Fossil fuels are incompatible with every single Sustainable Development Goal
Our first ever piece together, ‘Fuelling Failure’, was commissioned by the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty to be the first global review of the dangers posed by the fossil fuel industry to the Sustainable Development Goals.
Summary
Our report collated evidence of how the exploration, extraction, refining, transportation and combustion of oil, gas and coal is making it impossible for the global community to meet the SDGs, threatening lives and livelihoods, and the ability of the planet to sustain human wellbeing. It’s been cited by the United Nations General Assembly and the European Union’s European Economic and Social Committee.
The exploration, extraction, refining, transportation and combustion of oil, gas and coal is making it impossible for the global community to meet the SDGs, threatening lives and livelihoods, and the ability of the planet to sustain human wellbeing.
What the report does
Drawing on more than four hundred academic articles and civil society reports, the report examines each of the individual seventeen SDGs and specifies precisely how the exploration, extraction, transportation and combustion of fossil fuels, as well as the corporate conduct of the fossil fuel industry, are eroding efforts towards achieving them. The report not only acknowledges the direct and indirect impacts of fossil fuels and supporting infrastructures on the SDGs, but also explores the complex interlinkages between fossil fuels and other areas of the global economy, such as transportation, urban development, and consumption, amongst others.
Charting life after fossil fuels
The report concludes with a way forward that aligns ambitious climate action with efforts to revitalise the sustainable development agenda, reverse biodiversity loss and curtail pollution. This approach highlights the need for a new international framework to coordinate a fast, fair and equitable phase out of fossil fuels. Supply side action – stopping fossil fuel extraction in the first place, to complement existing efforts to reduce fossil fuel demand – is vital for stimulating an orderly, but rapid, transition away from fossil fuels, while supporting the most vulnerable communities, who have done the least to create this crisis, to thrive in our warming world.