George Andrew Olah (born Oláh András György; May 22, 1927 – March 8, 2017) was a Hungarian-American chemist.

[7] Olah was born in Budapest, Hungary, on May 22, 1927, into a Jewish couple, Magda (Krasznai) and Gyula Oláh, a lawyer.

[12] In the subsequent two years, from 1954 to 1956, he worked at the research institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, where he was associate scientific director and head of the department of organic chemistry.

[15] In particular, Olah's search for stable nonclassical carbocations led to the discovery of protonated methane stabilized by superacids, like FSO3H-SbF5 ("Magic Acid").

[20] He joined with Robert Zubrin, Anne Korin, and James Woolsey in promoting a flexible-fuel mandate initiative.

[21][22][23] In 2005, Olah wrote an essay promoting the methanol economy in which he suggested that methanol could be produced from hydrogen gas (H2) and industrially derived or atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2), using energy from renewable and nuclear sources to power the production process.