On 15 October 2020, at 11:00-12:00 (CEST), Carbon Tracker Initiative is hosting a webinar on "TEDxCarbon Tracker: Peak fossil fuel demand: When is the peak and what does it mean for financial markets and geopolitics?".
TEDxCarbonTracker is part of Countdown hosted by TED. This webinar will explore the timing of peak fossil fuel demand and what it means for financial markets and geopolitics, touching on topics from two of the Countdown themes: resilient economies and the future of energy.
Fossil fuels have enjoyed growth for the last 200 years and until recently the industry expected decades more of uninterrupted growth. However, technological innovation, regulatory changes, and societal pressure have brought this growth into question. Add to this a global pandemic, international lockdowns, and an OPEC price war, and future of fossil fuels is highly uncertain.
A quarter of equity markets and half of corporate bond markets are in sectors linked to the fossil fuel system. All of these sectors face disruption from peak demand in the same way that after coal demand peaked in 2013 the global coal sector lost 75 percent of its value and half the US coal sector went bust. Meanwhile, petrostates dependent on high oil prices will struggle in a new environment of falling demand, with profound geopolitical consequences. Investors, policymakers, business people, and other interested stakeholders require clear information about the transformation of the energy system to inform present decisions, which can have long-lasting impacts and build resilient economies.