The US Energy Information Agency Forecasts that US Energy Consumption Will Increase Through 2050

The US Energy Information Agency Forecasts that US Energy Consumption Will Increase Through 2050, and Petroleum and Liquid Fuels will Remain the Most-Consumed Source of Energy.

President Biden pledged at the United Nations Climate Conference in Glasgow to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Reaching that goal while also meeting the world’s increasing energy needs will be difficult unless we’re willing to work with producers to explore innovations with some of our traditional sources. One interesting possibility comes from Canada, the number one source of US oil and petroleum liquid fuel imports.

Canada has also pledged itself to reach net zero by 2050. To achieve this goal, Canada has had a national carbon price since 2019 and is investing in carbon capture, utilization, and storage research to lead to commercial scale development.

Six of the largest oil producers operating in the Canadian oil sands have embarked on an ambitious plan together to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions in oil sands production by 2050. In June, the CEOs of these companies and Alberta’s Premier Jason Kenney came to the Wilson Center to explain how they intend to reach that target through changes in extracting, processing, and transporting this oil.

Our northern neighbors are often lampooned by US comedians as being boring. But in the case of the oils sands effort—and the quiet push by government and industry leaders to clean up their oil sources—boring is not so bad. It might even be, eventually, attention-getting.