data/The_Power_of_Big_Oil/The Power of Big Oil.txt

As 2024 is on track to be the warmest year on record, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) has once again issued a red alert at the sheer pace of climate change in a single generation, turbocharged by ever-increasing greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere. This year is expected to also be the first in which the planet is more than 1.5°C hotter than in the 1850-1900 pre-industrial period. But, in spite of these stark stats as well as warnings, the world seems unwilling to cut carbon emissions.

It is now "virtually certain" that 2024—a year punctuated by intense heatwaves and deadly storms—will be the world's warmest on record, according to projections by the European climate service. Global average temperatures across the year are on track to end up more than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, which would make 2024 the first calendar year to breach this symbolic mark. These high temperatures are mainly down to human-caused climate change, with smaller contributions from natural factors such as the El Niño weather pattern. Burning of fossil fuels is the biggest cause behind the monster of climate change. There are three types of fossil fuel: coal, oil, and gas; however, oil is the most used fossil fuel simply because oil and its products have shaped our world. The oil-producing industry underlies the global economy—powering transport and industry, heating homes, providing electricity, and being the basis for raw materials like the plastics that are part of our daily lives. In short, humans have become dependent on oil companies for sustaining their lifestyles.

But oil releases a considerably high amount of carbon when burned—approximately a third of the world's total carbon emissions come from expansive networks of pipelines, mines, wells, refineries, roads, and ports connected to the oil industry. These activities carve up natural environments and release pollution into the air, water, and land. The world's major oil and gas companies are still producing and selling fossil fuel products. Our dependence on oil has enabled the industry to balloon to such an extent that it has been dubbed "Big Oil," synonymous with driving global temperature rise.

Many oil and gas companies claim they are playing a key role in the clean energy transition by investing in renewables and technologies like carbon capture. However, critics argue that they have also hindered progress.

So, what does the future hold for Big Oil and the climate? Here's what you need to know.

Big Oil
"Big Oil" refers to the largest oil—and usually also gas—companies in the world. While this is the typical definition, the term is also now used to refer to state-owned oil companies, which are among the biggest producers in the world. Despite its fluid meaning, Big Oil is a very useful term for capturing the industry's immense size.

With record breaking profits, trillions in investment and expansion plans, oil and gas industry generated an average annual profit of $1 trillion - or the equivalent $2.8 billion per day - during the period 1970-2020. And recent years have been particularly lucrative, with record gains in 2022, following energy price spikes after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Since then, oil and gas majors have paid shareholders an unprecedented $111 billion, according to analysis from international NGO Global Witness, which focuses on rights abuses, conflict, and natural resource exploitation. 

These companies are extremely powerful, extremely profitable, and have an extraordinary influence over governments and societies around the world. Sponsoring academic institutions to encourage research that is favorable to Big Oil and supporting fossil fuel lobbying organizations that hold immense sway in governments are two of the ways they achieve this.
A strong presence of industry representatives at UN COP climate summits also poses a huge challenge to any ambitious agreements on climate change action. At COP28 last year, the industry had a record number of lobbyists present, significantly more than the 10 most climate-vulnerable nations combined, according to the campaign Kick Big Polluters Out, a coalition of civil society organizations.

Have fossil fuel majors hindered climate action?
Recently, the climate website DeSmog published some documents from the Climate Investigations Center which revealed that major oil companies, including Shell and precursors to energy giants Chevron, ExxonMobil, and BP, were alerted about the planet-warming effects of fossil fuels as early as 1954. However, they paid no heed, as trillions of dollars are still flowing into fossil fuel development. The oil and gas industry today is the largest it has ever been.
Research from think tank Carbon Tracker shows that while some big oil and gas companies are planning production to peak or decline in the long term, there's a general trend toward increasing it in the short term. This is happening despite the International Energy Agency's (IEA) warning that there is no room for new oil and gas fields or coal mines if the world is to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.

Big Oil's 2023 Greenhouse Gas Emissions
Shell and Chevron's Scope 3 figures include combustion of fuels they sell to customers but not produced themselves. Other producers' headline figures focus on fuel produced from their own barrels alone.

How they hinder the energy transition
The most powerful oil and gas associations have, for the last 50 years, used three key strategies to oppose, weaken, and delay the global energy transition, according to recent research from think tank InfluenceMap.
The think tank report argues these include:

Downplaying the impact and viability of alternative energy.
Promoting consumer choice and market solutions.
Portraying renewables as a risk to energy security and affordability.
These strategies have likely succeeded in delaying the energy transition by slowing the growth of renewables and electric vehicles. Today, most of their public influence campaigning is taking place through PR agencies, marketing firms, sponsored content, and advertorials in media outlets, as well as subtler approaches such as supporting think tanks or academics.

Are oil and gas companies helping to tackle emissions?
Oil and gas contributed over 50% of global emissions from fuel combustion in 2022, according to the IEA. Yet oil and gas majors argue they play a key role in the clean energy transition by investing in renewables and technologies like carbon capture—which uses chemical reactions to remove carbon dioxide directly from the air or from power plants—and hydrogen, as well as pledges for net-zero emissions by 2050.
However, the IEA criticizes oil and gas companies for "watching the energy transition from the sidelines." Clean energy spending by oil and gas companies grew to $30 billion in 2023, but this represents just 4% of their capital expenditure, according to the IEA.

Conclusion
Every dollar a fossil fuel executive makes has been stolen from the bank of nature, pushing us further into climate breakdown and leaving even more climate refugees saddled with the fallout. The year 2023 was a human catastrophe, 2024 has been hotter, and yet oil and gas giants keep raking in the profits.
It has been 29 years since the first climate COP, yet in this time, world leaders have failed to take meaningful action to stem the tide of climate breakdown. Fossil fuel executives will never voluntarily cut their emissions. Our leaders' failure to force them to take action is unforgivable, but it is not irreversible. We know the causes, and we have the solutions to the crisis, but world leaders must finally step up.