What happens when the world needs more of everything?

Here’s something I’ve been thinking about lately: What happens when the world needs more of everything?

Not literally everything, of course. I doubt anyone is asking for more meetings.

I’m talking about the things that come with economic progress and modern life. More electricity. More mobility. More housing and infrastructure. More manufactured goods. More computing power. More access to healthcare and education. More opportunity.

In other words, many of the things billions of us already take for granted. But things that billions of others still aspire to attain.

This is not an academic question for me. I grew up in a small town in India. Some days we had electricity — and some days we didn’t. That was more than 40 years ago, and while things have improved, electricity is still not guaranteed 24/7 in my hometown.

The question of more is one of many tackled by ExxonMobil's 2026 Global Outlook, our view of how global energy demand and supply are likely to evolve through 2050.

And like all the most important questions, it starts with people.

We expect the world to add roughly 1.5 billion of them by 2050, almost entirely in developing countries. Those countries are also expected to grow their economies twice as fast as developed ones, helping global GDP rise roughly 80%. Average income per person is projected to increase about 70%.

Think about that last number for a moment.

A 70% increase in average income buys more than stuff. Higher incomes can mean better food, clean cooking fuels, better housing, reliable transportation, a refrigerator, an air conditioner, a computer, maybe a first car. It can mean sending a child to school instead of sending him or her to work to help meet the basic needs of the household.

And underpinning virtually all of it is energy.

Today, more than 4 billion people live in countries without enough energy to meet modern standards of living. Nearly 700 million people lack access to electricity. About 3 million die each year from illnesses caused by indoor air pollution, much of it associated with cooking with fuels such as wood, dung, and charcoal.

Those numbers put the question of more in a different light.

More does not always mean excess. For someone without reliable electricity, it can mean keeping the lights on. For a family cooking over a smoky fire, it can mean access to cleaner cooking fuel. For communities without reliable roads, hospitals, schools, or communications, more energy can help make those essentials possible.

So it should come as no surprise that the world is going to need more energy.

Our Outlook projects that developing countries will use about 25% more energy in 2050 than they do today. Global electricity demand is expected to jump roughly 65%, driven by improving living standards, industrial activity, data centers, electric vehicles, and other needs.

And here’s where things get interesting: The world needs less of something, too.

Emissions.

Our Outlook projects global energy-related CO₂ emissions will fall roughly 20% by 2050 even as economies expand, incomes rise, electricity demand grows, and billions of people seek better lives.

That’s meaningful progress, but more is needed.

At roughly 30 billion metric tons a year, energy-related CO₂ emissions in 2050 would still be above levels associated with society’s climate goals. Our Outlook highlights that gap and also projects a smaller reduction in emissions in 2050 than we did a year ago, in part because coal is proving more persistent and lower-emission technologies are not scaling as quickly as previously expected.

Understanding why that gap remains, even as the world makes progress, is important.

It would be considerably easier if the objective were simply to produce more energy. Or, conversely, if we could reduce emissions by simply using less of it.

Neither reflects the world we actually live in.

The more interesting question is: Why?

People expect energy to be available when they need it and affordable enough that they can pay for it. At the same time, society is also seeking ways to reduce emissions. And right now, many of the technologies capable of doing that remain too expensive to deploy at anything close to the scale required. That last part matters. That’s why making lower-emission technologies more affordable is just as important as making them more effective.

Translation: Technology is an important piece of the puzzle.

Solar and wind are growing quickly, and our Outlook expects them to account for more than 11% of the world’s energy mix by 2050. Natural gas use is also expected to increase, while coal declines (but remains important to many economies). Oil remains essential, particularly for commercial transportation and industry. And technologies such as carbon capture and storage, low-carbon hydrogen, and biofuels will need to become considerably more widespread if the world is to make greater progress reducing emissions from some of the hardest-to-decarbonize parts of the economy.

There are no guarantees about exactly how all this plays out. The Global Outlook is a projection, not a promise or a desired outcome. It examines how the global energy system is most likely to evolve based on the economic trends, technological developments, public policies, and consumer behavior we see today.

Technologies will change. Policies will change. Markets will change. Almost certainly, something will surprise us.

But I’d wager on one constant: People aren’t going to stop striving for better lives. Nor should they.

And they will need the energy to do it.

Prasanna Joshi is Economics and Energy Director at ExxonMobil.

Read ExxonMobil’s 2026 Global Outlook.