Climate summit: Oil companies such as Shell and Aramco want to reduce CO2 emissions

50 oil and gas companies around the world, including major players such as Shell, ExxonMobil and Saudi Aramco, pledged in a joint statement at the COP28 climate summit in Dubai that they will reduce CO2 emissions from their own activities. However, none of the companies plan to reduce their own oil and gas production. But they do pledge to cut emissions of methane, one of the most dangerous greenhouse gasses, to near zero by 2030 and to end routine flaring of natural gas.

COP28 chairman Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber, also CEO of Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), has announced that he also wants to involve the oil and gas industry in the climate fight. The 50 members of the Oil and Gas Decarbonization Charter, which endorse the commitments, account for approximately 40 percent of global oil production.

Al-Jaber calls it a "great first step". "We need the entire industry to keep 1.5 degrees Celsius within reach." Yet not all major oil companies support the promises. The most notable absentees are Chevron and ConocoPhillips. China's largest oil and gas companies have also not joined.

However, environmental organizations were not impressed and reacted somewhat indignantly to the announcement. "We don't have time for more commitments and initiatives with fancy names," said 350.org, a movement that wants to end the use of fossil fuels.

"This is a smokescreen behind which the biggest polluters are hiding," said climate expert Maarten de Zeeuw of Greenpeace Netherlands. "The world needs real solutions, not nonsense on the margins. Oil and gas companies are not going to usher in the end of the fossil age. We cannot rely on that. We need laws, not non-binding promises. The fossil industry must stop with new oil and gas extraction. And they will pay for all the climate damage they cause."

The oil companies' commitments do not include so-called scope 3 emissions, or the emissions caused by the use of the fuels they produce. This means that, for example, they do not include the emissions of cars that have filled up with petrol at Shell. While it is precisely this form of emissions that, according to climate activists, causes the most climate damage.