The U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Annual Energy Outlook 2025 (AEO2025) projects that U.S. energy consumption will decline over the next several years and will not begin to rise again until the early 2040s, continuing through 2050.
The report indicated that energy consumption in 2050 will be lower than in 2024 across most of the scenarios modeled, though outcomes vary widely depending on the assumptions used in each scenario. The AEO2025 explores long-term trends based on a Reference case that assumes current laws and regulations as of December 2024 remain unchanged through 2050.
EIA has analyzed several alternative scenarios to examine the impact of different policy, economic, and technological developments. In the Alternative Electricity case, regulations in effect prior to April 2024 are assumed, excluding the EPA’s new rule targeting carbon dioxide emissions from generating units.
The Alternative Transportation case excludes recent vehicle fuel economy and emissions regulations from the EPA, NHTSA, and the California Air Resources Board. The High Oil Price case assumes Brent crude oil rises to $155 per barrel by 2050, in contrast to $91/b in the Reference case and $47/b in the Low Oil Price case.
The High Oil and Gas Supply case projects a 50 percent increase in ultimate recovery rates for tight oil, tight gas, and shale gas wells, as well as a 50 percent rise in undiscovered resources in Alaska and offshore areas, accompanied by a 50 percent acceleration in technological advancements.
Conversely, the Low Oil and Gas Supply case assumes the opposite. In the Low Zero-Carbon Technology Cost case, the cost of zero-emission electricity technologies falls by 40 percent compared to the Reference case by 2050, while the High Zero-Carbon Technology Cost case assumes no further cost reductions.
Economic growth assumptions also vary, with a 2.1 percent compound annual growth rate in the High Economic Growth case, 1.2 percent in the Low Economic Growth case, and 1.8 percent in the Reference case.
For this edition, EIA has implemented substantial updates to its modeling framework, including the addition of a hydrogen market module, a carbon capture and sequestration module, and an enhanced upstream oil and gas resources module. Other improvements were made to better represent market behavior and new technologies.
GreentechLead.com News Desk