Nigerian oil firms abandon UN 2060 zero emission race – Report

Nigerian oil and gas firms, including top international oil companies, have been ranked among some of the worst offenders in the implementation of the 2015 Paris climate deal, multinational nonprofit platform, CDP has said.

According to a report by Reuters, Nigeria, Russia, the Arab Gulf, Algeria, Libya, Venezuela, Iraq and Iran are in the “lower ranks” of meeting their pledge to the zero gas emission targets.

The CDP’s Oil and Gas Benchmark report, published together with the World Benchmarking Alliance, said its latest assessment showed the oil and gas sector “has made almost no progress towards the Paris Agreement goals since 2021”.

It claimed none of the 100 oil and gas companies it assessed was set to cut its overall emissions “at a rate sufficient to align with a 1.5°C pathway over the next five years”.

Former President Muhammadu Buhari 2021 pledged to attain net-zero by 2060, 10 years behind the United States target of 2050.

The country had since stated that it was adopting gas as its transitional fuel.

The report also listed top oil and gas companies- TotalEnergies, Eni, Repsol, Shell, BP, Chevron, Conoco, and Exxon as part of the offenders.

“TotalEnergies which sees no big cut to its emissions by 2030, Eni and Repsol are in the top 10, and Shell and BP in the top 20. Big U.S. producers Chevron, Conoco and Exxon are in the top 40,” the report said.

Scientists say that by 2030, the world needs to cut greenhouse gas emissions by around 43 per cent from 2019 levels to stand any chance of meeting the 2015 Paris Agreement goal of keeping warming well below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels.

CDP has emerged as the world’s biggest repository of environmental data submitted on a voluntary basis by companies, which are under pressure from some shareholders to disclose how they plan to navigate the transition to a lower-carbon future.

The CDP said 81 oil and gas companies with extraction activities show “no significant reduction” in production before 2030, with production not expected to peak until 2028.

The world’s biggest Western oil and gas companies have set varying targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions from their operations and the combustion of the products they sell, with the latter, known as Scope 3, accounting for the lion’s share. Less than a third of companies in the report had any Scope 3 targets.

Only three European companies assessed – Neste, Naturgy and Engie – are investing more than 50 per cent of their budget in low-carbon technologies, according to the report.

Shell had earlier this month announced plans to increase its hydrocarbon exploration starting this year due to investors’ complaints of lower dividends and profit.