Daily Briefing: Record oil profits | EU spark-gap fight | Dam-gas downgrade

30.10.26

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News

Shell criticised over bumper earnings haul amid soaring oil prices

Holly Williams, The Press Association

There is ongoing coverage – including on the frontpage of the Daily Mirror – of the quarterly profits announced by Shell yesterday. The Press Association reports that campaigners have criticised the “profit haul”, which saw the company announce earnings of $10.81bn (£8.12bn), up from $5.43bn (£4.08bn) a year earlier. The newswire says Shell’s announcement came after the UK chancellor “chose not to increase windfall taxes on oil and gas firms in Wednesday’s budget”, despite calls to tap the sector’s “mammoth” profits to help pay for household energy support. It continues that Shell’s chief financial officer called on the government to approve the Rosebank oil field, a project part-owned by Shell. A separate Daily Mirror article covers analysis by Greenpeace which calculates that CEO Wael Sawan boss has “enjoyed a £4.7m boost” since the start of the Iran war, as the company has earned “£60,000 a minute”.

BP’s profits, meanwhile, have surged to a “new record”, with the company this morning reporting adjusted quarterly profits of $8.5bn – a near-quadrupling since this time last year, according to the Financial Times. The newspaper notes BP’s results follow “bumper earnings at European rivals Shell, TotalEnergies, Eni and Repsol which have increased shareholder payouts as the industry enjoys its strongest profits since the energy crisis triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022”. A separate Financial Times article notes that “the higher payouts are the first sign of how Europe’s oil companies intend to spend the billions of dollars of additional profits”. It adds that analysts also expect oil majors to use the windfall to “bolster their oil and gas reserves and eventually fund more mergers and acquisitions in the sector”.

MORE ON FOSSIL FUELS

TotalEnergies reported a net profit up 124% year-on-year in the third quarter, reaching $8.3bn, says Le Monde.
Campaigners have launched an online archive that shows how Shell knew that “burning fossil fuels could harm the climate as early as the 1960s”, reports DeSmog.
Soaring UK oil prices have already exceeded the UK Office for Budget Responsibility’s “worst-case forecast”, says the Daily Mail.
Reuters: “Russia to extend diesel-export ban, use quotas to fulfil US deal, sources say.”
Scottish leader John Swinney is under pressure from leaders of opposition parties to set out his position on Rosebank, says the Press Association.
The Scotsman says the UK government’s messaging on carbon-capture and storage funding for the Acorn project in Scotland has “descended into chaos”.

EU countries push back against Brussels plan to tax gas more than electricity

Marta Pacheco, Euronews

“More than a dozen” EU countries have pushed back against European Commission plans to make electricity cheaper than gas through preferential taxation, warning that Brussels is “overstepping its powers”, says Euronews. It reports that Germany, Italy, Malta, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria and Hungary were among the countries that came out against the measure at an EU energy ministers meeting on Thursday. Rapporteur also covers the meeting, noting that countries were “having none” of the EU executive’s plans to have “more of a say” in European energy taxation and network tariff design. It continues that France and Germany said that letting Brussels design grid fees could “affect national subsidy schemes for heavy industry”. On taxation, it explains that countries rejected EU plans to “use a legal trick to skirt the requirement for unanimity that applies to decisions over tax policy at the European level”.

MORE ON EUROPE

Rapporteur: “Centrist MEPs abandon electric-car quotas for corporate fleets.”
A draft of a joint EU-Canada statement, covered by Al Jazeera, sets out plans to conduct a joint feasibility study on Canadian liquefied natural gas exports to Europe.

COP31: Global initiative launched to accelerate push for electrified and efficient buildings

Michael Holder, BusinessGreen

The COP31 presidency is calling on countries and companies to sign up to a new initiative which aims to help “accelerate electrification” and increase the energy efficiency of buildings worldwide, reports BusinessGreen. The “Antalya compact for energy efficient buildings”, it explains, is a “framework” that “sets out priorities for action in support of the proposed global goal to reduce the operational energy intensity of the global building stock by 25% by 2035, relative to 2020 levels”. The outlet says it is also aimed at “rallying support and action towards ramping up electricity’s share of energy consumption to 35% by 2035”. It adds that the announcement follows the launch earlier this week of the “Antalya artificial intelligence pledge” by the COP31 presidency, which is seeking to rally global support behind an agreement to address the resource demands of data centres and “make AI part of the climate solution”.

China: CEC forecasts China’s installed power capacity to reach 4,300GW by end of year

China Electric Power News

Wind and solar are expected to account for half of China’s total installed power capacity by the end of the year, while coal’s share is projected to fall to around 31%, reports China Electric Power News, citing the China Electricity Council (CEC). The newspaper says the CEC expects China to add more than 350 gigawatts (GW) of power-generation capacity in 2026, reaching a total of 4,300GW, of which around 2,700GW (63%) will be non-fossil fuel capacity. It continues that in the first three quarters, China installed 170GW of wind and solar capacity, accounting for 68% of total additions. It adds that the increase in generation from non-fossil fuels accounted for 87.2% of the increase in total electricity consumption.

MORE ON CHINA

Stephen Orlins, president of the National Committee on US-China Relations, said Chinese companies should “license their advanced green technologies to US manufacturers”, according to Caixin.
Overseas orders for Chinese energy storage companies rose 83% year-on-year in the first half of the year, but “falling prices, tighter trade barriers and new compliance rules threaten growth”, says Caixin.
China’s commerce ministry said China opposes “protectionist practices” and will take “all necessary measures” to protect its businesses, reports Xinhua.
Germany’s president Frank-Walter Steinmeier said in Beijing that China must not “create one-sided dependence in other markets”, reports Reuters.
China’s NEA issued 326m “green electricity certificates” in September, down 8% from the previous month, reports BJX News.
People’s Daily reports the value of outstanding “green loans” in the first three-quarters rose 13% year on year, reaching 49.2tn yuan ($7.4tn).

Comment

Brazil’s victory for the planet and democracy: seven lessons from Lula’s win

Jonathan Watts, The Guardian

The Guardian’s global environment editor Jonathan Watts says the re-election of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in Brazil provides a “playbook for social and environmental movements in other countries”. Lula’s victory has thrilled “conservationists, climate activists and social justice campaigners across the world”, he continues, who hope that Brazil can “now go on to achieve its target of zero deforestation by 2030 and continue to support a global transition away from fossil fuels”. This, he says, would provide a “huge boost to flagging global efforts to stabilise the climate and protect degraded ecosystems”. Watts sets out seven “lessons” that events in Brazil offer to campaigners elsewhere, including the importance of social movements that advocate for the environment. Axios has an analysis looking at why Lula’s victory carries consequences beyond Brazil, including for the global climate, while Reuters explores how the Brazil vote impacts the flow of global resources.

MORE COMMENT

An editorial in the Daily Mirror argues that banks and energy giants reaping bumper profits should “shoulder more of the [cost-of-living] burden” felt by working people.
The Financial Times’ chief business columnist John Tapper says the UK government should approve the Rosebank oil field on energy security and economic grounds.
The Guardian’s finance editor Nils Pratley says the UK government’s plan for a “deep reform of our energy system” remains “blurry”.
Climate Home News editor Megan Rowling says COP reform is happening “quietly”.
For DeSmog, journalist Mitch Anderson says the Canadian government’s new data-centre principles have a “credibility problem”.
The mayors of Renca, Chile and Melbourne, Australia write in Climate Home News that cities are driving a “green investment boom”.
For Heated, Emily Atkin writes that it is no accident that climate change “isn’t getting much airtime” among Democratic candidates ahead of the US midterms.

Research

“Flood peaks” in central Europe due to Storm Boris in 2024 would have been 14-22% lower without the influence of human-driven climate change | Science Advances
Marshes along the US east and Gulf coasts store around 0.94m tonnes of carbon every year, with “brackish marshes contributing more than previously recognised” | Earth’s Future
Dams may produce only 19% of the greenhouse gas emissions suggested by previous estimates | Science Advances