COP28 ‘moment of truth’ for oil industry, says energy boss
The world's oil and gas industry has been warned it faces a "moment of truth" at next week's UN climate talks.
Dr Fatih Birol, head of energy watchdog the International Energy Agency, was speaking as the IEA published a new report on the future of fossil fuels.
He said the sector must choose between contributing to the climate crisis or "becoming part of the solution".
Last year fossil fuel companies were responsible for just 1% of global investment in renewable energy.
The publication of this report just a week before the start of the UN climate summit, also known as COP28, is no coincidence. The IEA will want to put pressure on governments attending the conference to get an agreement on reducing the use of fossil fuels.
"The uncomfortable truth that the industry needs to come to terms with is that successful clean energy transitions require much lower demand for oil and gas, which means scaling back oil and gas operations over time - not expanding them. There is no way around this," Dr Birol said.
This year's conference is also controversial because a major oil producer is host.
In the run up to COP28, the man who will chair the climate talks, Sultan Al Jaber of the United Arab Emirates, has been criticised for prioritising a technology known as carbon capture and storage.
Carbon capture stops most of the CO2 produced from burning fossil fuels in power stations from being released into the atmosphere, and either re-uses it or stores it underground. But it is expensive and in its infancy.
Some critics say fossil fuel producers hope to use the technology to allow them to continue relying on oil and gas
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