I’m far from convinced to be honest, given that these people have the most interest in maintaining the status quo. Asking them what they can do to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels just feels backwards i.e. their turnover and profits. You’re not going to get a balanced answer.
But they are still the industry best placed to provide our energy needs going forward. They’re cash rich, have significant infrastructure, huge teams of engineers. The largest petrol companies are the ones investing the most in developing cleaner forms of energy technology. Because they recognise that if they still want to be the companies providing the world’s energy needs into the future they need to be providing clean sources of energy.
At their heart the largest corporations are not fossil fuel providers, they’re energy providers.
It’s equivalent to berating China, Russia, etc for turning up. Only no, they didn’t, and they’ve been rightly criticised.
Correct but at the same time they need to be told in no uncertain terms that their time under the current environment is limited and if they want to exist they need to be smarter and provide alternatives. Having them there in a negotiating capacity, especially when their numbers exceed all others only reduces that possibility.
I dont think we should be negotiating this. They need to be told. I do however concede that they need to be informing everyone on what they could do from a technological perspective. Again though I don’t think someone from Shell, BP or whatever is the right person to do that, I’d rather listen to an independent scientist to be honest.
No it isn’t.
It may be an uncomfortable reality, but you need these guys at the table.
ok but not in the capacity that they are.
What capacity is that? 
There are more delegates from fossil fuel industries than any other. Simply a case of numbers.
My view here is that its basic chemistry and business. If you burn fossil fuels (carbon based) you produce carbon dioxide and other various substances. We therefore simply need to be burning less of them. Trying to force BP into that way of thinking with them at the table and you wont get the most effective answer. I note that the article you’ve linked above is BP basically admitting that they need to diversify to maintain their share price. As a business they are fully entitled to do that but I’d bet a load right now that the BP board would be massively concerned if people started using less oil over night.
I believe that legislation needs to be put in place to force a change and if the likes of BP dont like it, tough, they can look at renewables 
. It’s like plastic bags at supermarkets. Without legislation nothing would have changed. Supermarkets adapted.
But my point is that the large petrol companies are already doing this. They’re not idiots, they’ve seen the direction of travel and want to remain relevant (aka profitable).
More than anything, the business case is compelling, as you highlight.
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It is remarkably dishonest to label IETA as a ‘oil and gas’ interest. It has oil and gas members, but they are nowhere close to the majority - and the ones that have been historically opposed to climate policy like Exxon aren’t members. It also has other large industrial emitters, but it also contains carbon trading firms, financials, etc, who generally take a very different view of climate change policy than oil and gas companies.
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Right, so stop supplying aviation fuel? Didn’t that survey just find that less than 25% of citizens in the West think they should reduce their personal use of aviation? Exactly who is going to tell those fuel companies to do that? Which government has been elected with that mandate?
Ah thanks for the clarification
Maybe we should really be looking at how and where we fly. The UK with domestic flights for example, is there really a need? There’s a vast array of possible things that can help reduce fossil fuel use but none of them will be 100% popular but I just think we’re honestly getting to that point. Ultimately every government has that responsibility because the airlines aren’t going to do it are they?
If there’s an easier answer I’m honestly all ears but I cant see beyond reducing our use of fossil fuels significantly somehow.
The presence of the fossil fuel industry is dwarfed by the ENGOs, most of whom constitute an industry of sorts themselves, watching the COP process achieving nothing year after year, yet attending en masse and applying some of the most dogmatic possible thinking in hopes that somehow the process will produce a different result than the obvious. Policy decisions that were made 25 years ago that have made an effective outcome close to impossible, and are no longer even empirically valid in some cases, are recited as articles of faith.
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I agree absolutely with that. But it isn’t going to happen because a single oil and gas company decides it - and were they all to decide to multiply the cost of aviation fuel by 8x to cut down flights from the UK, you can be fairly sure they would be drawing praise as climate crusaders. Prosecution as a cartel would be more likely.
It has to be regulatory, which means it has to be a political decision first, and that is where it gets awkward. In the West, we are getting the climate policy we actually want. We are just uncomfortable with that truth.
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This is exactly my thinking put in a far more eloquent manner. Simply I’m not sure how anyone can legislate to that scale with a fossil fuel supplier at the table. I think we all need to wake up to that very point, that our comfort is not really the right one going forward.
These people, coming up with ever more ridiculous ideas as to how to harness different forms of renewable energies…pah
I’m surprised that they seem to be overlooking the more obvious kinetic energy created by dancing itself. Install floors that flex slightly when people dance and convert that movement into energy in addition to capturing thermal energy from body heat.
ah memories of the Ritz in Manchester in the early 90’s. That big dance floor used to bounce like a trampoline at the time. No idea if it still does. I was useless at harnessing the thermal energy from body heat bit. Willing but utterly shocking performance.
What are people’s thoughts on nuclear? The UK has just announced a deal with Rolls Royce for the construction of min reactors. From a climate perspective the electricity they generate is free from CO2 and over their lifetime have a smaller carbon footprint than some renewables. (I’m not 100% sure on this) There is however the issue of nuclear waste.
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