Exxon Says Energy Demand Makes Case for Fossil Fuel Growth

An Exxon Mobil Corp. oil drilling rig near Stanton, Texas. Photographer: Justin Hamel/Bloomberg

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Exxon Mobil Corp. will pursue fossil fuel growth long into the future to meet demand it says will “not materially change” between now and 2050.

The Texas oil major is not concerned with “chasing the narrative of the week” but will invest in oil and gas projects that it believes will be needed for decades to come, Dan Ammann, president of the company’s upstream division, said at the BloombergNEF Barrel of Tomorrow in the Age of AI summit in Houston Thursday. Exxon plans to double its sales of liquefied natural gas by 2030 and is investing heavily in oil growth in Guyana and the Permian Basin.

“We take a long-term view based on the fundamentals, and we invest behind that, Ammann said. “Our long-term view of the global energy equation is that the demand for energy is going to continue to grow.”

Exxon has not deviated from its fossil fuel focused strategy despite global climate goals. Ammann said this strategy has served it well compared with other oil companies that pivoted to renewable energy only to come back to oil and gas when the returns were lacking.

“We saw some oil and gas companies, five, six, seven years ago say they were going to reduce production 40% by 2030,” he said. “There was literally no math you could do to suggest that was a good idea.”

Exxon sees oil and gas holding steady at 55% of the global energy mix by 2050 despite dramatic growth from low carbon sources, chiefly due to a large increase in overall consumption. While oil demand will likely plateau around 2030, gas will help make up the shortfall, the company said in its Energy Outlook published last month.

“We see material growth on the gas side,” Ammann said.

Exxon is planning to bring its Golden Pass LNG operation, a joint venture with QatarEnergy along the Texas Gulf Coast, online within the next few months and expects to make final investment decisions on major projects in Mozambique and Papua New Guinea by the end of next year.