How are Exxon, Chevron, and Occidental progressing with their emissions reduction plans?
Exxon, Chevron, and Occidental have pledged to reduce their emissions and have unveiled plans to invest billions of dollars in low-carbon technologies. How will they reconcile climate targets with Trump's fossil fuel agenda? The Wall Street Journal article
Big oil companies face a difficult balancing act: helping advance President Trump's “energy dominance” agenda while also meeting their own climate goals, the WSJ writes.
The Trump administration has made the elimination of climate regulations a cornerstone of its energy policy. One of its goals is to reduce production costs and motivate drilling companies to maximize fossil fuel resources.
Trump ordered the United States' withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement, the international accord that aims to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, and dismantled much of the climate law pushed by former President Joe Biden. His administration is moving toward abolishing a key tool the government used to reduce emissions.
The escalating attacks on climate initiatives put major oil companies like Exxon Mobil, Chevron, and Occidental Petroleum in an awkward position. They have promised to reduce their emissions and unveiled plans to invest billions of dollars in low-carbon technologies like carbon capture and storage, hydrogen, and biofuels.
Over-promoting their sustainability goals risks antagonizing the administration, which is pressuring oil companies to increase production. But scaling them back could put them in the crosshairs of a future administration that follows the scientific consensus on climate change, and could ultimately cost them more money.
The Trump Administration's Pro-Fossil Moves
Exxon has long sought to downplay climate change, but in recent years it announced it would spend billions of dollars to help mitigate global warming. Last week, the company said further global progress is needed to meet international climate goals.
The industry has praised Trump's pro-fossil fuel agenda, and he has achieved victory after victory since his return to office. His administration is opening vast swathes of land and water to drilling, approving new export licenses, and vigorously supporting new fossil fuel projects, among other measures.
Trump also moved to roll back environmental regulations that the oil and gas industry had denounced as burdensome and unnecessary, such as rules imposed by Biden to reduce emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas.
But the administration's anti-climate crusade is going far beyond what most in the industry are demanding, forcing its lobbyists into embarrassing contortions.
Earlier this year, the Environmental Protection Agency declared it would seek to repeal a landmark climate rule known as an "endangerment finding." The 2009 statement stated that greenhouse gases threaten public health and well-being by raising global temperatures, increasing the likelihood of heat waves, more intense hurricanes, and storms with heavy rainfall. The EPA used the rule to regulate emissions from power plants, airplanes, motor vehicles, landfills, and oil and gas producers.
BIG OIL INVESTMENTS IN LOW-EMISSION TECHNOLOGIES
The Trump administration's disdain for net-zero emissions goals has created further headaches. Companies like Exxon and Occidental have had to plead their case with the administration to retain Biden-era tax credits to support carbon capture.
Exxon spent nearly $5 billion to acquire Denbury, a carbon dioxide pipeline operator, betting it would help it become a leader in carbon capture, and has proposed investing billions of dollars in hydrogen development. Occidental has an ambitious plan to suck carbon dioxide out of the air and trap it underground, as well as reuse it to extract more fossil fuels.
Under Trump, the companies maintained their climate goals, while also clarifying their efforts to produce more fossil fuels. Both companies plan to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 across all their operations and energy consumption, and, for Occidental, also across customer use of its products. Occidental recently stated that it believes its carbon capture plans could extend America's energy independence by 10 years.
“CHOOSE WHICH SIDE TO BE ON”
Chevron's latest sustainability report did not mention its previously set goal of achieving net-zero emissions across all its upstream operations and energy consumption by 2050. The report was about half as detailed as the previous one, released by the company during the Biden administration. Chevron's low-carbon investments have lagged behind its competitors.
“Ultimately, this is becoming a moment where the industry really has to choose sides,” said Andrew Logan, senior director of Ceres, a nonprofit that works with investors and companies on sustainability issues.
(Excerpt from the eprcomunicazione press review)
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/energia/exxon-chevron-occidental-riduzione-emissioni/ on Sun, 07 Sep 2025 14:39:52 +0000.