Domestic oil output in the United States reached a record high last week, in contrast to attempts by the Biden administration and world leaders to reduce heat-trapping carbon emissions.
Furthermore, it runs counter to Republican talking themes that Biden is waging a “war on American energy.”
According to the Energy Information Administration of the U.S. Department of Energy, American oil production reached 13.2 million barrels per day in the first week of October, breaking the previous high from 2020 by 100,000 barrels. The first week in October 2012 to the present has seen a doubling of the weekly domestic oil production.
Several industrialized nations throughout the world are dangerously producing more fossil fuels than they should be, according to experts, despite the United Nations and scientists’ predictions that global carbon emissions from burning coal, oil, and natural gas must be reduced by 43% by 2030 and to zero or almost zero by 2050.
“Continued growth in oil and gas production is hypocritical and in no way consistent with the global call to phase down fossil fuels,” said climate scientist Bill Hare, CEO of Climate Analytics, which assists in tracking international policies and initiatives to combat climate change. “The United States’ support for increased fossil fuel production will undercut international efforts to cut emissions.”
However, this isn’t just a problem for the United States. Hare included Norway, Australia, the United Kingdom, and Canada. He also added France because of TotalEnergies’ backing. And the national oil firm of the United Arab Emirates, which has declared plans to increase drilling, is headed by the man chosen to lead upcoming climate negotiations.
According to MIT professor John Sterman, a senior advisor at Climate Interactive, a company that predicts future warming based on countries’ proposed actions, “those with fossil resources seek to boost production and delay action to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions,” from Exxon-Mobil to Shell, Guyana to Cote d’Ivoire. He declared that the course would result in “catastrophe.”
No nation or business wants to reduce oil and gas production if someone else is going to sell oil nonetheless, according to climate scientist Rob Jackson of Stanford University and director of the emissions tracking group Global Carbon Project.
“We’re in a fossil trap,” Jackson declared.
Increased domestic oil production has long been viewed by White House officials as a way to smooth the transition to renewable energy sources. The increase in domestic production over the past year which has been strictly monitored by officials, has been more than one million barrels per day on average. It is proof that many oil price spikes are a result of Saudi Arabia and other nations’ policies regarding a commodity with a worldwide market price.
In order to reduce the harm caused by climate change, the Biden administration has committed several hundred billion of dollars in government incentives for switching from fossil fuels.
According to Samantha Gross, director of energy security and climate at the liberal Brookings Institution, just because the United States is producing more oil doesn’t imply it won’t gradually reduce emissions. She said that US oil had a lower carbon footprint than other types of oil, a claim that the oil business in the UAE also makes.
“So long as oil is demanded,” stated Gross. “Demand drives production; to reduce oil demand, the entire system must be changed.”
“Replacing oil in power production is a lot easier than replacing oil in transportation,” Gross wrote in an email. “We need policies like teleworking, walkable neighborhoods, and good public transportation to reduce demand for transportation, as well as changes in the transportation sector.”
In a separate report, the Energy Department’s EIA forecasts that through 2050, global carbon emissions will increase rather than decrease.
According to Jackson of Stanford, “If the EIA is correct, we’ll add another trillion tons of CO2 pollution to the atmosphere by 2050, and millions of people will die.” There isn’t any other way to look at it.
This year, Republican senators and representatives have frequently used the phrase “Biden’s War on American Energy,” including members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
The White House Council of Economic Advisers’ Jared Bernstein disagreed with that last month.
The number of locations where oil corporations could drill, according to Bernstein, is in the thousands. They’ve made a lot of money. They have produced a lot. Therefore, I don’t believe that is the issue.
Jackson from Stanford noted that while the Biden administration approved the Willow oil project in Alaska, it revoked drilling permits in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
It is evident that the Biden administration is either not waging a war against fossil fuels or, if it is, that war is failing miserably. Climate Analytics Hare said
