Essay by Eric Worrall
“… There will be a significant boost to renewables and nuclear power and a further shift towards a more electrified future …”
The damage is done’: global oil crisis has changed fossil fuel industry for ever, IEA chief says
Exclusive: International Energy Agency’s Fatih Birol, the world’s leading energy economist, also says UK should largely forgo North Sea expansion
Fiona Harvey Environment editorSat 25 Apr 2026 01.00 AEST
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Fatih Birol, the executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA), also said that, despite pressure, the UK should forgo much of its potential North Sea expansion.
Speaking exclusively to the Guardian, Birol said a key effect of the US-Israel war on Iran was that countries would lose trust in fossil fuels and demand for them would reduce.
“Their perception of risk and reliability will change. Governments will review their energy strategies. There will be a significant boost to renewables and nuclear power and a further shift towards a more electrified future,” he said. “And this will cut into the main markets for oil.”
Birol said there was no going back from the crisis: “The vase is broken, the damage is done – it will be very difficult to put the pieces back together. This will have permanent consequences for the global energy markets for years to come.”
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Tiebacks, whereby the range of existing oilfields are extended, were a different matter, he added – they should go ahead.
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/apr/24/global-oil-crisis-changed-fossil-fuel-industry-for-ever-iea-chief-fatih-birol
To be clear, Fatih Birol isn’t denying a near term requirement for more fossil fuel, but thinks fossil fuel demand is going to disappear too quickly to make it worth opening new North Sea oil and gas fields.
This is an odd thing for an IEA head to advise. What if electrification doesn’t happen as quickly as Fatih Birol expects? Surely it makes more sense to allow private companies to risk their own capital developing resources which might not be needed, than to gamble on predictions of rapid electrification eliminating supply demand, only to discover you really needed that oil and gas after all.
Back in the real world the UK grid is struggling with current loads. Any significant rise in electrification could tip the UK grid into crisis.
Yet another fantasist spouting drivel. Is there a factory somewhere churning out these morons?
Its in China where they pay stooges like her to sell “renewable” equipment made from their coal fired power plants with their gulag slave labor.
Pretty sure it’s a “he”, though these days one can never tell.
When good Mr Birol gives up his own oil and gas usage, along with everything derived therefrom, maybe I’ll believe him.
trans? 🙂
Yes, the factories are called ivory towers and Kafkaesque burro-ocracies.
Fatih is obviously a man of Faith!
What he seems to be thinking about is the fragility (vulnerability) of the world’s fossil fuel supplies. He forgets that there are large vulnerabilities in renewables, just different ones. If you are wind/solar dependent you are likely more dependent on China than anyone is on Middle East oil today. The world is a scary, dangerous place. As in the past, it is always more convenient in the moment to bury nations’ collective heads in the sand until disaster (e.g. Hitler, Pearl Harbor etc.) happen.
Wonder if anyone has estimated what Superstorm Sandy would have done to the planned and fantasized offshore wind farms off the mid Atlantic and New England?
The Great New England Hurricane of 1938.
It did tremendous damage to the forests of the region. We’re constantly being told that the possibility of it happening any time is so strong that we must adjust our forestry policies to ensure diversity so that some forests will survive. Yet, they persist in wanting to run everything on electricity from wind and solar. Such a hurricane will destroy both. Ironically, they say the climate emergency will make it MORE likely!
https://www.weather.gov/okx/1938hurricanehome
Did you recall any recent monster nor’easters that could wipeout the wind farms? What were the engineers thinking when they built the wind farms in nor’easter alley? Did they cross the fingers behind their backs and hope the “Big One” will never come roaring out of the North Atlantic?
I know over the years there have been plenty of storms of all types that have damaged many solar farms- not a wipe out, but significant damage. A lightning storm damaged about 10% of the 20 acre solar farm next to my ‘hood. We even get tornadoes here- not every year- maybe 1-2 per decade. Imagine of those hitting a solar or wind farm! And I’m not even on the coast- maybe 100 miles inland. The coasts get worse storms- and that’s where all the wind machines are or planned.
If you are wind/solar dependent you are without electricity a good part of the time.
We were also threatened with imminent destruction some 60 years ago now –
Eve Of Destruction
1965
As another popular doomsday prediction, this also hasn’t aged well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfZVu0alU0I
Ah the Western world is in danger
We the People have become like strangers
Taking polls and opinions while the fabric decays
For the greed of the few how much the innocent pay
And the children are watching, if you hear how they pray
And you tell me over and over and over again my friend
You don’t believe we’re still on the eve of destruction?
Think of this green Earth, a tropical rainforest
And take a look around to the Sahara Desert
You wanna cut it down, burn it to the ground, leave barren and waste
Till there’s no room for living, animals, rivers and lakes
And there’s nothing to stop it but a miracle of faith
And you tell me over and over and over again my friend
Said you don’t believe we’re still on the eve of destruction
Now you don’t believe we’re still on the eve of destruction?
I know you understand what we’re trying to say
Can’t you see the madness that’s led up to today?
We believe it’s time for a change, for a new golden age
Where the business of life runs in harmony with nature
For nature reflects the beauty within ourselves
And this changin’ attitude would ring out the Liberty Bells
For the hungry and the homeless and the helpless as well
And you tell me over and over and over again my friend
Sayin’ you don’t believe we’re still on the eve of destruction?
Ah you don’t believe we’re still on the eve of destruction?
At the source of silence, we’ll sing song of creation
Transcending the boundaries of our soul’s imagination
You can’t twist the truth, it knows no regulation
‘Cause the truth is in love, freedom and cooperation
Let there be peace in your heart, that’s all right, that’s where it starts
Let there be peace tonight, in all the nations
For the music of life is in our laughter, liberation
And you tell me over and over and over again my friend
You don’t believe we’re still on the eve of destruction?
No, no, no you don’t believe we’re on the eve of destruction?
Baby boomer mind poison! No wonder they fled into the absurdity of the Age of Aquarius.
Great song and poetry even if it was all wrong. As for the eve of destruction- we’ve always been on it. The details just change. Ultimately, we’re all gonna be unalived.
Erlrodd,
supplier vulnerability is one factor, but the other significant factor is the variability of weather to proved energy to a system that cannot accept that variability.
Security and weather dependant generation is a nonsense.
Surprisingly, the IEA is not a UN child.
But they follow the same globalist marching orders.
Yep.
It wasn’t until 2025 that the IEA finally admitted that fossil fuel use would not be declining anytime soon. The EIA [eia.gov] is a more realistic entity.
the IREA has been established because the IEA was found guilty of the mortal sin of holding fossil fuel as a necessary and reliable source of energy.
There are probably too many true scientists and engineers in the IEA to prevent total perversion of their foundational philosophy.
Time for them to revolt. Not doing so is bad karma. 🙂
But where are all the common sense engineers who should bring it back to reality?
Maybe not but my pet theory is that Fatih Birol wants to become the first Turkish Secretary General of the UN!
Another useful idiot.
It is about time to tell useful Idiots from willing prostitues.
And he ain’t an Idiot,
but he was given the highest civil awards possible in several different countries (this makes Mayer Lanskies and Lucky Lucianos Medal of Freedom award retroactively plausible, as one can only serve so much for a single country) and the Germans honored him way back in 2009 specifically for
helping to protect “Climate” – and after that they started to work on shutting their nuclear plans while paying Ukraine money to keep their old, dangerous trashplants running.
His very approach in his statement is a distortion and omission of facts:
The vase ain’t broken and the biggest problem is a deliberate one(closure of Hormuz),
the rest can be repaired with barely any pain as of now as most of the infrastructure still exists – but it will be managed that way Hormuz stays closed ; and he knows that.
Then he is dishonest, as the broken pieces of the vase,
are part of deliberate sabotage on oil infrastructure.
Not only Ukraine became suddenly so successful in hitting russian refineries since the Iran war.
At the same time a lucky streak for green energy happened all around the world,
as refineries started burning also in Texas, Australia etc.
45+ fires in 45 days according to Wionews –
or if we use Soros -Speak: “Arab refinery Springs going global”
(if you can’t compete you must take out the competition ).
Strangely this superexport isn’t interested in talking about this elephant in the room
Faith Birol and much of what his Paris based IEA produces is just plain dumb wrong, and has been for all the years I have been following them since publishing Gaia’s Limits in 2011. As shown again here. You cannot electrify long haul trucking, construction, ag, forestry… even IF you could easily build out nuclear.
Iran is beaten but has not yet surrendered—but probably cannot hold out much longer. More likely a few weeks than a few months. They run out of crude storage soon with all tankers blockaded and they will have to start permanently damaging their oil fields as wells have to be shut down (at least two problems, reservoir water cones and paraffin ‘freezing out’ in the well bores). No trade, currency essentially worthless, severe drought in parts of Iran (like Tehran) so presently unable to replenish food supplies without imports.
Hormuz will reopen one way or the other soon enough. Japan has 18 months crude supply in storage. North America is self sufficient. China and Europe are hurt by the Hormuz closure, in both cases IMO deservedly so but for different reasons.
The Middle East ‘hydrocarbon vase’ is NOT ‘irretrievably broken’.
There is no all tanker blokade:
More than 3 dozens ships have passed and only 4 intercepted,
as you can’t cover such a huge territory with just 16 ships(especially when your ships are 500 + miles away from Iranian coast) and Iranian ships can sneak along their and Pakistani coast00 without entering international waters.
+ they have access to the Caspian sea. Railroad connections etc.
And Hormuz will not reopen – no way.
This is the way for elites to go green.
The military zones are highly autonomous and Iranian militias can fire and drones for many years and hit targets whenever they like.
And whenever they hit a tanker or 2 the straights will be closed for days because insurance companies will cancel contracts.
Your pessimistic data is wrong. I just checked with CENTCOM.
As of their last report, 4 ships have been ‘intercepted’ (I.e. forcibly captured) but 29 have been forced to turn around and either return to Iranian port or leave the vicinity.
The demining might take a few weeks as it is now being done ‘safely’ using autonomous underwater drones. The Warthogs can and will take out any new minelayers that venture out. 15 have already been sunk, as well as the major Iranian mine stockpiles destroyed.
With US navel escorts thereafter, all the ‘autonomous’ potential Iranian air attack assets against large commercial vessels are impotent. They used 101 to try to get to the Ford carrier task force. Score: US 101, Iran zero.
And Trump already announced an alternative US backed insurance facility for Hormuz, taking commercial insurance out of the equation.
bingo!
Right up there—the face of a moron. Or one with bulging pockets of climate grift.
His 1%er lifestyle would be more like a 3rd-worlders without it. But he knows that.
First and foremost the UK Government should forego contributing taxpayers’ money to the IEA budget, an organization that is useless, if not at all harmful.
Another agency to add to the reduce funding by 50% from the U.S. list: NATO, UN, IEA, pretty soon we’ll be talking about real money.
Yet another international organisation captured by Marxism.
The U.S. has threatened to leave (defund) EIA if it does not quit its anti fossil fuels stuff. Maybe this will do it. Here’s hoping.
I just checked. IEA has 31 formal country members, and US contributes 23% of its regular budget! Suckers again.
Acronym wars. Is it EIA or IEA?
Simple. IEA is international Paris based. EIA is DC based division of DoE.
It’s not simple when people use them interchangeably.
Eric you are far to kind to Fatih. It is clear international organizations are pathetic. Fatih is the best they have to offer yet he still clings to fairytales and unicorns. At the very least the US needs to stop financing crappy outfits like this.
He’s delusional. Actually, the Renewables Humpty Dumpty will be taking a great fall very soon, and all the Cuckoo Climateers’ whingeing and all the Cuckoo Climateers’ clowns won’t be able to put Humpty together again. The horses have left the barnyard, and the chickens are coming home to roost. And they can cry about it ’til the cows come home, but it won’t do any good.
My California rancher grandfather used to say ‘The chickens are coming home to roost.’ Took me a while to figure out what he meant—there will be chickensh*t everywhere. As here.
What is actually happening is that more countries are trying to find and develop their own fossil fuels.. The exact opposite of what the globalist muppet is saying
Anyone sane knows that modern civilisations are built on fossil fuels, and that grid wind and solar are really just a parasitic waste of time.
And almost 120 countries in the world are still producing oil every day.
That’s all I need to know.
The irony here is that the IEA has recently predicted that fossil fuels are highly likely to be the planet’s dominant energy source for decades yet. Meanwhile just last year Texas set a record for the amount of oil it extracted, and China and India are still consuming huge amounts of coal annually despite their vague commitments to renewables. Yet Birol seems to be out of touch with such facts, or maybe part of his job is to downplay them.
“Fatih Birol (born 22 March 1958) is a Turkish economist and energy expert, who has served as the executive director of the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA) since 1 September 2015. During his time in charge of the IEA, he has taken a series of steps to modernise the Paris-based international organisation, including strengthening ties with emerging economies like India and China and stepping up work on the clean energy transition and international efforts to reach net zero emissions.”
India and China?
Okay, how does it look in his country of Origin?
“Turkey’s primary power sources are dominated by fossil fuels—specifically coal and natural gas—which together produced over 55% of the country’s electricity as of early 2025. Coal is the largest single source (approx. 35-36%), followed by natural gas, while hydropower (approx. 20-22%), wind, and solar are rapidly growing renewable sources.”
Um… looks like another guy who attends endless meetings and works 80 hour weeks without ever leaving his office to see what’s going on.
“Um… looks like another guy who attends endless meetings and works 80 hour weeks without ever leaving his office to see what’s going on.”
“Works” is doing a lot of work there.
He looks like I imagine John Belushi would look like if he had lived on
It is perhaps telling that he was making his comments to the Guardian.
The Guardian has the role of providing elevated prose when guiding other media in how to frame the ‘climate crisis’ Perhaps the head of the IEA was presenting his views to what he considers is a Guardian reader rather than to members of the real world?
Yes, that is how the game is played. Who pays the piper calls the tune..
Fatih BirolFaith Br Oil
“Birol said a key effect of the US-Israel war on Iran was that countries will realize how important are
would lose trust infossil fuels and demand for them will increasewould reduce.”fixed it
Electricity replaces pipelines and tanker trucks. It does not replace oil and gas. Oil and gas are where the electricity came from in the first place.
He sounds as stupid as Justin Trudeau, who famously stated there was no business case for Canadian natural gas exports around 8 years ago.
May I get some of what he is smoking?
I notice he is not forgoing using all the oil and gas products he wants. Living that jetset lifestyle as he does.