BEYOND BIG OIL
‘There are a small group of companies who have deliberately derailed action on climate change, and we can take them on and win’
This isn’t working.
Wherever Big Oil goes, it brings devastation. Spills smother ecosystems; air pollution chokes cities. Earthquakes follow fracking and gas extraction. Plastics clog up seas. Democratic governments are toppled or corrupted, strongmen propped up.
Wars are fought over hydrocarbons, fuelled by them. Here Ukraine is not an aberration but a continuation, the latest in a line of conflicts and coups that runs back through Yemen, Libya, Iraq, Iran and beyond, back to the coaling stations of the British Empire. Fossil fuels tie Europe to Putin’s government and enrich his oligarchs – just as they tie the US to Saudi Arabia’s murderous monarchy.
This just isn’t working. Many people are bracing for a drastic drop in living standards as, led by oil and gas markets, energy prices are skyrocketing around the world. Some countries have seen blackouts. But so far the boosted profits of Big Oil have been left untouched by the politicians in its thrall. Meanwhile greenhouse gases fill the atmosphere, past Earth’s breaking point.
Spreading like a slick
Imagine for a moment what life could be like if we were free of our dependence on oil and gas. Stepping out into a neighbourhood without the noise of the combustion engine, you breathe deeply, fresh air filling your lungs. It could be a world with fewer resource conflicts, one with good quality green jobs, where everyone has access to the renewable energy they need. Climate change’s worst effects could be avoided. Standing up to dictators would be easier.
Something is blocking that future – the oil and gas industry. For decades it has dumped its waste on communities; dumped workers according to its whims. For decades industry bigwigs have known that their products are imperilling the planet, burning up what the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report calls ‘a liveable and sustainable future for
