Environmental Crisis: It’s All About the Money |
Photograph Source: Lula Oficial – CC BY-SA 4.0
For regular viewers of Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now! Program, she and her team recently reported from the COP30 conference in Belém, Brazil. This COPS spotlighted Indigenous people, and the program had numerous interviews with not only representatives of different Indigenous groups but also environmental activists challenging fossil-fuel hegemony.
The Money
Sadly, none of the well-meaning people interviewed mentioned that the global oil-and-gas cartel garnered $5.9 trillion in revenues for 2024. And the U.S. coal industry accounts for an additional $16.4 billion.
Most disturbing is Wikipedia revealing breakdown of the oil & gas revenues for individual companies by country for 2022. Its comprehensive list is drawn from data for S&P Global Commodity Insights Top 250 Global Energy Company Rankings, along with Statista and Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute.
The Wikipedia list reminds readers that Brazil’s oil-and-gas companies are relatively small companies compared to, say, those in the U.S. or Saudi Arabia. It identifies the following with 2023 revenues:
• Brazil’s three companies as YPFB ($8.1/b), Petrobras ($124.4/b) and Ultrapar ($27.8/b).
• In the U.S., it identifies 31 companies, including Chevron Corp. ($246.2), ExxonMobil ($413.6), Marathon ($179.9), Philips 66 ($175.7/b) and Valero Energy ($176.3/b).
• Saudi Arabia there are Bahri ($2.2/b) and Saudi Aramco ($604.3/b) – the world’s largest oil and gas company.
Most troubling, the Council on Foreign Relations reports, “The United States is the world’s top producer of oil and natural gas.” It adds, “The country’s economy runs on these fossil fuels, but producing and burning them releases greenhouse gas........