HOUSTON, March  21, 2024 (BSS/AFP) - Fossil fuels will eventually be seen 
as just as unhealthy as cigarettes, according to Brazil Energy Minister 
Alexandre Silveira, who oversees the South American country's balancing act a 
giant of both renewables and oil.

               "The energy transition will happen one way or the other, but it will also 
happen because of another factor, which is the cultural issue," Silveira told 
AFP, speaking at an energy conference in Houston, Texas.

               "The new generations are going to begin to repudiate fossil fuels as they 
repudiated the cigarette industry in the last 20 years," he said, drawing a 
comparison with awareness around tobacco's harms that helped drive down its 
usage.

               "This is going to happen with oil," he said.

               Silveira's comments Wednesday come as Brazil, a member of the oil-producing 
OPEC+ countries, also advocates for a transition toward clean energy.

               Since returning to office for a third term in January 2023, Brazil's 
leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has made solid progress on his 
pledge to end illegal deforestation in the Amazon, which fell by half last year 
compared to 2022.

               At the same time, Brazil -- Latin America's top oil producer -- also racked 
up several monthly crude output records last year, including in November when 
it produced nearly 3.7 million barrels a day.

               Oil is "a source of funding both for education and health," Silveira said, 
as well as "a very important source of funding for the energy transition" 
itself.

               Noting that much of Brazil's oil is exported -- more than 1.3 million 
barrels per day, in 2022 -- he argued that such demand comes from the global 
market more than the domestic market. 

               "The demand for increased oil production is not national," he said -- 
noting that such demand indicates "transition is slower than it should be."

               The energy transition needs "global governance that can make a fairer and 
more equitable dialogue between the countries of the Global South and the 
developed countries," Silveira said.

               Earlier this month, a report from the think tank Carbon Tracker found the 
world's major oil and gas companies, including Brazilian state oil company 
Petrobras, were planning fossil fuel expansion incompatible with limiting 
warming to the Paris climate agreement goal of 1.5 degrees Celsius.

               In total, renewables account for 47 percent of Brazil's energy mix, more 
than triple the world average of 15 percent, according to government figures.