Even as climate advocates call for eliminating fossil fuels, companies continue to launch major production plans. Earlier this year, for example, President Joe Biden’s administration approved the $8 billion Willow project on Alaska’s North Slope, which is expected to yield some 600 million barrels of oil over three decades. And last month, ExxonMobil announced a nearly $60 billion deal to acquire the oil producer Pioneer Natural Resources, which would allow it to more than double its production in the Permian Basin to 1.3 million barrels of oil and gas a day.
Hundreds of fossil fuel extraction projects now planned or already in production constitute so-called carbon bombs that hold the potential to emit more than a billion tons of carbon dioxide over their lifetimes, one analysis found. If these projects go forward, the researchers concluded, their emissions would be twice the limit that would keep global temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit). The United Nations Paris Agreement, ratified in 2015, seeks to hold the average global temperature increase to well below 2 C above preindustrial levels to minimize climate impacts, and advocates a 1.5 C increase as a major goal to avoid the most severe impacts.
