The Guardian: Big oil companies are retreating from their climate pledges

Leading fossil fuel suppliers such as BP, Shell and ExxonMobil are backtracking this year on earlier pledges to cut carbon emissions and limit oil and natural gas production. The newspaper The Guardian reported that major energy companies are trying to block humanity’s move away from fossil fuels, whose combustion causes global climate change.

In recent years, oil companies have announced various environmental plans, citing concerns about the climate crisis as their motivation. BP, for example, set a target of reducing its emissions by 35 percent by 2030. But this February, it revised the target to 20 to 30 percent, The Guardian reports.

The newspaper also cites ExxonMobil’s decision to quietly cut funding for a high-profile plan to produce biofuel from algae. Another oil giant, Shell, announced that it would not increase investment in renewable energy this year, despite previously pledging to dramatically cut carbon emissions.

Meanwhile, the same companies are signaling that they have no intention of limiting oil and gas production. BP has expanded gas production, while ExxonMobil CEO Darren Woods announced in June a plan to double oil production from US shale fields within five years. Shell said this year that it had already met its pledge to cut oil production by 20 percent by 2030, but the decline was due to the sale of some of its operations to another oil company. „It has therefore not reduced emissions into the atmosphere,“ The Guardian reports.