A number of both state-owned and private sector firms are increasingly coming under the gun for what is felt to be their unrelenting exploitation of the world’s oil, gas and coal reserves, which are believed to be directly linked to more than a third of all contemporary greenhouse gas emissions.
Back in October, as global attention continued to focus on the oil recovery exploits of the oil majors, in an effort to determine the extent to which these companies contributed to the emission of greenhouse gases, The Guardian in October, disclosed the names of twenty fossil fuel companies whose sustained exploitation of the world’s oil, gas and coal reserves, it says, is linked to more than one-third of all greenhouse gas emissions in the modern era.
The publication asserts that new data from what it says are world-renowned researchers, puts much of the blame for a climate emergency which threatens the future of humanity, on the so-called “cohort of state-owned and multinational firms.” The research, the publication says, provide details of just how the oil giants have proceeded with the sustained expansion of their operations notwithstanding their awareness of the oil industry’s devastating impact on the planet.
The research, attributed to Richard Heede at the Climate Accountability Institute in the US, purportedly the world’s leading authority on the big oil companies’ role in what is seen as an escalating climate emergency, evaluates what the global corporations have extracted from the ground, and calculates the extent of the emissions for which these fossil fuels have been responsible since 1965, the point at which experts contend the environmental impact of fossil fuels was a matter of widespread public knowledge.
A top-twenty list of oil companies tagged as having contributed 35% of all energy-related carbon dioxide and methane worldwide, totaling 480 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide also includes BP and Shell. Twelve of the top 20 companies are state-owned and together their extractions are responsible for 20% of total emissions in the same period. The leading state-owned polluter is Saudi Aramco, which has produced 4.38% of the global total on its own.
The just concluded December 2-13 climate change talks in Chile was due to tackle, among other issues, the role of fossil fuel companies in the creation of the so-called ‘climate crisis’ and what is to be done to rein in their activities.
The argument that the profit-related pursuits of a handful of “polluting interests” are setting a climate-related price which seven billion people the world over must pay, has, in recent years, gained accelerated traction with some of the world’s leading climate scientists and international organisations including the UN.
The list of global polluters was calculated using company statistics on annual production of oil, natural gas, and coal as a basis for calculating how much of the carbon and methane is emitted to the atmosphere throughout the supply chain, from extraction to end use.
The study reportedly found that 90% of the emissions attributed to the top twenty ‘climate culprits’ derived from use of their products, such as petrol, jet fuel, natural gas, and thermal coal. One-tenth came from extracting, refining, and delivering the finished fuels.
Some of the companies named on the so-called ‘climate culprit’ list have challenged claims that the environmental impact of climate change was known more than half a century ago. Others have accepted the findings of current climate science pursuits and say they are supportive of the targets set out in the Paris Agreement to reduce emissions and hold global temperature rises to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.
