World Biggest Oil Majors Set Collective Goal To Cut Carbon Emissions

Some of the biggest oil companies in the world set their first joint target to cut their collective carbon emissions from upstream operations in a move that saw Saudi Aramco and ExxonMobil joining European majors in pledging reduced carbon intensity.  

The Oil and Gas Climate Initiative (OGCI), a CEO-led voluntary alliance of some of the world’s biggest oil and gas companies, said on Thursday that it would aim to reduce the collective average carbon intensity of member companies’ aggregated upstream oil and gas operations to between 20 kg and 21 kg carbon dioxide equivalent per barrel of oil equivalent (CO2e/boe) by 2025, from a collective baseline of 23 kg CO2e/boe in 2017.

The initiative’s members include BP, Chevron, CNPC, Eni, Equinor, ExxonMobil, Occidental, Petrobras, Repsol, Saudi Aramco, Shell, and Total.

“Together we are increasing the speed, scale, and impact of our actions to address climate change, as the world aims for net zero emissions as early as possible,” the CEOs of the OGCI member companies said in a joint statement.

Some of the companies, especially the European majors, have individual company targets to cut emissions, and some of them have even pledged to become net-zero energy companies by 2050. 

U.S supermajors Exxon and Chevron, however, do not have any targets yet to reduce emissions. Exxon, in particular, has been criticized for it’s lack of targets and for failing to take climate change into account in its accounting practices and commodity price assumptions.

Environmental think-tank Carbon Tracker commented on the joint carbon intensity target that “Having some targets to reduce carbon pollution is better than none.”

“But the industry can never consider itself ‘aligned’ with the Paris goals when business plans assume steady investment in fossil fuel production on a planet with absolute limits. This target is based on intensity, so it allows increases in emissions overall, and a group average may let poor performers off the hook,” said Andrew Grant, Head of Oil, Gas & Mining at Carbon Tracker.  

By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com

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