Fossil fuels are still expected to meet 40 percent to 60 percent of global energy demand in 2050, according to a new report from McKinsey & Co.
That’s down from 78 percent last year but not nearly a big enough decline to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, as outlined in the Paris climate agreement. The consulting firm’s report, which modeled three potential energy transitions, found that global emissions may not start to decrease until 2035 amid increasing energy demand and continued fossil fuel use.
“Today, emissions continue to rise, and across all three of the scenarios that we’ve modeled, we still don’t get to where we need to get,” said Diego Hernandez Diaz, a partner at McKinsey who led the report.
The report models three “plausible” scenarios: a “sustainable transformation” in which nations coordinate toward decarbonization; a continuation of the current energy transition momentum; and a “slower evolution” in which the world is fragmented in its decarbonization efforts. The global temperature would increase between 1.8 degrees and 2.6 degrees by 2050, depending on the scenario.
