Originally Posted by
Australopithecus
Regarding fuel prices, here is a quote from an article on 5/1 in The Atlantic:”
The world has started to reduce its investment in producing fossil fuels. Right now, the world’s investment in oil and gas supply looks to be, somewhat shockingly, on track with a pathway of 1.5 degrees Celsius of global warming, according to the International Energy Agency. At the same time, the world is investing as much as ever in cars, power plants, and other products that use fossil fuels. That is, our investment in oil and gas demand still assumes a more-than-1.5-degree pathway. Consumers, companies, and countries seem to be assuming that oil and gas will be just as plentiful in the future as they are now.
The technical way to say this is that there is a mismatch between future oil supply expectations and future oil demand expectations. Let’s call this Mismatch No. 1.
The other mismatch is between clean energy and fossil fuels. Even as the world ramps down its investment in fossil-fuel supply, it isn’t investing enough in zero-carbon energy. According to the IEA, annual investment in clean-energy supply must triple for humanity to reach net zero by 2050. That’s Mismatch No. 2: The world is preparing for a net-zero world on the fossil-fuel side, but not on the clean-energy side.
Put together, these mismatches suggest that, if nothing changes, we can expect energy costs to go up. In the medium term, companies and consumers are going to want more oil and gas than the market can reasonably provide, and the price of both will increase.”
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Easiest way to make the general public transition to another energy source, make the cheaper one more expensive. Whether that is right or wrong is another debate, but that is what is being said in that piece. Cost will push most of the public to accept the new technology, at least easier than trying to mandate stuff and looking the bad guy, let them think they are making a financial choice rather than ecological one.
What does that mean for aviation and especially leisure travel markets? One thing, more cost and getting used to less expansion and no cheap fares, good luck to any new entrants into the industry now.