I agree with you that we should be moving to renewables as fast as possible.
At the same time, there's a lot of upside to reducing the power of authoritarian oil states that gives dictatorships power to squash democracy and human rights.
"Study after study has found that, while discovering big oil deposits doesn't turn democratic countries with a lot of oil like Norway and Canada authoritarian, authoritarian countries are more likely to stay that way if they've got a ton of oil. Of all the bad things that oil does for countries, this is probably the worst and most robustly demonstrated."
At the same time, there's a lot of upside to reducing the power of authoritarian oil states that gives dictatorships power to squash democracy and human rights.
"Study after study has found that, while discovering big oil deposits doesn't turn democratic countries with a lot of oil like Norway and Canada authoritarian, authoritarian countries are more likely to stay that way if they've got a ton of oil. Of all the bad things that oil does for countries, this is probably the worst and most robustly demonstrated."
https://www.vox.com/2014/4/10/5601062/oil-curse-explained
Say what you will about the U.S. (and Canada and Norway), but I'd rather a democracy be the biggest producer than an autocracy.