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Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

bloomberg.com

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Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#31

Post by NoMoreNicksLeft »

riffraff wrote: post #19

The plan that was shelved was about carbon offsets, these have not proven to be particularly effective so maybe not too big a deal. The greater loss is that the new CEO had already scaled down Shell's investment in renewables, setting a target of 4.5% of the total investments in renewables by 2025[0]. Some other Oil&Gas companies seem to be a bit more inclined to actually invest in renewables, or at least pay lip ser…

If there are x offsets available, and demand is x + 100, then when Shell buys offsets, they're not really fixing the problem at all, they're just shifting blame right? They're saying "since we spent this money on the offsets, our carbon emissions were good (or at least 'less bad'), but the other company that couldn't afford or wouldn't bother with the offsets is bad even though there were only enough offsets for one of us".

Honestly, this upsets people?

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#32

Post by IKantRead »

robnado wrote: post #26
wredue wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some 40% of the population is actively pro big oil and actively denies the carbon footprint causal links with climate change and warming. You think 20 years is enough for this reckoning? Honestly, I think they’re all going to get away with it with zero repercussion. If humanity is still around in a couple hundred years, there might be retroactive virtue signalling. But that doesn’t matter cause everyone responsible w…

The earth is getting warmer. To try to guilt people about it achieves nothing. The only action humanity can take at this point is to predict the effects of global warming and build infrastructure to slow it down, mitigate it or plan for the mass migrations.

I do believe that included in "only action" is: keep fossil fuels in the ground.

The idea that we can only mitigate is insane. Yes we've already signed up for a lot of pain as a civilization, but as long we keep burning fossil fuels we are looking at an increasingly worse future.

It's not like a smoker who has gotten lung cancer, where the best we can do is try to ease the pain, and more smoking won't really matter.

The biggest first step in preventing the worse case is to be able to point to an established oil field and say "that will never be extracted, and will remain in the earth for at least a 1000 years."

Every ton of carbon we can keep in the ground that way, the better of our future, even if that future is already slated to be bad.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#33

Post by aaomidi »

TinyRick wrote: post #27
DoingIsLearning wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If your view is that all fossil fuel assets are headed towards zero over the next 3-4 decades, then you want to extract every last penny from the existing assets and move them into the pockets of shareholders. I can not locate the long piece article now but I read a piece from someone that effectively got invited into a Shell (UK) think tank and heard exactly that from some vp/executive at a dinner table. That they…

> public opinion would still make it palatable to continue hydrocarbon fuels extraction for another 2 to 3 decades I don't think it's public opinion so much as it is necessity to maintain current standards of living for the next few decades. Renewable energy is still a relatively small fraction of overall energy use, and net global oil consumption has been steadily increasing the past few years (likely to surpass pre…

Meanwhile companies with “climate pledges” forcing RTO.

Even when society wants to shift, the ones in charge say no.

We should have had a governmental mandate requiring companies over a certain size to allow WFH and justify why they can’t do it if they really can’t.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#34

Post by konschubert »

jnsaff2 wrote: post #10

Correct me if I'm wrong but even the original plan only covered carbon footprint of Shell's operations? Which I presume are pretty much a minor fraction of the carbon footprint of their products and kinda makes the whole exercise a PR campaign. Even when it would cover pipeline leaks and the like it's still nowhere near their total impact.

It’s ridiculous.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#35

Post by bryanlarsen »

TinyRick wrote: post #27
DoingIsLearning wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If your view is that all fossil fuel assets are headed towards zero over the next 3-4 decades, then you want to extract every last penny from the existing assets and move them into the pockets of shareholders. I can not locate the long piece article now but I read a piece from someone that effectively got invited into a Shell (UK) think tank and heard exactly that from some vp/executive at a dinner table. That they…

> public opinion would still make it palatable to continue hydrocarbon fuels extraction for another 2 to 3 decades I don't think it's public opinion so much as it is necessity to maintain current standards of living for the next few decades. Renewable energy is still a relatively small fraction of overall energy use, and net global oil consumption has been steadily increasing the past few years (likely to surpass pre…

Global hydrocarbon consumption is down on a per capita basis. And that's despite the fact that renewable energy and electric vehicles had a negligible share. It's only the last year or two that renewable energy's share has become non-negligible. The EV transition is lagging the renewable energy transition, but it's happening too. EV's now have a non-negligible share of new vehicle sales, but since it takes ~20 years to turn over the global vehicle fleet, they still have a negligible share of the entire fleet. But that's changing, very slowly.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#37

Post by ImHereToVote »

aaomidi wrote: post #33
TinyRick wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> public opinion would still make it palatable to continue hydrocarbon fuels extraction for another 2 to 3 decades I don't think it's public opinion so much as it is necessity to maintain current standards of living for the next few decades. Renewable energy is still a relatively small fraction of overall energy use, and net global oil consumption has been steadily increasing the past few years (likely to surpass pre…

Meanwhile companies with “climate pledges” forcing RTO. Even when society wants to shift, the ones in charge say no. We should have had a governmental mandate requiring companies over a certain size to allow WFH and justify why they can’t do it if they really can’t.

I think the bottom up approach to combat climate change is doomed to fail. We need to start top down. The most powerful institutions and people need to lower their living standards and resource extraction. Start with eliminating private jets for instance.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#38

Post by steve_adams_86 »

iamflimflam1 wrote: post #30

I try to remain positive, but climate change is the one area where I have pretty much lost hope. People (and I include myself) are simply unwilling to accept that their lives have to change. Barring some of unforeseen technical miracle the next 20-30 years are going to get increasingly grim.

The main thing I struggle to downsize or make sustainable is my work. As a programmer, I depend on an immense infrastructure of earth-harming systems to get my equipment (both in my possession or leased in the cloud). My employers use a lot of energy. In the scheme of things we aren’t the worst polluters, but it’s undeniably bad.

I’ve dramatically reduced my personal energy usage, I don’t eat animal products, my family has found ways to generate remarkably little garbage, and other “nice” things, but it’s pretty much meaningless. It’s all theatre compared to the damage we do with our car, jobs, community and provincial infrastructure we depend on, etc.

I feel like I’m willing to change my life, and I have already I guess. I’m just not willing to give up my livelihood when it means so little in the bigger picture. I’m no different from someone working on an oil rig or forestry or whatever. What I do looks nicer, but my rationale is no different.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#39

Post by toomuchtodo »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #35
TinyRick wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> public opinion would still make it palatable to continue hydrocarbon fuels extraction for another 2 to 3 decades I don't think it's public opinion so much as it is necessity to maintain current standards of living for the next few decades. Renewable energy is still a relatively small fraction of overall energy use, and net global oil consumption has been steadily increasing the past few years (likely to surpass pre…

Global hydrocarbon consumption is down on a per capita basis. And that's despite the fact that renewable energy and electric vehicles had a negligible share. It's only the last year or two that renewable energy's share has become non-negligible. The EV transition is lagging the renewable energy transition, but it's happening too. EV's now have a non-negligible share of new vehicle sales, but since it takes ~20 years…

> And that's despite the fact that renewable energy and electric vehicles had a negligible share.

I could not disagree with this more. While China is a "developing" country, they are arguably making herculean efforts to move away from oil for transportation. They will drag the developed world along, as they will have built up all of this EV and electric scooter/bike/moped manufacturing capacity with only so much domestic consumption for it.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37307619 (China Reaches Peak Gasoline in Milestone for Electric Vehicles)

From the Bloomberg piece:

> Earlier this month, Chinese oil giant Sinopec made a surprise announcement that mostly flew under the radar. It’s now expecting gasoline demand in China to peak this year, two years earlier than its previous outlooks. The main culprit? The surging number of electric vehicles on the road.

> China has been the largest driver of global growth for refined oil products like gasoline and diesel over the last two decades. But EV adoption rates in China are now soaring, with August figures likely to show plug-in vehicles hitting 38% of new passenger-vehicle sales. That’s up from just 6% in 2020 and is starting to materially dent fuel demand.

> Fuel demand in two and three-wheeled vehicles is already in structural decline, with BNEF estimating that 70% of total kilometers traveled by these vehicles already switched over to electric. Fuel demand for cars will be the next to turn, since well over 5% of the passenger-vehicle fleet is now either battery-electric or plug-in hybrid. The internal combustion vehicle fleet is also becoming more efficient due to rising fuel-economy targets.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#40

Post by jacquesm »

TinyRick wrote: post #27
DoingIsLearning wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If your view is that all fossil fuel assets are headed towards zero over the next 3-4 decades, then you want to extract every last penny from the existing assets and move them into the pockets of shareholders. I can not locate the long piece article now but I read a piece from someone that effectively got invited into a Shell (UK) think tank and heard exactly that from some vp/executive at a dinner table. That they…

> public opinion would still make it palatable to continue hydrocarbon fuels extraction for another 2 to 3 decades I don't think it's public opinion so much as it is necessity to maintain current standards of living for the next few decades. Renewable energy is still a relatively small fraction of overall energy use, and net global oil consumption has been steadily increasing the past few years (likely to surpass pre…

> necessity to maintain current standards of living for the next few decades

You can't always get what you want.

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