Bob Dudley: Continuation of oil, gas decarbonization charter in COP is crucial

Continuation what came out of COP28 with Oil and Gas Decarbonization Charter (OGDC), monitoring that, seeing that going into the COP process is absolutely essential, Bob Dudley, Former CEO of BP Group and the Chairman of the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative Organization, told Report.

Dudley noted that the oil and gas industry today faces lots of climate challenges.

“One of the things they're working particularly hard on is what I would call the low-hanging fruit of climate change initiatives, which is the reduction of methane or methane leakages and detection. And the industry is working all across the board on that, started that some time ago, and now big commitments came out of COP28 in the UAE and now be reviewed and monitored a year later with 50 companies having signed up for a charter commitment from COP28, and it'll be reviewed in Baku for COP29.

He added that it, of course, has higher increased demand for energy: “But it's working hard on Carbon capture, use, and storage (CCUS), to make that economic, and they're now real projects. They're not just on paper.

They're real projects that are happening, which is a challenging thing to do. And then, of course, the development of making economic, the roads to economic markets of hydrogen. Hydrogen, and in my view, the most globally significant to move around would be blue ammonia, for example, because it's stable and you can move it in ships. These are just some of the many challenges that the industry is working hard on.”

Dudley pointed out that taking similar steps in other industries will increase the global intensity: “We need to see similar things in other industries to create the global momentum. It’s an example which can encourage others whether it’s aircraft, whether its steel or aluminum. I think that COP has to move from being just setting more targets and policies, and has to be more practical, thinks the Chairman of the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative.”

Dudley believes that the industry can make a huge difference towards the goals to 1.5 temperature target and continued reduction over time here to get to there.

“The most significant and the earliest is the reduction of methane leakages, detection, keeping it in the pipes, sealing it up, that will have a huge early impact on climate change. And then, carbon capture, use and storage, the development of hydrogen for fuels, among the many things. But this is going to be a real challenge because by 2040, there will be 2 billion more people on the planet who need energy and who is looking for raising standards of living. It's an enormously difficult thing and the industry can do a lot by making and producing energy as efficiently and low carbon intensity as you can decarbonizing its fuels,” the chairman highlighted.

Dudley stated that in emerging economies the fossil fuel dependency is still high. He added that energy plans to reduce and decarbonize energy is needed everywhere, including emerging economies: “I personally think transitioning away from coal as fast as we can be good. There's more use of coal today than ever in its history, and so that's, in my mind, the most emitting fuel. Natural gas displacing coal is really important. The world has another new challenge, and I think people are just starting to realize it, because the energy transition has now been turned on its head in the last year by the enormous amount of energy required for these new AI data centers.”