TO READERS OF THE MORAL CASE FOR FOSSIL FUELS

Note: If you’ve never read my previous book on fossil fuels, I encourage you to skip this section and go straight to chapter 1.

In my 2014 book, The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels, I made the highly unusual and controversial prediction that fossil fuel use would grow, not shrink, and that the benefits of growing fossil fuel use to human flourishing would far outweigh its negative side-effects, including any negative climate impacts.

My prediction was based on three conclusions:

If you read The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels and are reading this book, it’s likely that you found my conclusions at least somewhat convincing.

But even if you found them very convincing, it is understandable that you might think I have been proved substantially wrong, given what is reported to us on a daily basis—that fossil fuels no longer have any unique benefits, and that fossil-fueled climate change has been causing immense harm that we can no longer adapt to, let alone master.

Today, stories about how “renewables,” specifically solar and wind, are rapidly replacing fossil fuels due to superior economics, are ubiquitous. Some of our most impressive technology companies, such as Apple, Google, and Facebook, proclaim themselves to be 100 percent renewable, with the implication that if 100 percent renewable is working for them, then it can surely work for the rest of us.

Also on a daily basis, we see stories about how fossil-fueled climate change is now an “existential threat” to our lives. New alleged catastrophe predictions have become prominent, such as “ocean acidification” and mass species extinction. And climate-related disasters such as storms, floods, and wildfires are presented as reaching new and overwhelming heights of danger. Witness the horrific, out-of-control wildfires in California and Australia, which we are told are without precedent and are unmanageable by any means other than by rapidly eliminating our CO₂ emissions.

In sum, today’s incessant narrative is that fossil fuels are making the world a worse and worse place to live, but renewables are coming to the rescue—and could do far more if we would just get off fossil fuels already.

If true, this narrative would certainly refute my predictions and my call in The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels to use more fossil fuel energy going forward, not less.

But, as I stressed in Moral Case, to know the truth we cannot just look at anecdotes or narratives; we have to look at the “big picture” facts.

And if we look at the big-picture facts about fossil fuels, alternatives, human flourishing, and climate, The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels has thus far been completely vindicated.

Fact 1: Fossil fuels are still the dominant source of energy around the world, providing four times more energy than all alternatives combined. And fossil fuel use is still growing. “Renewable” solar and wind are just 3 percent of the world’s energy, a 3 percent that is dependent on mandates, subsidies, and reliable fossil fuel power plants—a 3 percent that is leading to increasing costs and/or major reliability problems everywhere solar and wind are used in nontrivial quantities.

Fact 2: The world has continued to become a better place to live, especially for the poorest people, and low-cost, reliable energy from fossil fuels is a fundamental cause. Among many other benefits, fossil fuels have powered the increased industrialization that has brought down the rate of extreme poverty—the percentage of people living on less than $2 a day—from 42 percent in 1980 to less than 10 percent today.[1]

Fact 3: While fossil fuels have contributed to a warming global climate system, that warming amounts to 1°C over the last 170 years—and climate-related disaster deaths continue to fall to all-time lows thanks in large part to fossil-fueled “climate mastery”: from fossil-fueled irrigation to fossil-fueled heating and cooling to fossil-fueled construction of sturdy buildings to fossil-fueled early warning systems. Over the last century, the rate of climate-related disaster deaths has fallen by 98 percent.[2]

While you may be heartened, as I have been, by the vindication of The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels so far, you may still wonder if, going forward, the facts on the ground might change drastically, as more and more money and talent go into “renewables” and as the amount of CO₂ in the atmosphere rises.

I, too, have wondered this. Over the last seven years I have become particularly interested in understanding and evaluating the long-term future of fossil fuels. What can we expect to be the benefits and side-effects of fossil fuels compared with the alternatives in the decades and generations to come?

Seeking to answer this question has led me to spend a lot more time researching and thinking about energy, human flourishing, and climate. It has also led me to develop a much more explicit framework for thinking about energy issues than I had when I wrote The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels. I call this framework “the human flourishing framework.”

Also helpful has been discussing these issues with tens of thousands of people as I’ve traveled the United States and the world sharing my ideas.

When I began thinking more about the long-term future of fossil fuels, I have to admit that I expected to become a little bit less enthusiastic about them. There was a period of a couple years after The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels when I didn’t follow technical developments in energy and in climate as closely as I had before or have since. Popular reporting was so emphatic about the radical improvement of renewables and unprecedented negative developments in climate that I thought, Maybe promoting fossil fuels isn’t what I want to spend my time on.

But once I started an intensive study of the long-term future of fossil fuels, armed with a much better framework and the latest facts, I became convinced that there is a far stronger moral case to be made for fossil fuels than I thought—a case that extends generations—a moral case for a fossil future.

Unfortunately, while the reality of fossil fuels has become much more positive and my understanding has become much more positive, fossil fuel policy and perception have gone in exactly the opposite direction.

Whereas in 2014 the policy of rapid elimination of fossil fuels was a rather extreme position, now it is almost ubiquitously viewed as the mainstream, “expert” view, with institutions from every part of the culture declaring their support for fossil fuel elimination by pledging to be “net zero” or “carbon neutral” by 2050 at the latest.

Surveys about fossil fuels and climate show that some 50 percent of the people in many countries believe that fossil-fueled climate change threatens to cause the extinction of the human race.[3]

“Climate emergency” and “climate crisis” are no longer treated as predictions about the future. They are treated as descriptions of the present—even though in the present we are safer from climate than any human population has ever been.[4]

Given that I regard continuing, expanding fossil fuel use as essential to global human flourishing, I regard “net-zero” proposals as apocalyptically as others regard fossil-fueled climate change. Net-zero policy, if actually implemented, would certainly be the most significant act of mass murder since the killings of one hundred million people by communist regimes in the twentieth century—and it would likely be far greater. (If you don’t believe me, I think you will once you read chapters 4 through 6 of this book.)

Because net-zero policies are so apocalyptic, I believe they will never be implemented consistently. In particular, China, Russia, and India have given every indication that they will not adopt such policies.[5]

But the increasingly consistent attempts to implement fossil fuel elimination policies will certainly have two consequences that I want to do whatever I can to avert.

One consequence is the indefinite delay of the world’s poorest places bringing themselves out of poverty—which today requires fossil fuels. It’s always easier to stop something new than to stop something in progress. Thus, the anti-fossil fuel movement has and will continue to find it easier to stop new fossil-fueled development throughout Africa than it has in slowing existing fossil-fueled development in China or India.

The second consequence to avert is economic suicide by the world’s freest countries—including my own country, the United States of America.

Right now the countries most avidly embracing fossil fuel elimination in their plans are the traditionally freest countries. Contrast this with unfree China, which has an explicit goal of being the world’s leading superpower by 2049 and is using an 85 percent fossil-fueled economy to get there—including by using fossil fuels to produce unreliable solar panels and wind turbines that are contributing to the higher prices and lower reliability of the U.S. electrical system, which in turn is becoming less and less attractive to industry.[6]

The unprecedented security that America and, largely by extension, the rest of the free world enjoys today is due to America’s economic strength and its military might. Both depend on low-cost, reliable energy. As Daniel Yergin documented in The Prize, war requires mobility, and wars are often won by those with the best mobile energy—above all, oil. A world in which free countries are killing their economies and, by extension, their militaries, while China leverages low-cost, reliable fossil fuel energy to become the largest economy with the most formidable military is not a world I want to live in.[7]

For these reasons and many others that will emerge in this book, I regard the drastic decline in fossil fuel policy and perception as an existential threat to freedom and flourishing around the world—including a threat to the long-term existence of the United States.

It has been upsetting to witness this trend occurring despite my and others’ efforts to persuade people about the moral case for fossil fuels, and despite the fact that we have been proven right.

However, I have also been heartened by the impact that The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels has had, along with my work promoting its ideas in many different forms and forums.

Time after time I’ve seen my arguments turn non-supporters into supporters, including those from unlikely backgrounds, such as liberal Harvard students and former climate activists.

Just as important, I’ve seen my arguments turn supporters into champions—people who themselves can win over others.

In 2014, I called on the fossil fuel industry to stand up for itself. It’s not happening as much as is necessary, but now there are prominent CEOs, such as Chris Wright of Liberty Oilfield Services and Adam Anderson of Innovex, making the moral case for their industry.[8]

In 2014, I called on people in poorer places to champion fossil fuel energy. Now individuals such as energy researcher Vijay Jayaraj in India and Africa Energy Chamber’s NJ Ayuk are doing just that.[9]

The success of my work in turning non-supporters into supporters and supporters into champions, combined with the drastic decline in public opinion of fossil fuels, has motivated me to improve my ability to explain the facts about energy—and to think a lot about the highest-leverage ways I can spread the truth.

In 2018, I concluded that the best thing I could do would be to write an entirely new book about fossil fuels—one that is completely current, far more comprehensive, far clearer, and far more future-oriented than The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels.

My goal in Fossil Future is to help far more people learn the truth—both directly, through the book, and indirectly, by helping other supporters of fossil fuels and energy freedom (hopefully you) explain the evidence to others clearly and persuasively.

I hope you find Fossil Future enjoyable, clarifying, and empowering.