The global energy system is governed by complex dynamics that play out over time across regions and sectors of the economy. Projected increases in population and incomes drive our expectation of rising energy demand through 2050.
Since our last IEO two years ago, IEO2021, the global energy system has evolved against a backdrop of new energy policies, the transition to zero-carbon technologies, energy security concerns, and economic and population growth.
The International Energy Outlook 2023 (IEO2023) explores long-term energy trends across the world through 2050. We explore three key findings in separate sections of this report, each containing a series of in-depth explanations that include region- and sector-specific insights across modeled cases.
Our projections highlight a key global insight—global energy-related CO2 emissions will increase through 2050 in all IEO2023 cases except our Low Economic Growth case.
We project global electricity generation will increase by 30% to 76% in 2050 from 2022 (depending on the case) and will primarily be met by zero-carbon technologies across all cases.
Natural gas and crude oil supply, consumption, and trade patterns evolve in our projections to meet growing demand against the backdrop of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which we assume will continue to limit Russia’s exports to Western markets.
IEO2023 includes a Reference case and a series of six side cases that reflect different assumptions related to macroeconomic growth, fuel prices, and technology costs.
We included assumptions in our IEO2023 cases regarding Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which are held constant across all cases.
For the International Energy Outlook 2023 (IEO2023), we are introducing new regional groupings for countries in the World Energy Projection System (WEPS) based solely on geography.