(Bloomberg) — ExxonMobil is reinforcing its long-term commitment to expanding fossil fuel production, anticipating that global demand will “remain largely unchanged” through 2050.

According to Dan Ammann, president of Exxon’s upstream division, the energy giant is focused on sustained investment in oil and gas projects that it expects to remain essential for decades, rather than reacting to short-term trends. He spoke at the BloombergNEF “Barrel of Tomorrow in the Age of AI” conference in Houston on Thursday. Exxon aims to double its LNG sales by 2030 and is channeling significant investment into oil developments in Guyana and the Permian Basin.

“We take a long-term view based on the fundamentals, and we invest behind that, Ammann said. “Our long-term view of the global energy equation is that the demand for energy is going to continue to grow.”

Exxon has maintained its fossil-fuel-centered approach despite international climate objectives. Ammann said this strategy has served it well compared with other oil companies that pivoted to renewable energy only to come back to oil and gas when the returns were lacking. 

“We saw some oil and gas companies, five, six, seven years ago say they were going to reduce production 40% by 2030,” he said. “There was literally no math you could do to suggest that was a good idea.”

In its Energy Outlook report released last month, ExxonMobil noted that despite significant growth in low-carbon energy sources, oil and natural gas will still account for about 55% of the global energy mix by 2050. This is primarily due to a substantial increase in overall energy demand. The company stated that while oil demand is expected to level off around 2030, natural gas will fill the energy gap.

“We see material growth on the gas side,” Ammann said.

Exxon is nearing the startup of its Golden Pass LNG terminal, a joint project with QatarEnergy located on the Texas Gulf Coast, with operations expected to begin in the coming months. The company also plans to finalize investment choices for major ventures in Mozambique and Papua New Guinea by the end of 2026.