Climate change challenges requires to globally phase out fossil fuels. For fossil fuel rich LMIC this seems to present negative trade-offs with other important national targets: decreasing poverty and inequality and promoting growth, employment and energy access. Nevertheless, various local communities, civil society organizations and scientists in Africa and Latin America, supported by transnational networks, propose Leaving Fossil Fuels Underground (LFFU) in order to simultaneously combat socio-environmental injustice, ecosystem degradation and climate change, and achieve inclusive sustainable development. A few of these innovative LFFU ideas and initiatives have already been successful. Given their potential relevance for realizing SDGs 13, 15 and 16, and given the limited interdisciplinary scholarship on these initiatives, this project analyses, develops and shares successful LFFU arguments and strategies. Their potential for upscaling to other countries as well as the possible trade-offs on SDGs 1, 7, 8 and 10 are integrated in the project design. Through combining governance and rights-based approaches, co-creating new knowledge with various stakeholders, and connecting to and expanding existing networks, this project expects to have a positive impact on the promotion of LFFU in LMIC. The interdisciplinary team will train MSc/MA and PhD students and practitioners in South Africa, Ecuador, the Netherlands and beyond and will produce multiple tangible tools to adequately share research results to local communities, NGOs, policy-makers, social movements and institutional investors in Africa, Latin America and Europe.