COP28 produces new climate pledges from oil and gas companies. We’re leaning into the tough next step: keeping them.
We’re used to hearing pledges and targets at the annual United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP). It usually promises a new slate of international partnerships and collaborations. As I walked the avenues in Dubai, this year seemed different, like it was the starting gun in our fight against climate change.
More than 50 companies representing 40% of global oil and gas production signed the Oil and Gas Decarbonization Charter and committed to net-zero operations and methane emissions reductions by 2050, zero routine gas flaring by 2030, and investments in renewable energy, low-carbon fuels, and other climate-friendly technologies. More than half the participants were national oil companies (NOCs), who, in total, produce more than half the world’s oil and gas. For many of them, the Charter is their first meaningful commitment to cutting methane emissions from their operations.
In fact, this is the first COP where the future of fossil fuels and the companies that produce them appeared to be addressed head-on, and the role of natural gas as a transition fuel came into clearer focus.
Amidst the excitement of strong climate pledges, a sobering reality looms — 2030 will come quickly. These companies will have to quickly transition from making pledges and setting targets to keeping and hitting them, all the while ensuring they individually and collectively produce the climate benefits they were designed to. That will require an accurate, transparent, and reliable accounting of emissions and climate impacts that countries, companies, investors, and the public can trust, whether it’s for methane emissions or other low-carbon energy solutions, like hydrogen.
At this moment of decarbonization momentum, GTI Energy’s message to oil and gas companies is clear: you don’t have to do it alone. Scores of organizations, ourselves included, have invested untold hours developing the tools, frameworks, and systems industry needs to deliver on their historic and ambitious climate promises.
Methane Measurement and Verification
GTI Energy’s Veritas Initiative is the only global publicly available protocol to measure, reconcile, and verify methane emissions across the entire value chain. Developed with input from a diverse group of stakeholders including academics, environmental NGOs, companies, investors, policymakers, and vendors, Veritas protocols have been tested and refined by industry leaders and cover all segments of the natural gas supply chain. These technology-neutral protocols formulate a comprehensive toolbox designed to accurately measure and verify total emissions, which can, in turn, help companies accelerate methane emissions reductions. In 2024, GTI Energy will partner with the Oil & Gas Methane Partnership to produce Veritas 2.0 protocols for source-based methane emission measurement and reconciliation.
Common Climate Standards for Hydrogen
Hydrogen has significant potential to decarbonize hard-to-abate sectors like concrete and heavy industry, and billions in public funding are already committed to new demonstration projects around the world. But hydrogen faces “accounting” challenges of its own. Depending on how it is produced, its carbon intensity is highly variable, which makes it difficult for governments, industry, and investors to discover and accurately compare the long-term climate impact of any given project.
That’s what drove GTI Energy to form the Open Hydrogen Initiative (OHI), which is building an open-sourced and standardized accounting methodology for facility-level hydrogen emissions to harmonize the market when it comes to climate solutions and support global trade for low-carbon hydrogen. OHI’s stakeholders have been testing the methodology in real demonstrations around the world, zeroing in on a usable, standardized methodology to measure hydrogen emissions and climate impact.
At COP28, the UAE announced that almost 40 countries joined a declaration of intent around hydrogen carbon intensity, an important step toward quantifying and assessing the “climate-worthiness” of this promising fuel.
Leveraging Existing Natural Gas Infrastructure
Beyond methane mitigation, decarbonization for many natural gas companies will require new strategies for leveraging existing energy infrastructure. GTI Energy’s Net Zero Infrastructure Program was established to test and map the most practical opportunities for integrating low-carbon solutions within the existing U.S. natural gas infrastructure, including hydrogen, renewable natural gas, carbon transportation, carbon storage, and more.
A Global Resource for a Global Challenge
COP28 indeed produced some very promising announcements, partnerships, and pledges. To me, COP felt like the start of this critical race, not the end. We have a lot of hard work ahead between now and 2030, and GTI Energy is not merely watching from the sidelines. We are building the tools and fostering collaborations that will propel companies and countries towards low-carbon, low-cost energy systems. Join us in navigating this critical race because every step and every runner will count.
