Having said that, surely it's a fact that we'll run out of fossil fuels at some point and will need an alternate source of energy, and that will be expensive no matter when we do it, so why not start early?
There are plenty of current, pressing problems to solve; why solve a problem that won't exist for decades if not centuries?
Examples of this would be guano (replaced by saltpeter and then by the Haber process) and whale oil (replaced by petroleum).
Their screaming leads to a lot of tension and escalation. THIS IS A PROBLEM. SOLVE IT RIGHT NOW. This is what FUD is after all. This leads to rash decisions. We don't know where and when to invest. Should we invest in more nuclear and supplement with distributed photovoltaics? Should we build giant panels? Should we focus on batteries and what kinds of batteries?
Or should we focus on hydro power instead? Or maybe beam energy from space (it's a thing)? What about clean chemical reactions?
And most importantly - when should we start and when should we double down on it? What are the checkpoints of R&D and production grade equipment? What should we wait on?
Opportunists did what they do best - they found an opportunity to get attention and are exploiting it for their gain. This goes against the general public's gain. That's what I am against. Repeating completely unproductive rhetoric to get the tension high.