The “Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries” (OPEC) published on June 18, 2026 the “World Oil Outlook 2050”.1234 The key message from the report and the presentation:
“(…) there is no peak oil demand on the horizon.”
Haitham Al Ghais, OPEC Secretary General in Vienna, June 18, 2026
In the view of Mr. Al Ghais, the report “offers data driven, transparent, and objective views that aid policy makers worldwide” and he adds that the so far OPEC outlook “proved to be entirely correct”.


OPEC projects overall global primary energy demand to rise by 23% by 2050, with a decline in coal’s share (from 26% to 14%) and stable shares for oil (30%) and gas (24%) in the overall energy mix. The growth in demand will be fuelled largely by India and further developing (non-OECD) countries.
In my view, we are just witnessing the by far greatest political failure ever in human history – one that is far worse than the failures seen both in advance and during “World War II“, with striking similarities in the patterns.
This OPEC outlook means significant increase in “greenhouse gas” (GHG) emissions, exponential global warming5, and a projected decline in the global population to around 2 billion people by the end of this century – a loss of about 6.5 billion people within 75 years6 – aligned with human, et al. suffering that is currently unimaginable.
Sources
- cf. OPEC (2026): “Launch of OPEC’s World Oil Outlook 2026”, https://youtu.be/YcJKcFW5gu4 ↩︎
- cf. OPEC (2026): “World Oil Outlook 2050“, download of report requires user-registration. ↩︎
- cf. OPEC (2026): “World Oil Outlook 2050 – promotion video”, https://youtu.be/P9WDDWfp3dk ↩︎
- cf. OPEC (2026): “OPEC launches World Oil Outlook 2026 and sees global oil demand reaching 124 mb/d by 2050“, Press Release ↩︎
- cf. Baumann, K. (2024): “Temperature rise will be exponential“, IDGR.org ↩︎
- cf. Baumann, K. (2026): “How global warming will affect global population – a first theory“, IDGR.org ↩︎
picture shows photo (c) OPEC from the official launch of the “World Oil Outlook 2050” report in Vienna, June 18, 2026,