The idea of oil supply peaking, or so-called peak oil, surfaced as early as the 1880s, with some predicting a looming exhaustion in the US due to the demise of the Pennsylvania oil fields.

Throughout history, repeated predictions of peak oil supply have repeatedly been moved further into the future, and at ever-higher levels.

In 2024, oil supply continues to expand, driven by improved economics and continuous advancements in technology that have helped lower costs, open up new frontiers and add new reserves. Moreover, there are no concerns about the available resource base, which is large enough for this century and beyond.

Ultimately, peak oil supply has never come to pass, and predictions of peak oil demand are following a similar trend. Time and again, oil has defied expectations regarding peaks. Logic and history suggest that it will continue to do so.

Note: "Logic"?

This week, scientists, conservationists, and public officials from 196 countries are in Cali, Columbia for the UN Conference on Biodiversity (COP16), discussing how carbon markets and other so-called “nature-based solutions” to climate change can be implemented at the global scale.

But as governments and corporations throw their faith behind carbon offsets, one thing has become clear: not only are these schemes proving to be ineffective tools for mitigating climate change, carbon offsets are also displacing Indigenous and other local communities living in the world’s most vulnerable ecosystems––clearing the way for further extraction in the lungs of the Earth. (...)

In late September, half a dozen activists with the group Voices Against War chained themselves to turnstiles inside the lobby of Chevron’s offices in Herzliya, Israel, just north of Tel Aviv. Reading from prepared remarks, a spokesperson for the group said that they were Israeli citizens “horrified by the genocide that is being committed in our names” and accused Chevron of “fueling the genocide in Gaza with hundreds of millions of dollars in tax payments, fueling energy apartheid throughout Palestine and destroying our planet’s climate along the way.”

They hope that the combined movements for Palestinian liberation and climate justice will finally bring the genocide to an end.

More recently, researchers with the Gastivists Collective, who focus on the intersection of climate and oppression

Activists from both the Palestinian liberation and climate justice movements have already begun to seize on such connections, as is evident in the case of Citigroup, one of the largest financial institutions in Israel and one of the largest investors in fossil fuels in the world. Furthermore, Citigroup board member James S. Turley is also on the board at Northrop Grumman, which manufactures fighter jets for the Israeli military, as detailed by Genocide Gentry. Parker says that these connections inspired a series of actions against Citigroup.

Climate change is embedded in the history of colonialism and capitalism. Reflecting on this history allows to better understand the carbon market.

Coal and colonialism

The science unequivocally says that burning fossil fuels is the leading cause of the climate crisis. Based on historical and per capita emissions data, a comprehensive study estimates that industrialised countries in the Global North are responsible for 92 per cent of the excess emissions driving climate breakdown. Not everyone in the Global North is equally responsible, however. Just 75 investor-owned companies are responsible for about a third of worldwide emissions, and just 125 billionaires emit 393 million tons of CO2 each year. That is more than the 2022 emissions of Chile and Argentina combined.

New research is helping anti-genocide activists identify and target the corporations enabling and profiting from the war in Gaza.

In late September, half a dozen activists with the group Voices Against War chained themselves to turnstiles inside the lobby of Chevron’s offices in Herzliya, Israel, just north of Tel Aviv.

International oil and gas companies supply 35 percent of Israel’s crude oil. Among those companies are not only U.S. ones — such as Chevron, which supplies 8 percent of Israel’s crude oil — but others with consumer-facing businesses in the United States, including BP (also 8 percent), ExxonMobil (6 percent) and Shell (5 percent). Chevron, Shell and Exxon all hold stakes in the Caspian Pipeline, which delivers oil from Kazakhstan to Israel via Russia, the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. And BP holds a stake in the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan Pipeline, which delivers oil from Azerbaijan to Israel via Georgia, Turkey and the Mediterranean.

The understanding of such supply chains can aid activists in disrupting them, according to Rowell.

In June, South by Southwest announced that it would be severing partnerships with both the U.S. Army and the weapons manufacturer RTX (better known as Raytheon) after more than 80 performers withdrew from the annual festival in protest, explicitly citing the Israeli genocide in Gaza. Similarly, Human Rights Campaign quietly removed weapons manufacturer Northrop Grumman from its list of corporate partners following a protest against the gay rights advocacy organization’s “pinkwashing of the war machine” in February.

The study

The Lancet Countdown on health and climate change

Introduction

Published annually, the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change is an international, multidisciplinary collaboration, dedicated to monitoring the evolving health profile of climate change, and providing an independent assessment of the delivery of commitments made by governments worldwide under the Paris Agreement. All content on this page is either Open Access or has been made free to read with registration.

The last climate summit, Cop28, was also held in a petrostate, the United Arab Emirates. In the runup to that conference, an army of fake social media accounts promoted and defended the UAE. Countries failed to agree to “phase out” fossil fuels at Cop28, as many wanted, instead choosing the weaker ambition of “transitioning away from fossil fuels”.

And the number of signatures has gone up