The Fuel Decisions of This Decade Will Shape Industrial Decarbonization

For hard-to-abate sectors, the question is no longer whether transition is needed, but how executable pathways can be built.

The debate over net-zero timelines will continue. Industrial decisions, however, cannot wait. Across shipping, aviation and other hard-to-abate sectors, the role of clean molecules has moved beyond hype and skepticism into a more practical reality: some sectors will depend on them if decarbonization is to succeed. Yet markets remain stuck. Demand waits for supply. Supply waits for demand. Technology in some end uses is moving faster than the fuel system needed to support it. No single company, and no single sector, can solve this gap alone. What is now required is coordination across sectors, infrastructure, finance and policy. The Future Fuels Forum was established to help make that coordination possible, and to turn fragmented ambition into more executable pathways.

A platform built to close the gap between ambition and execution.

Future Fuels Forum brings fuel systems, carbon availability, infrastructure, finance and policy into one decision-grade framework.

Mission

To enable practical, executable decarbonization pathways for hard-to-abate sectors through cross-sector analysis, advisory and roadmapping, with a focus on e-fuels and other hydrogen-based derivatives.

Vision

To help shape a transition in which limited clean molecules are deployed with greater realism, coordination and strategic discipline across sectors, regions and value chains.

Aim

To provide boards, governments, regulators and investors with integrated guidance on what can realistically be deployed, when, where and under what conditions.

Why a New Platform Is Needed Now

Many transition plans still lack clarity on fuel availability, cost, timing and cross-sector competition.

Companies and governments are committing to decarbonization without clear answers on future fuel supply, cost trajectories, infrastructure readiness or competition across sectors. At the same time, capital is tighter, geopolitical uncertainty is rising and regulatory pathways are diverging. As a result, many current transition plans risk being misaligned with technical, commercial and financial realities. Future Fuels Forum addresses this gap by testing assumptions across sectors and translating them into practical sequencing and investment logic. The platform does not promote hydrogen, e-fuels or carbon capture as ends in themselves. It focuses on what can be executed in the real economy, and on how policy, finance and industry strategy can better reflect that reality.

Core Strategic Axis for cross-sector collaboration.

«Whether incentives or penalties, you need something to address the gap. You can have the stick or the carrot, but without those you cannot make it work.»

Alexandra Ebbinghaus
General Manager Decarbonization , Shell Marine

No Hard-To-Abate Sector Will Solve This Alone.

Future fuels markets will be shaped by shared constraints, not isolated sector strategies.

Shipping, aviation, cement, steel, chemicals, agriculture, energy and power generation are linked by the same underlying challenge: all depend, in different ways, on scarce molecules, infrastructure, carbon sources, capital and time. This means that assumptions made in one sector affect the others. Uncoordinated scaling can lead to price shocks, bottlenecks, duplicated infrastructure and stranded investments.

Coordinated planning can improve sequencing, reduce risk and support more credible pathways to deployment. Future Fuels Forum is designed to reconcile these tradeoffs. Its role is to connect sectors that are often discussed separately, but that in practice compete for the same resources and depend on the same enabling conditions.