Climate activists from Greenpeace and Uplift during a demonstration outside the Scottish Court of Session, Edinburgh, on the first day of the Rosebank and Jackdaw judicial review hearing, November 12, 2024
HUMAN rights and environmental groups have challenged Rosebank oil field’s links to illegal Israeli settlements at its owner’s AGM.
Amnesty International intervened at the AGM of Equinor — the majority owner of the controversial Rosebank oil field — in Norway on Wednesday over its links to Delek Group, an Israeli fuel conglomerate.
Equinor shares ownership of Rosebank with Ithaca Energy, which is majority-owned by Delek Group.This means Equinor’s Rosebank project could send £253 million to the group, which operates in illegal settlements and provides fuel to the IDF, the campaigners say.
Delek Group has also been flagged by the UN for human rights violations in Palestine.
Greenpeace also tabled a first-of-its-kind shareholder proposal, which calls on Equinor to conduct due diligence over its links to companies operating in Israel’s illegal settlements.
Activists hold a white sign reading “Rosebank will kill us” on September, 27, 2023 in London, United Kingdom. (Photo: Mike Kemp/In Pictures via Getty Images)
Oceana U.K.’s leader called the decision “a massive win for campaigners and another step towards… a cleaner, greener future for our seas, planet, and climate.”
Climate campaigners celebrated Thursday after the United Kingdom’s new Labour government announced it will not legally defend decisions to allow controversial offshore drilling in a pair of areas in the North Sea.
The two sites are Shell’s Jackdaw gas field and the Rosebank oil field, owned by Equinor and Ithaca Energy. Both projects have been loudly criticized by international green groups as well as U.K. opponents.
“This is amazing news and a BIG WIN for the climate. The government must now properly support affected workers and prioritize investment in green jobs,” declared Greenpeace U.K., which along with the group Uplift had demanded judicial reviews.
The approvals for both North Sea sites occurred under Conservative rule—in 2022 for Jackdaw and last year for Rosebank, the country’s biggest untapped oil field. Voters handed control of the government back to the Labour Party in May.
Then, as The Guardian detailed, “in June, the cases against the oil and gas fields received a boost when the Supreme Court ruled in a separate case that ‘scope 3’ emissions—that is, the burning of fossil fuels rather than just the building of the infrastructure to do so—should be taken into account when approving projects.”
“Now we need to see a just transition plan for workers and communities across the U.K. and an end extraction in the North Sea for good!”
The U.K. Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, led by Secretary Ed Miliband, cited the “landmark” Supreme Court ruling in a Thursday statement that highlighted the government’s decision not to defend the approvals “will save the taxpayer money” and “this litigation does not mean the licences for Jackdaw and Rosebank have been withdrawn.”
“Oil and gas production in the North Sea will be a key component of the U.K. energy landscape for decades to come as it transitions to our clean energy future in a way that protects jobs,” the department claimed, while also pledging to “consult later this year on the implementation of its manifesto position not to issue new oil and gas licenses to explore new fields.”
Welcoming the U.K. government’s acceptance of the recent high court ruling, Uplift founder and executive director Tessa Khan said on social media that “the immediate consequence… is that the Scottish Court of Session is very likely to quash the decision approving Rosebank, although we’re likely to have to wait a while before that’s confirmed.”
“If Equinor and Ithaca Energy decide they still want to press ahead with developing the field,” Khan explained, “then the next step will be for them to submit a new environmental statement to the [government] and regulator… that includes the scope 3 emissions from the field.”
“If you need reminding, those emissions are massive: the same as 56 coal-fired power plants running for a year or the annual emissions of the world’s 28 poorest countries,” she added. “If Equinor and Ithaca try to push Rosebank through again, the U.K. [government] must reject it.”
The government has made the right decision not to waste time and money trying to defend the indefensible.
The oil and gas industry will fight back. But the days where they can cause such devastating harm while everyone else pays the price are over.
Greenpeace similarly stressed that “Rosebank and Jackdaw would generate a vast amount of emissions while doing nothing to lower energy bills,” and “the only real winners from giving them the greenlight would be greedy oil giants Shell and Equinor.”
“To lower bills, improve people’s health, upgrade our economy,” the group argued, the government must: increase renewable energy; better insulate homes; and boost support for green jobs.
Celebrations over the government’s decision and calls for further action weren’t limited to the groups behind the legal challenges.
Oceana U.K. executive director praised the “incredible work” by Greenpeace and Uplift, and called the government dropping its defense “a massive win for campaigners and another step towards… a cleaner, greener future for our seas, planet, and climate.”
“There is no defending more fossil fuel extraction,” the organization said. “Now we need to see a just transition plan for workers and communities across the U.K. and an end extraction in the North Sea for good!”
Global Witness similarly celebrated the government’s move, declaring on social media that “this is brilliant news!”
“New oilfields are an act of climate vandalism,” the group added. “Governments must prioritize people, not polluters’ profit.”
Major fossil fuel firms have committed tens of millions in finance to UK universities since 2022, DeSmog can reveal.
Many of these commitments have been accepted by institutions that have actively pledged to divest from oil and gas companies.
According to freedom of information requests submitted by DeSmog, more than £40.4 million has been pledged to 44 UK universities by 32 oil, coal and gas companies since 2022 in the form of research agreements, tuition fees, scholarships, grants, and consulting fees.
Most of the funding spans the current academic year, with a handful of projects running for a number years, up to as far as 2027.
The largest contributors were Shell, Malaysian state-owned oil company Petronas, and British Petroleum (BP). These three companies account for over 76 percent of the total figure awarded, having committed £20.98 million, £5.19 million, and £4.89 million respectively.
A further 10 companies made up nearly 20 percent of the remaining contributions during this period: Sinopec, Equinor, BHP Group, Total Energies, Eni SPA, Saudi Aramco, ExxonMobil, Kellas Midstream, Ithaca Energy, and Chevron.
Previous reporting from openDemocracy and the Guardian found that, between 2017 and December 2021, £89 million had been given to UK universities from some of the world’s biggest fossil fuel companies.
These partnerships have shown no sign of abating. DeSmog’s research shows an additional £40 million committed by fossil fuel firms since 2022, despite pledges from 102 higher education institutions to divest from the industry.
The universities in receipt of the most money were: Exeter, Imperial College London, Heriot-Watt, Manchester, Cambridge, Oxford, Royal Holloway, Queen Mary London, and Teesside.
“Young people care so deeply about protecting the planet because their futures are on the line,” said Green Party MP Caroline Lucas. “Yet fossil fuel giants are putting that future at risk with their planet-wrecking pollution, and then attempting to youthwash their reputation by handing over dirty money to universities”.
“If we’re going to tackle the climate emergency and secure a liveable future for the next generation, educational institutions should cut all ties with fossil fuel companies immediately.”
These figures do not include a total for Durham University, which declared that it had research agreements involving fossil fuel firms totalling £1.7 million but did not declare the sums that the oil and gas firms had contributed to these agreements.
These figures also do not include the amount held in fossil fuel investments by these universities. Our research indicates that at least 18 higher education institutions held direct investments in 25 fossil fuel companies over the relevant time period, collectively worth a further £8.1 million.
Many top universities also hold stakes in high-value pooled investment funds that are pouring hundreds of millions into fossil fuel giants. Research conducted by the student campaign group People & Planet estimates that, as of July 2022, as much as £319 million was still held in these funds by universities across the UK, including some institutions that have made promises to divest.
More than 65 percent of the country’s higher education institutions have refused to make further fossil fuel investments. This would potentially remove £17.7 billion from the reach of the industry, while 51 universities have yet to divest from oil and gas
Laura Clayson, climate campaigns manager at People & Planet, told DeSmog: “we say to those 51 universities left to divest: the student movement will remain unwavering in its demands for justice until our victory list includes every single one of you.”
The Leaderboard
The University of Exeter has received the most from fossil fuel firms since 2022, having signed a £14.7 million, five-year deal with Shell in November, as revealed by Byline Times. The project is to work on “carbon storage and sequestration”, and continues a 15-year relationship between the university and the oil giant.
According to the contract award notice, the project is part of a “wider Shell-led research programme focused on sequestration which aligns with Shell’s target to be a net-zero emissions energy business by 2050”.
Last year, Shell produced only 0.02 percent of its energy from renewable sources, analysis by Greenpeace has revealed. The company also recently abandoned plans to cut oil production by 1-2 percent each year until 2030, and will be investing £33 billion in oil and gas production between 2023 and 2035, compared to just £8-12 billion in “low-carbon” products.
Shell claims that it has reduced oil production more quickly than expected, though the company’s planned emissions between 2018 and 2030 are estimated to account for nearly 1.6 percent of the global carbon budget.
A spokesperson for the firm said: “We remain committed to becoming a net zero emissions energy business by 2050… It remains our view that global energy demand will continue to grow and be met by different types of energy – including oil and gas.”
New research from the University of Queensland shows that more than half of the world’s top fossil fuel producers will fail to meet climate targets unless they expand plans to decarbonise, while a major report from the UN has warned that the world will miss its climate targets unless it commits to “phasing out all unabated fossil fuels”.
A University of Exeter spokesperson said that its work with Shell will “contribute to the global race to net zero.”
Imperial College London has received the second most from fossil fuel firms since 2022. This follows a long association with oil and gas giants, which gave £54 million to the university between 2017 and 2021.
A spokesperson for Imperial told DeSmog that it pledged in 2020 it will only engage in research partnerships “with fossil fuel companies where the research forms part of their plans for decarbonisation, and only if the company demonstrates a credible strategic commitment to achieving net-zero by 2050”.
The university has maintained a working relationship with 13 fossil fuel companies since 2022.
The largest beneficiaries of fossil fuel financial commitments since 2022
Exeter
£14,700,000
Imperial College London
£6,725,769
Heriot-Watt
£6,005,844
Manchester
£3,077,268
Cambridge
£2,821,437
Oxford
£1,209,221
Royal Holloway
£740,657
Queen Mary London
£587,956
Teesside
£500,000
The University of Manchester houses the BP Centre for Advanced Materials (ICAM) research unit, a collaboration between BP and leading universities in the UK and US, including Manchester, Cambridge, and Imperial. The ICAM website states that the centre supports “BP’s ambitions to become a net zero company by 2050”.
BP generated just 0.17 percent of its energy from renewable sources in 2022 and, in the first half of last year, the company spent more than 10 times more on new oil and gas projects than it did on “low carbon” energy. In 2022, 92.7 percent of all activity for both BP and Shell went into fossil fuel investment.
As with Shell, BP posted record profits in 2022 worth some £23 billion. At the same time, it scaled back plans to cut emissions by 2050 on the grounds that it needs to keep investing in new oil and gas to meet consumer demand. BP did not respond to our request for comment.
The University of Manchester’s funding agreements with BP stretch back to 2008, when it was selected by the fossil fuel giant to run its Projects and Engineering College.
Hundreds of people have subsequently completed BP’s courses at the university, with Manchester describing the partnership as a “strategic alliance that has a major impact on both organisations”. The university has also received money from Shell and TotalEnergies.
A spokesperson for Manchester told DeSmog: “Since 2019 all new research funded in the BP ICAM has been focused on topics in materials sciences that support the energy transition, providing research to support BP’s goal to become a net zero company by 2050.”
Since 2022, Durham University’s research projects have included contributions and commitments from BP, ExxonMobil, and the China Petroleum and Chemical Corporation (Sinopec).
The university also previously partnered with the universities of Edinburgh and Leeds to form the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council’s Centre for Doctoral Training in Soft Matter and Functional Interfaces (SOFI CDT), which has been sponsored by industrial partners including Infineum, a joint venture between ExxonMobil and Shell.
Durham University is also a sponsor of the GeoNetZero CDT, a PhD research and training programme focused on geoscience and the energy transition, which has 11 other university partners; Heriot-Watt, Aberdeen, Birmingham, Dundee, Exeter’s ‘Camborne School of Mines’, Keele, Newcastle, Nottingham, Plymouth, Royal Holloway and Strathclyde.
From 2020 to 2022, CDT recruited 16 PhD students per year, funded in part by the oil and gas firm NEO Energy, which pledged £2.5 million alongside academic partners.
The centre is based out of the Shell Building at Heriot-Watt University’s School of Energy, Geoscience, Infrastructure and Society, and has nine core industry partners: BP, Cairn Energy, Chrysaor, China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), Equinor, ExxonMobil, NEO Energy, Shell, and Total Energy.
A spokesperson for Heriot-Watt told DeSmog: “Heriot-Watt University and our Centres for Doctoral Training (CDTs) are committed to a rapid and just energy transition, led by our world-class research and teaching… The GeoNetZero CDT is a new programme of PhD research and training set up to address key areas in geoscience and their role in the low carbon energy transition and challenge of net zero.
“We work in collaboration with the energy sector to develop education and research opportunities related to net zero, responsible consumption of oil and gas, and the transition to renewable energy sources.”
Studentships
Fossil fuel companies pledged to fund scholarships and tuition fees across at least 17 universities in 2022.
The Italian multinational Eni funded a scholarship programme at the University of Oxford’s Saïd Business School in 2022 called the Africa Scholarship, as well as a scholarship programme with St Anthony’s College, Oxford.
Oxford has previously said that it “receives funding from and donations from companies and organisations from the fossil fuel sector” typically at an average of £3 million a year in research funding and £2 million in philanthropic donations. It says that the research funding is equivalent to less than 1 percent of the university’s research turnover.
Kellas Midstream also funds a set of scholarships at Teesside University, while Cardiff receives over £870,000 from TotalEnergies for its OneTech Futures graduate programme, which began in 2018 and runs through to 2025.
Shell has given the University of Aberdeen £150,000 for new “Transition Scholarships” for the coming academic year, funding research into “key challenges around net zero and reducing emissions”.
The university, based in Europe’s “oil capital” on the coastline of the UK’s North Sea oil and gas fields, pledged to divest from fossil fuels in 2021 – saying that it planned on excluding fossil fuel extraction companies from its £52.7 million investment portfolio by 2025.
A report commissioned by the University of Cambridge and led by Nigel Topping, a former UN climate action champion, last year recommended that the institution halt all funding from fossil fuel companies, including for research or philanthropic purposes. Cambridge itself took £2.8 million from Shell, BP, and BHP Billiton in 2022, and has reportedly received around £3.3 million per year from the industry since 2017.
A spokesperson told DeSmog: “The University of Cambridge only accepts funding from energy companies where it is sure that the resulting collaboration will help the UK and global society move to renewable or decarbonised energy. An enhanced set of criteria created in 2021 includes a written assessment from non-conflicted experts on whether the purpose of the proposed collaboration contributes meaningfully to the energy transition.”
A spokesperson for the University of Strathclyde said: “The University of Strathclyde is committed to supporting the energy transition to a sustainable, renewable energy system and the delivery of net zero targets by 2050. Much of the University’s work in the achievement of a sustainable and zero carbon economy is carried out in collaboration with industrial partners in the energy sector.”
A spokesperson for Royal Holloway, University of London, said: “At Royal Holloway, University of London, we are committed to developing and implementing activities that support environmental sustainability and a solution-based approach to net zero.”
The University of Bradford refused to reveal how much it received in partnerships with both Sinopec and the Saudi chemicals company SABIC, citing the commercial interests of the companies.
A deal struck between the University of Surrey and BP, running from 2019-2022, was also withheld because of a non-disclosure agreement in place.
A number of other universities refused our freedom of information requests or failed to respond to repeated requests for comment. This included the universities of East Anglia, Nottingham, Birmingham, Plymouth, Loughborough, Bishop Grosseteste, and Oxford Brookes.
Additional reporting by Joey Grostern and Sam Bright
UPDATE: 5 October 2023 – This article previously erroneously listed Scottish Power as a fossil fuel company. The firm has now been removed from the article and Strathclyde University removed from the largest recipients of fossil fuel funding.
In a four-line statement announcing the approval of the new Rosebank oil field 80 miles west of Shetland, the UK’s offshore oil and gas regulator showed its mission no longer serves the public good.
The announcement by the North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA), which regulates oil and gas extraction in the waters off the British coast, asserted that net zero considerations had been taken into account – a technical definition that makes it appear long-term oil production is compatible with climate goals. This has outraged and dismayed climate scientists, campaigners, and the many other people concerned about the UK’s faltering climate leadership.
The approval greenlights a process that is expected to produce first oil by 2026, and around 300 million barrels of oil (and a smaller amount of gas) over the next two decades. The project’s developers are Equinor, an oil company owned for the most part by the Norwegian state, and Ithaca Energy, owned by the Delek Group listed on the Tel Aviv stock exchange.
The decision is out of step with demands for rapid action on climate change coming from a range of quarters. This includes shareholder activists demanding corporations accelerate decarbonisation, direct action groups such as Just Stop Oil, and financiers concerned about the risks of “asset stranding” as renewables become cheaper than fossil fuels.
Public protests and legal challenges to the NSTA spotlight the irrationality and recklessness in the government’s expressed support for issuing new licenses. Activists are not alone in making this point.
A welter of scientific studies and reports by international agencies confirm that new fossil fuel extraction is incompatible with keeping global temperature increases well below 2℃.
Rosebank has been a major focus for climate activism in the past couple of years, as science, international policy and campaigners turn their attention to stopping new extraction, rather than solely focusing on reducing emissions. Calls to end new licensing for oil and gas are in line with climate science.
But a climate politics focused on new licensing alone misses the point. The thing is, like other North Sea oil fields yet to be approved, Rosebank was licensed for oil and gas extraction years ago.
The NSTA approval process follows licensing, sometimes after considerable time has passed. And it is this approval process that locks the UK into hydrocarbon production for years to come.
End ‘maximising economic recovery’
The core objective of the NSTA is to maximise the economic recovery of UK petroleum – a principle shorthanded as MER – as set out in the 1998 Petroleum Act. In practice, this means the regulator’s primary mission is to facilitate the extraction of oil and gas.
A revised strategy in 2021 paired MER with an obligation to support the UK’s net zero commitments. And the former Oil and Gas Authority changed its name to include an explicit reference to the “transition” in 2022, underpinned by ambitions for emissions reduction and decarbonisation.
NSTA sees its job as effecting the industry’s alignment with these goals. It is now also in charge of licensing for carbon capture and storage and offshore hydrogen storage.
Rosebank’s approval therefore reveals a deeper truth: the regulator’s guiding objective fails the public good test. Regulation aims to avoid economic, environmental and social harms, and ensure the public good through delivering collective benefits and upholding socially-desirable ideals. The Rosebank decision arguably breaches this principle.
Supporters of Rosebank argue it will contribute to the UK’s energy security and deploy decarbonisation technologies that reduce CO₂ emissions overall. These arguments do not stand scrutiny, however: oil from Rosebank, like around 80% of North Sea oil production, will be sold directly into international markets and will not materially affect the price of petrol or diesel for UK motorists.
Much of the value of that oil will flow into the portfolios of Equinor and Ithaca. That value could be harnessed to speed up transition to renewables or ensure its benefits are widely distributed, but that’s largely down to Equinor and Ithaca – not the UK government.
A decade ago, a decision by NSTA would not have raised much attention. Now it highlights a significant problem in need of reform. Piecemeal adaptation has left MER and other core regulatory principles untouched, which is at odds with the climate emergency.
Existing licensed fields escape the weak scrutiny embodied in instruments such as the climate compatibility checkpoint, a series of tests to be applied in decisions about future licensing rounds. What’s more, as a litmus test for approval, Rosebank indicates other licensed projects may get the go-ahead, like Cambo.
Removing NSTA’s central objective to maximise economic recovery requires nothing less than a rewrite of the Petroleum Act. This would be an opportunity to fundamentally revise what the North Sea is for, and whether or how to exploit its resources in the future. A start would be to consider a reversal of direction – a “minimising” of economic recovery, for example – which redefines the “economic” in terms of what is socially necessary.
Such a move will inevitably entail reviewing licences already in place, and will likely generate challenges from the sector and other powerful incumbents. Rosebank exposes, however, how the new mission of the offshore regulator has to be about securing a new public good. This needs wider social debate, and should ultimately be decided through parliament.
Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?
Climate activists from Greenpeace and Uplift during a demonstration outside the Scottish Court of Session, Edinburgh, on the first day of the Rosebank and Jackdaw judicial review hearing, November 12, 2024
