Last year’s combined $200bn profit for the ‘big five’ oil and gas companies brings little hope of driving down emissions
While 2022 inflicted hardship upon many people around the world due to soaring inflation, climate-driven disasters and war, the year was lucrative on an unprecedented scale for the fossil fuel industry, with the five largest western oil and gas companies alone making a combined $200bn in profits.
Given the scale and complexity of the transition away from hydrocarbons, some worry that economic analysis has been given short shrift in the policy planning process. A clear-eyed assessment of the transition's prospects requires a deeper understanding of at least four major challenges.
Lula’s victory raises many hopes, despite the alliances made too early with a motley array of forces, including those who helped to topple Dilma Roussef in 2016, and those who welcomed Lula’s April 2018 jail sentence.
