Reports show that top, publicly listed oil and gas companies around the world spent around one percent ($2.6 billion) of their combined 2018 budgets on clean energy. While they have nearly doubled wind, solar, and battery technologies from cumulative 2010 – 2017 levels with investor pressure to reduce emissions, build clean energy infrastructure, and increase disclosure on climate change, these investments remain below the companies’ level of spending on fossil fuel lobbying.
The Oil and Gas Climate Initiative, a group of 13 top oil and gas companies, plans to reduce upstream methane emissions by 20 percent by 2025. Considering available technologies in gas and oil operations, a World Resources Institute working paper cites International Energy Agency estimates that relative to 2015 levels, these companies could reduce 75 percent of global methane emissions, and that the companies could conduct nearly 40 – 50 percent of the total reduction at zero net cost. Reuters