Shell, BP sabotage Paris climate agreement

28 February 2017

Shell Oil Company made Climate of Concern in 1991 as a warning against the dangers of climate change; then they ignored it.

Oil giant Shell has spent millions lobbying against action on climate change. Yet a video uncovered by journalism platform The Correspondent has revealed that the company was acutely aware of the dangers of global warming as early in 1991 when it produced a short documentary warning against the threat of global warming. Find out more here.

Translated from Dutch NOS TV today:

The investments that oil and gas companies such as Shell and BP want to make in the coming five years make it impossible to achieve the Paris climate targets. Seventeen international environmental organizations, including Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace, state this in a research report they presented at the climate summit in Madrid.

According to the researchers, between 2020 and 2024 the fossil industry is pumping more than 1.26 trillion euros into new oil and gas projects. The pumped-up fossil fuels are ultimately burned and CO2 is released and that greenhouse gas retains heat. According to the report, the projects that are planned for the coming five years are good for 148 gigatons of CO2. That is just as much as 1200 new coal-fired power stations.

According to environmental organizations, the earth will heat up by more than 1.5 degrees, perhaps even more than 2 degrees. It was agreed in the Paris Climate Agreement that global warming should be limited to “well below 2 degrees”, preferably about 1.5 degrees.

Incidentally, even with the existing oil and gas reserves, it is not possible to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees, the researchers say. According to Friends of the Earth, the new study “clearly shows that there is no room for more oil and gas extraction“.

‘Shell is literally destroying our future’. Extinction Rebellion targets the fossil fuel giant’s HQ in Scotland: here.