From LNGworldnews:
Major oil and gas companies, BG Group, BP, Eni, Royal Dutch Shell, Statoil and Total sent a call to the governments around the world and to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, to introduce carbon pricing systems.
The companies urge the governments to create clear, stable, ambitious policy frameworks that could eventually connect national systems.
These would reduce uncertainty and encourage the most cost-effective ways of reducing carbon emissions widely, the companies said.
The six companies set out their position in a joint letter from their chief executives to the UNFCCC Executive Secretary and the President of the COP21. This comes ahead of the UNFCCC’s COP21 climate meetings in Paris this December.
With this unprecedented joint initiative, the companies recognize both the importance of the climate challenge and the importance of energy to human life and well-being. They acknowledge the current trend of greenhouse gas emissions is in excess of what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says is needed to limit global temperature rise to no more than 2 degrees Centigrade, and say they are ready to contribute solutions.
In their letter the CEOs write, “Our industry faces a challenge: we need to meet greater energy demand with less CO2. We are ready to meet that challenge and we are prepared to play our part. We firmly believe that carbon pricing will discourage high carbon options and reduce uncertainty that will help stimulate investments in the right low carbon technologies and the right resources at the right pace. We now need governments around the world to provide us with this framework and we believe our presence at the table will be helpful in designing an approach that will be both practical and deliverable.”
In their letter, the CEOs highlighted the role natural gas can play in addressing climate change.
“We believe the pragmatic step of implementing a widespread and effective pricing of carbon emissions is critical to realising the full and positive impact natural gas can have,” they said in the letter.
Clearly the business shift from oil to gas is on among the majors. Global carbon pricing could dramatically lift gas consumption as the transition fuel to renewables longer term.
Thank goodness Australia had the vision to introduce such a scheme ahead of time and to position itself as a provider of said gas. It was a triumph of public policy and private endeavour working in concert to overcome the nation’s major coal dependency and prosper in the process.
Oh wait…
