Antonio Guterres continues to warn of the devastating effects of climate change. In June, the UN Secretary-General again called world leaders for action: “We must start by tackling the polluted heart of the climate crisis, the fossil fuel industry,” he urged. With very clear slogans: “No more new coal-fired power stations. End licensing and financing of new oil or gas facilities. Stop expanding current fields. »

From a climate point of view, this call to put an immediate end to the expansion of fossils responds to mathematical reasoning. To keep warming below 1.5°C by the end of the century compared to the pre-industrial era (the most ambitious goal of the Paris Agreement), the total amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere must not exceed a certain threshold. As emissions continue to increase, the “carbon budget”, that is to say the accumulation of emissions that it is still possible to reject – a sort of little cake that humanity must share – is increasingly reduced.

According to the latest synthesis report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the carbon budget to have a one in two chance of staying below 1.5°C is 500 billion tonnes of CO2, or l The equivalent of only twelve years of emissions at the current rate. For 2°C, it would be 1,150 billion tonnes, or twenty-eight years of emissions.

“Lock in” CO2 emissions

However, IPCC scientists have shown that CO2 emissions from already existing fossil fuel infrastructures, if they operate as planned, largely exceed the carbon budget to stay below 1.5°C, and are roughly equivalent to the budget for 2 °C. From this observation follows the fact that continuing oil or gas expansion is incompatible with compliance with the Paris agreement. “The continued installation of fossil fuel-related infrastructure without carbon capture or storage solutions will “lock in” greenhouse gas emissions,” writes the IPCC.

In theory, it could be possible to invest in new fossil fuel infrastructure if, at the same time, existing installations were shut down. In reality, however, this hypothesis is not very credible. “It is much easier not to open a new facility than to close an existing field,” explains Olivier Bois von Kursk, policy advisor at the International Institute for Sustainable Development, an independent think tank that has analyzed around a hundred scenarios. of transition. Once capital has been invested in a project, companies will do everything to exploit it to the end. Workers’ unions can also oppose a closure. »