Defusing the Carbon Bombs: A race against time in the climate change battle
With the world edging closer to the Paris Agreement's 1.5°C lower limit on global warming, even a slight uptick in CO2 emissions could potentially jeopardize the target initially set for the end of the century. However, the threat of “carbon bombs” – large-scale fossil fuel extraction operations – alone portends CO2 emissions far over those left to curb climate change. Thus, as humanity races against time to limit global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, hundreds of looming carbon bombs threaten to leave global efforts down for the count.
Carbon bombs, eating into our carbon budget
In its State of Global Climate report released in March 2024, the World Meteorological Organization identified 2023 as the hottest year on record, with unprecedented heat and ocean acidification, rising sea levels, Antarctic sea ice loss, and glacier retreat. As the global average near-surface temperature reached 1.45°C above the pre-industrial level, the WMO "sounded the Red Alert to the world," declaring that “never have we been so close to the 1.5° C lower limit of the Paris Agreement on climate change.”
Thus, 2023 has eclipsed previous records, surpassing the two hottest years, 2020 (1.27°C) and 2016 (1.29°C) previously recorded. This global average temperature increase highlights the international community's failure to put the world on the right track to combat climate change. Indeed, despite international commitments to reduce CO2 emissions – the main driver of climate change – concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have reached historic highs, contributing to the increase in long-term global warming.
To comply with the 2015 Paris Climate Accords, which set a limit to global temperature increase, the world now has only a scarce amount of allowable carbon dioxide emissions left. This amount is determined by the 'carbon budget,' which is set at an upper limit emission of 500 gigatons of CO2 according to the IPCC. However, with humanity's carbon budget shrinking rapidly, massive fossil fuel extraction operations alone threaten to deplete the few amounts of CO2 available to emit. With each extraction site having a CO2 emissions potential exceeding one gigaton, they have since infamously been labeled as 'carbon bombs.' The danger of these carbon bombs was brought to international attention by a research article published in Energy Policy in 2022. It identified 425 worldwide with an estimation of generating 1,182.3 gigatons of CO2 by the end of their exploitation. As a benchmark for comparison, global energy-related CO2 emissions amounted to 36.8 gigatons in 2022.
Of these carbon bombs, mainly from coal mines, gas, and oil fields, 294 are currently in operation and are expected to release 883 gigatons of CO2 into the atmosphere. Another 128 are still planned, with the potential to emit 294 gigatons of CO2. Only three carbon bombs, which collectively accounted for a modest 0.36% of emissions, were stopped. Thus, launching these planned fossil fuel extraction operations would even exhaust the carbon budget for the most stringent and imperative objective of keeping global warming below 2°C – estimated at 1,200 gigatons of CO2. Furthermore, that does not account for thousands of additional fossil extraction sites that do not qualify as carbon bombs as their emissions fall below the one gigaton threshold but may have much larger cumulative CO2 emissions.
Locating carbon bombs worldwide
Although carbon bombs are present in 47 countries, four – China, the United States, Russia, and Saudi Arabia – can alone release enough CO2 to cause warming of more than 1.5°C. Indeed, these four states collectively account for more than half of all CO2 emissions from carbon bombs. China is home to 141 of them (28.3% of total potential CO2 emissions), the United States follows with 28 (12.8% of emissions), then Russia with 40 (9.9% of emissions) and finally Saudi Arabia with 23 carbon bombs (9.1% of emissions).
Although to a lesser extent, Europe is nevertheless home to several carbon bomb projects or operations. Indeed, there are currently four active coal mega mines in Greece, Bulgaria, and Germany and two offshore oil and gas fields in Norway. Poland, Denmark, and the United Kingdom also plan significant oil and gas extraction sites on their soil.
Consequently, there is a blatant inconsistency between these countries' promises to reduce CO2 emissions and their actions fueling them. Indeed, while the United States and China boast of committing to achieving carbon neutrality by 2050 and 2060, respectively, and Europe claims to lead the fight against climate change, all allow these major extraction operations on their territories and contemplate new exploitation projects. Their promise appears meaningless when considering that 60% of oil and gas and 90% of coal must be left unextracted to meet the 1.5°C carbon budget.
Unveiling the carbon bombers
However, even if some countries do not have these large-scale fossil fuel extraction sites on their soil or do not presently exploit them, several nevertheless appear in the chain of responsibility for carbon bombs. Two French NGOs, Eclaircies and Data for Good, sought to identify the industrial and financial players contributing to the proliferation of carbon bombs. The two NGOs uncovered 454 companies exploiting the 422 carbon bombs, serving as operators, shareholders, or financiers.
There are 126 American companies, among which Exxon Mobil and Chevron stand out, involved in 16 and 9 carbon bombs, respectively. 125 Chinese groups are also participating, including China Energy (41 carbon bombs) and China Coal Xinji Energy (14 carbon bombs). In Russia, the main company is the majority state-owned company Gazprom (9), and in Saudi Arabia, the national oil company Saudi Aramco (18). However, a large number of European companies are also implicated, such as the French TotalEnergies (23), the English Shell (9), the Italian Eni SpA (6), and the Spanish Repsol SA (4). These European companies thus contribute significantly to the operation of these massive fossil fuel extraction projects, with TotalEnergies participating in the exploitation of more carbon bombs than any other company worldwide apart from China Energy.
Yet, the accountability for carbon bombs can also be traced back to various economic players that indirectly support extraction projects, including insurance, engineering and consultancy companies, and banks. Indeed, the ability of these companies to extract fossil fuels is contingent on the colossal provision of funds by global banks. These lending institutions have massively supported the companies that operate them. In the seven years since the Paris Climate Accords were ratified, the world's 60 largest banks have financed $5.5 trillion in fossil fuel extraction, with $669 billion in 2022 alone. That same year, the 454 carbon bomb-related companies were funded by $160 billion from global banks. The top ten lenders include Chinese, American, French, and Japanese banks, notwithstanding their alleged determination to fight climate change. Notably, through the Net-Zero Banking Alliance, Citi Bank, BNP Paribas, Crédit Agricole, JPMorgan Chase, SMBC Group, and Mizuho have all explicitly committed to financing the transition of the economy towards net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Yet, they persist in financing companies sabotaging global efforts to achieve carbon neutrality.
This illustrates the significant divergence between the financial sector and the goals of the Paris Climate Accords. To keep global warming to 1.5°C, emissions must be reduced by 45% by 2030, and net zero emissions must be achieved by 2050. To this end, the IEA has called for a halt to all investments in oil, gas, and coal. Nevertheless, hundreds of financial institutions in signatory countries continue to finance current and new carbon bombs.
COP28's ineffective efforts and the path forward to defusing carbon bombs
The investigation into carbon bombs was published by the British newspaper The Guardian and its French counterpart Le Monde, ahead of the COP28 summit, starting in November 2023.
This timely publication aimed to move the needle on fossil fuels at a controversial conference. Indeed, COP28 took place in the United Arab Emirates, the world's fifth-largest emitter of CO2 per capita and home to seven carbon bombs. It was also chaired by Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, Minister of Industry and, above all, CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company. This appointment raised concerns about the conflict between economic interests and the environmental agenda. Thus, rather than a platform to confront the taboo of fossil fuels, COP28 has turned into a facade for concluding oil deals. Additionally, Al Jaber claimed there was "no science" behind the need to phase out fossil fuels to limit global warming to 1.5°C, defying the widespread scientific consensus. Overall, the conference brought meager results and was ultimately rated 3.8/10 by BloombergNEF. Although COP28 ended with the "UAE Consensus" on phasing out from fossil fuels, it provided no binding commitments to implement it, let alone the urgency of stopping the extraction of carbon bombs.
Despite the lack of global reaction, the threat of global warming and the urgency of reducing CO2 emissions for the future of humanity underline the necessity to defuse carbon bombs. Yet, in this race against time to achieve carbon neutrality, unrestrictive and uncoordinated commitments to transitioning away from fossil fuels keep us behind the clock. Faced with this reality, twelve national governments, one hundred and three cities and subnational governments, thousands of civil society organizations, Nobel laureates, scientists, and activists, as well as the World Health Organization and the European Parliament have endorsed the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty (FFNTP) initiative. Inspired by the breakthrough from the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in combating the threat of nuclear weapons, FFNTP aims to achieve a binding multilateral treaty to defuse the dangers posed by fossil fuels. The treaty would forge a commitment to ending fossil fuel exploration, extraction, and exploitation while facilitating the transition to renewable energy, which is essential to defusing the carbon bombs and meeting the Paris Climate Accords.
With 2024 already ahead, significant efforts must be made to avoid breaking a new world temperature record, which would consign the +1.5°C target to scrap and bring the world closer to the point of no return of +2°C. The dire conclusions of the WMO report and the looming issue of carbon bombs must prompt the international community to reach binding agreements, such as the FFNTP initiative, on the prompt transitioning out of fossil fuels to combat climate change.
Countries must abide by their pledge to achieving carbon neutrality, which cannot be attained with the continuous exploration, extraction, and exploitation of fossil fuels on their territory. Moreover, holding financial institutions and private companies accountable for financing carbon bombs on national and foreign soil in the face of their commitments to enabling net zero greenhouse gas emissions is essential to stop fossil fuel extraction operations worldwide. Finally, putting the issue of carbon bombs on the agenda of climate change international dialogues is critical to raising global awareness of this insufficiently addressed challenge and developing clear strategies to mitigate its devastating impact. Consequently, with the carbon clock ticking at full speed, tedious efforts to achieve a global commitment to shifting away from fossil fuels are yet to be made in order to stop carbon bombs and get on the right path to limiting global warming.