Fossil Fuel Firms Flock to Conservative Party Conference

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Original article by Joey Grostern and Sam Bright republished from DeSmog.

Influential right-wing groups are set to host events featuring major polluters, days after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak watered down green targets.

Image of InBedWithBigOil by Not Here To Be Liked + Hex Prints from Just Stop Oil's You May Find Yourself... art auction. Featuring Rishi Sunak, Fossil Fuels and Rupert Murdoch.
Image of InBedWithBigOil by Not Here To Be Liked + Hex Prints from Just Stop Oil’s You May Find Yourself… art auction. Featuring Rishi Sunak, Fossil Fuels and Rupert Murdoch.

A number of oil and gas firms have been announced as the hosts of stands and events at this year’s Conservative Party conference. 

The conference, which is being held from 1 to 4 October in Manchester, will play host to the likes of BP, British Gas’ parent company Centrica, petrochemical giant Valero, and Drax – the UK’s largest CO2 emitter. 

Events hosted by the companies will cover a range of energy and climate issues, and will feature senior Conservative MPs and ministers.

A range of influential right-wing organisations will co-host the panels. They include the Spectator magazine and groups based in and around Westminster’s Tufton Street, home to a network of opaquely funded, free market think tanks with a history of criticising climate action and pushing for more fossil fuel exploration.

This news comes as Prime Minister Rishi Sunak this week announced several delays to the government’s net zero policies. Sunak announced on Wednesday that a ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel vehicles will be pushed back from 2030 to 2035, while he also watered down schemes to phase out gas boilers and scrapped new energy efficiency regulations on rented homes. 

Dozens of organisations will be running stalls at the Tory conference, including a number of fossil fuel firms and major polluters. These include oil giant BP, petrochemical manufacturer INEOS, and Drax, which operates the UK’s single most polluting power station and has actively attempted to influence government energy policy in its favour. 

A “Hydrogen Zone” stand which “showcases what the hydrogen economy could deliver for the UK by 2030” will also exhibit projects from a number of gas extraction and distribution companies including RWE, Centrica, Cadent, Northern Gas Networks, National Gas, SGN, and Wales and West Utilities.

DeSmog has previously revealed that the Conservative Party received £3.5 million in donations from fossil fuel interests and climate science deniers in 2022, while two-thirds of the directors in charge of the party’s multi-million-pound endowment fund have a financial interest in oil, gas, and highly polluting industries.

The CPS

The Centre for Policy Studies (CPS), a Tufton Street think tank, is hosting two separate events at the conference in partnership with gas companies. 

Valero, the US-based downstream petroleum company which operates an oil refinery in Pembroke, Wales, is hosting an event with the CPS entitled “How do we decarbonise and remain competitive?” featuring Conservative MPs Gareth Davies and John Penrose. 

French gas giant EDF and German-owned energy firm E.ON will also be co-hosting a CPS event asking how energy can be made cheaper. The panel will include Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury Gareth Davies. 

The CPS has supported the expansion of fossil fuel exploration. In response to the release of the government’s new “energy security” strategy in April 2022, the think tank included ending the ban on fracking for shale gas in a list of “significant missed opportunities” by the government, along with onshore wind and home insulation.

This followed years of lobbying from the CPS on the subject, including a report in December 2013 entitled, “Why every serious environmentalist should favour fracking”. 

In an economic bulletin issued by the CPS in March 2022, the think tank also stated that “we need to continue to support offshore exploration and production activity in the North Sea. As part of this, the government should look at accelerating regulatory approval for upcoming oil and gas projects such as Rosebank… Clair South, Glengorm, Cambo and Bentley”.

The International Energy Agency has stated that new oil and gas exploration is incompatible with net zero.

A DeSmog investigation published earlier this year revealed that three CPS board members have donated £610,000 to the Conservative Party since Rishi Sunak became prime minister. 

CPS runs the online publication CapX, which has published a number of articles recently attacking net zero policies. One set of “positive” policy prescriptions featured in a piece by Andrew Hunt included pushes, in place of the “obsession” over net zero, to “force developers to build more beautiful buildings” and “replace ugly road bollards and railings with ‘green street furniture’”.

Vocal climate crisis denier Ross Clark also argued on CapX in February that net zero carries a “perverse incentive to destroy UK jobs”, and that Britain was “highly unlikely” to “get anywhere net zero by 2050”. In another CapX piece, Clark said it would be “impossible” for Britain to electrify its power grid by 2030.

The CPS told DeSmog that, in recent years, it has been “one of the most prominent champions of free-market environmentalism, with a dedicated workstream on net zero.

“Our director, Robert Colvile, has been one of the country’s most prominent advocates of onshore wind and solar, as well as co-authoring the 2019 Conservative Party manifesto, which contained a prominent commitment to net zero. 

“Our CapX site offers a platform for robust debate on the policy issues of the day. The most cursory glance at our output would show that this includes publishing many pieces that are strongly supportive of net zero”.

A Spectator Sport 

The Spectator magazine will be hosting a Conservative conference event in association with Cadent Gas, discussing public consent for net zero. The event will feature two outspoken climate crisis deniers: Conservative MP Jacob Rees-Mogg who is also a GB News host, and Sherelle Jacobs, a columnist at the Telegraph.

Rees-Mogg is well-known for his anti-net zero views, and was a leading proponent of further fossil fuel extraction during Liz Truss’s short tenure as prime minister.

In August, Rees-Mogg argued that the government should “revisit its approach to net zero” and “cancel the ban” on oil-fired boilers from 2026, points which Sunak mirrored in his recent net zero announcement.

Jacobs has previously argued that climate science is “being manipulated into alarmist fake news,” and more recently claimed that net zero was a “damp squib”. 

The Spectator regularly publishes articles attacking net zero and questioning climate science. It  hosts the work of notorious climate crisis deniers such as Toby YoungRoss ClarkBrendan O’NeillCharles MooreDominic LawsonRod LiddleMatt Ridley and Rupert Darwall, among others.

An Spectator editorial published in reaction to Sunak’s climbdown on net zero measures claimed that the plan to phase-out the sale of new fossil-powered engines was a “always was a conspiracy against the public, justified on very thin environmental arguments,” and that Sunak’s announcement was “an important step”. 

The editorial argued for further climate inaction on the basis that Britain contributes less than 1 percent of total annual greenhouse gas emissions. (This argument has been identified as a common example of the key climate delay tactic of “Whataboutism”, in an influential academic paper published by Cambridge University Press).

The Spectator is also hosting a drinks reception with newly formed UK gas infrastructure operator National Gas. 

National Gas is also set to host an event at the Conservative conference on the UK’s “need” for hydrogen entitled “Gassed up”. The event is being co-hosted with the influential centre-right think tank Onward.  Several of Onward’s former staff members are now working in Sunak’s government. 

German fossil fuel giant RWE, which owns and operates Europe’s second most polluting power plant, will also host an event in association with the Conservative Environment Network (CEN). The event will ask whether wind and solar energy are “energy saviours or a blight on our communities?”. The event will feature Lee Rowley, a minister at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.

RWE also claims to be the world’s second largest offshore wind company and Europe’s third-largest renewable energy company.

Centrica is co-hosting an event with the CEN asking whether Britain is “winning or losing” at the “green industrial revolution”.

Liquefied Natural Gas supplier Liquid Gas will also host an event on decarbonising rural areas. 

The Spectator, the CEN, Onward and the Conservative Party have been approached for comment.

Original article by Joey Grostern and Sam Bright republished from DeSmog.

Greenpeace activists display a billboard during a protest outside Shell headquarters on July 27, 2023 in London.
Greenpeace activists display a billboard during a protest outside Shell headquarters on July 27, 2023 in London. (Photo: Handout/Chris J. Ratcliffe for Greenpeace via Getty Images)
Continue ReadingFossil Fuel Firms Flock to Conservative Party Conference

The oil industry has succumbed to a dangerous new climate denialism

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Opec predicts oil demand will be 10% higher by the 2040s.
Iurii

Adi Imsirovic, University of Surrey

If we have not been warned of the dangers of climate change this summer, we never will be. Extreme heat, forest fires and floods have been all over news reports. Yet the oil and gas industry remains largely in denial.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) says steep cuts in oil and gas production are necessary to reach the Paris (COP 21) goal of keeping global warming at 1.5℃. However, only a tiny fraction of the industry, accounting for less than 5% of oil and gas output, has targets aligned with the IEA’s “net zero” requirements.

The current secretary general of production cartel Opec, Haitham al-Ghais, expects global oil demand to rise by about 10% to 110 million barrels a day by 2045, a volume incompatible with the Paris goals. The UK government has just offered a helping hand, granting around 100 new North Sea licences. What are we to make of this mismatch?

The new denialism

Typical of the new breed of climate denialism is a recent report by the Energy Policy Research Foundation (ERPF), a body funded by the US government and various undisclosed corporate interests and foundations. It sees the IEA’s requirements as a “seal of approval … to block investment in oil and gas production by western companies”. The report views meeting the targets as too costly, too harsh on poor countries and too bad for the energy security of the west.

In fact, it is wrong on each account. Many eminent economists and scientists use the concept of the social cost of carbon (SCC), which is defined as the cost to society of releasing an additional tonne of CO₂. Expert estimates from 2019 put this at between US$171 and US$310 (£133 to £241). If we go with, say, US$240 per tonne, the social cost of continued carbon equivalent emissions comes out at almost US$8.5 trillion every year.

A recent study has factored into the calculation climate feedback loops. This is where one problem caused by global warming leads to others, such as melting permafrost unleashing stores of methane.

When the study estimated the economic damage that this could cause, it produced an SCC in excess of US$5,000. That implies annual costs of more like US$170 trillion a year, which makes the US$4 trillion investment into clean energy that the IEA thinks necessary to meet the Paris climate goals look like a drop in the ocean.

It may help to break this down to one barrel of oil. A special IEA report for COP28 estimates that on average, each barrel of oil emits 0.53 tonnes of CO₂ equivalent in greenhouse gas across its life cycle, 20% of which comes from production.

Going back to our average SSC per tonne of US$240, that points to a social cost of US$126 per barrel. With oil currently at US$85 per barrel, the societal damage from producing, transporting, refining and consuming it is far greater – and that’s before including climate feedbacks.

Meanwhile, the arguments by the EPRF and like-minded supporters about energy security are laughable. The history of the oil and gas industry is a history of wars and geopolitical tensions. Transitioning to cleaner fuels can only increase our energy security and reduce the need to police remote autocracies.

The argument that poor countries need to continue burning carbon for development reasons is no better. In its latest report from 2022, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said climate change would probably see an increase in “losses and damages, strongly concentrated among the poorest vulnerable populations”.

Equally, the World Health Organization estimates that: “Between 2030 and 2050, climate change is expected to cause approximately 250,000 additional deaths per year from malnutrition, malaria, diarrhoea and heat stress.”

How to respond

The denialists offer no alternatives to cutting carbon emissions, and often simply ignore climate change altogether. The recent ERPF report mentions climate change only four times. It is as if heatwaves, forest fires, flooding, rising sea levels and the demise of natural habitat caused by climate inaction were happening on another planet.

We still have time to limit global warming below 1.5℃. It is true that we will need oil and gas for many years, and that there are currently no alternatives for certain sectors such as air travel, shipping and some industries. Nonetheless, there is still much that can be done now to make a substantial difference.

To incentivise the transition to cleaner energy, governments need to end fossil fuel subsidies, which the IMF estimates amounted to US$5.9 trillion in 2020 alone. We also need to put a proper price on carbon – only 40 countries have attempted this so far, and none has it anywhere near the estimated social cost of emitting carbon.

Countries that resist charging their own polluters should face a carbon border adjustment mechanism, which is a tariff that effectively puts the polluter on the same footing as local players. If all the actors in the fossil fuel supply chain had to face the cost of the damage they cause, the need to phase out long-term investments in fossil fuels would become more obvious.

The IEA requirements for “net zero” are just one of the pathways towards meeting the Paris goal of 1.5℃ warming. Others are explored by some of the more credible actors in the petroleum industry, such as Shell, BP and Norway’s Equinor, but all require a substantial decline in oil demand and production by 2050.

Required production cuts

Graph showing the required production cuts to meet net zero
I left the IEA’s scenario off the graph because it published so few datapoints, but it is broadly in line with the others. Meanwhile, the Opec data is for reference and not a net zero scenario.
BP, Shell, Equinor and Opec

Instead of criticising efforts to slow climate change and sponsoring ridiculous reports calling for more fossil fuels, the oil industry should eliminate leakages, venting and flaring of methane, and electrify as many processes as possible using renewable power. It should also employ carbon capture, usage and storage technologies over the next ten years – yes this will increase the price of fossil fuels, but that is exactly what we need to make clean sources of energy competitive across the board and speed up the energy transition.

The sooner the industry starts facing up to the realities of climate change, the more chance it has to survive. The companies and even countries that produce fossil fuels will have to face and pay the cost for the damage they cause. Those costs are already massive and will grow. Those that survive will do so only as a provider of clean and sustainable energy.


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Adi Imsirovic, Fellow, University of Surrey

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Continue ReadingThe oil industry has succumbed to a dangerous new climate denialism

Science shows the severe climate consequences of new fossil fuel extraction

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An offshore drilling platform.
Mike Mareen/Shutterstock

Ed Hawkins, University of Reading

The world has just suffered through its warmest month ever recorded. Heatwaves have swept across southern Europe, the US and China, breaking many temperature records in the process.

Climate scientists have been sounding the alarm for decades that this type of event will become more frequent as the world continues to warm. The major culprit behind this is the burning of fossil fuels. So it’s extremely concerning that the UK government has announced its intention to grant hundreds of licences for new North Sea oil and gas extraction.

Although burning fossil fuels to generate power and heat has enabled society to develop and flourish, we are now experiencing the unintended side effects. The carbon dioxide that has been added to the atmosphere is leading to a rise in global temperatures, causing heatwaves to become hotter and downpours more intense. The resulting large-scale disruption and suffering is becoming ever more visible.

This warming will continue, with worsening climatic consequences, until we reduce global carbon dioxide emissions to “net zero”. After that, we will still have to live and suffer in a warmer climate for generations. The collective choices we make now will matter in the future.

The small-scale, but high-profile, disruptions caused by Just Stop Oil protesters in the UK are extremely frustrating for many. But their single demand – for no licenses for new UK coal, oil and gas projects – is consistent with the science underpinning the international agreements that the UK has signed.

Temperatures are rising

Since the 1860s, the scientific community has understood that adding more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere would warm the climate. And as long ago as 1938, the burning of fossil fuels was linked to the observed rise in both carbon dioxide levels and global temperatures. Fast forward to now and global temperatures are warmer, and increasing faster, than at any point in human civilisation.

In response to the overwhelming scientific evidence, the UK and 193 other nations came together in 2015 to ratify the Paris agreement on climate change. One of the agreed goals is to limit global warming to well below 2℃, and even aim for 1.5℃, compared to the pre-industrial era.

However, the latest synthesis report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which all governments explicitly endorsed, paints a stark reality. If we burn all of the fossil fuels that we currently have access to, then global warming will exceed 1.5℃ and may reach 2℃.

To avoid breaching the limits set out by the Paris agreement, some of the coal, oil and gas that we can already extract must remain unburnt. New fossil fuel extraction projects will make it even harder to stop further global warming.

Build up renewable infrastructure

There are other options. The UK government’s official advisers, the Climate Change Committee, have put forward a vision for UK power generation consistent with a net zero future. They say that the UK could provide all of its energy needs by 2050 through a combination of renewables, bioenergy, nuclear, hydrogen, storage and demand management, with some carbon capture and storage for fossil gas-based generation in the meantime.

A family walking dogs on a beach in front of an offshore wind farm.
The UK can achieve energy security without causing additional global warming.
Nigel Jarvis/Shutterstock

If the UK followed the example of China and rapidly increased its investments in renewable energy, then it could achieve energy security without causing additional global warming. China emits the most carbon dioxide of any country in the world. But it is installing more renewable energy generation than the rest of the world combined.

Rapidly reducing our reliance on fossil fuels, and not issuing new licenses to extract oil and gas, is the most effective way of minimising future climate-related disruptions. The sooner those with the power to shape our future recognise this, the better.


Imagine weekly climate newsletter

Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?

Get a weekly roundup in your inbox instead. Every Wednesday, The Conversation’s environment editor writes Imagine, a short email that goes a little deeper into just one climate issue. Join the 20,000+ readers who’ve subscribed so far.The Conversation


Ed Hawkins, Professor of Climate Science, University of Reading

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Continue ReadingScience shows the severe climate consequences of new fossil fuel extraction

‘The World Burns as Our Dangerous Age of Unreason Fuels the Flames’

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Greenpeace activists display a billboard during a protest outside Shell headquarters on July 27, 2023 in London.
Greenpeace activists display a billboard during a protest outside Shell headquarters on July 27, 2023 in London. (Photo: Handout/Chris J. Ratcliffe for Greenpeace via Getty Images)

https://bylinetimes.com/2023/08/01/the-world-burns-as-our-dangerous-age-of-unreason-fuels-the-flames/

Every political system has its share of charlatans or nutcases who deliberately try to stir up division, embrace conspiracy theories, deny reality or advocate dangerous policies for short-term advantage.  But what do you do when such views are not just held on the political fringe, but are embraced at the heart of government, as is currently happening in the UK? 

There are plenty of immediate challenges facing the Government – inflation, housing shortages, crumbling infrastructure, struggling public services and immigration. Internationally, conflicts rage in many parts of the world, Iran and North Korea continue to pursue nuclear weapons, and democracy itself is under threat from hostile regimes, such as Russia and China. 

But by far the biggest long-term threat, which will only make all of these immediate problems harder to tackle, is climate change.

Climate change is not only already devastating animal and plant life, and exacerbating poor health, famine and poverty in some parts of the world, but also fuelling more conflict within and between states for scarce resources. It is driving migration levels higher and, through melting the polar ice cap, opening up new areas of strategic competition with Russia and China. 

Climate change is not just a long-term survival threat, but an ongoing, immediate, security, political and economic threat. The evidence is all around, plain to see.

According to the UN’s World Meteorological Organisation, July was the hottest month on record, possibly the warmest month humanity has ever experienced. The planet’s temperature has surpassed the crucial threshold of limiting global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial temperatures. Swathes of the American South, the Mediterranean and China have endured devastating heatwaves this summer. Only last week, we saw on our TV screens thousands of desperate British tourists fleeing devastating fires on Greek islands. 

https://bylinetimes.com/2023/08/01/the-world-burns-as-our-dangerous-age-of-unreason-fuels-the-flames/

Continue Reading‘The World Burns as Our Dangerous Age of Unreason Fuels the Flames’