bar for Corporate Clean Energy Buying
Walking the walk on “100% clean powered”
· Seaver Wang
Analysis
Quiet Climate Policy Is Dead. Long Live All-of-the-Above Energy Policy.
How Climate Polarization Swallowed Bipartisan Energy Policy
· Ted Nordhaus, Alex Trembath
Analysis
How California Regulated Itself Into an Energy Crisis
Ensuring gasoline affordability will require compromising on the environmental regime
· Lauren Teixeira
Analysis
Sub-Saharan Africa Needs Fossil Fuels to Process Its Critical Minerals
Three Case Studies of Localizing Value-Addition in Mineral Supply Chains
· Ryan Alimento, Seaver Wang
1–6 of 20
Who to talk to
Alex Trembath
Executive Director Email
Latest: Quiet Climate Policy Is Dead. Long Live All-of-the-Above Energy Policy.
Vijaya Ramachandran
Director, Energy and Development Email
Latest: Greenwashing With Chinese Characteristics
Questions
When will fossil fuels run out?
Not anytime soon. Coal, oil, and natural gas remain abundant, and new technologies can make additional resources economical to extract. The challenge is not waiting for fossil fuels to run out, but developing cleaner substitutes that can outperform them.
Why are fossil fuels bad for the environment?
Fossil fuels have powered enormous improvements in living standards and remain essential to modern economies. But burning them releases carbon dioxide that drives climate change, as well as pollutants like particulate matter, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and mercury that harm human health.
Should fossil fuels be banned?
No. Fossil fuels remain essential to modern economies and global development, and abruptly banning them would collapse global agriculture, trade, manufacturing, and electricity production—making a ban functionally impossible.
Do fossil fuels still supply most of the world's energy?
Yes. Fossil fuels—coal, oil, and natural gas—still supply over 80 percent of the world’s total primary energy and around 68% of final energy. That includes energy used for transportation, heating, industry, and electricity generation, not just electricity.