Lagos — The African Petroleum Producers’ Organization, APPO has accused the IEA of becoming an impediment to an inclusive and successful energy transition, noting that the Agency is unable to come to terms with the global reality for phasing down oil and gas.
This position was contained in a statement signed by Dr. Omar Farouk Ibrahim, Secretary General, African Petroleum Producers’ Organization, APPO, spotlighting the latest Report of the IEA, describing COP28 as the “moment of truth’’ for the oil and gas industry.
“According to the Report, global oil demand shall peak by 2030 and demand shall fall by 45% by 2050. Furthermore, the report describes CCUS and other CDR technologies for emissions reduction as illusions.”
“The problem with the IEA is that it is unable to come to terms with the global reality for phasing down oil and gas. And the more this reality stares the IEA on the face the more hysterical it becomes to the point that IEA’s projections have lost the credibility that they used to have. Only a couple of years ago, IEA posited that “reaching net zero will be virtually impossible without CCUS.’’ It further argued that “CCUS will need to form a key pillar of efforts to put the world on the path to a net-zero emissions.’’
“The world heeded that advice and started making progress on that front. The gradual success being recorded along that line has now jolted the IEA into abandoning any pretense to objectivity and scientific analyses. It is high time that IEA admitted that it is pursuing an ideological agenda. That admission will earn for it some respectability.
“For APPO and other oil and gas producing countries, and for the majority of the global population living in energy poverty, CCUS, CDR and other technologies are not illusions. We are aware of the efforts to kill their development by those who are determined to end oil and gas use, not because of environmental concerns but because they believe that pursuit of narrow energy security for their countries takes precedence over energy accessibility to the over 1.2 billion poor people of the world who have no access to energy.
“The IEA and other institutions, blinded by dogma, would not want other options for remedying emissions put on the table. They do not want the world to discuss how to handle the legacy emissions that are largely responsible for today’s climate challenge. These legacy emissions were mostly released by those who fund the IEA. This is not surprising as he who pays the piper dictates the tune.
“IEA’s targeted accusation of NOCs is a cheap blackmail which aims to drive a wedge between
NOCs and IOCs. It will not succeed. It is high time the IEA stopped all pretenses to objectivity.
APPO noted that the actions and utterances of some powerful stakeholders who claim to want the success of the energy transition, are far from honest, open or fact-based, noting that these stakeholders have allowed their blind pursuit of a dogma and the quest for a narrow energy security, to color the way they see everything in the climate discourse.
“They have become unreasonable, unaccommodating, dishonest and hysterical in their discourse on climate
change. They are not prepared to look at any option that, in their opinion, shall detract from their
aggressive pursuit of their perceived energy security, even if it is at the expense of the billions
of people living in energy poverty in other parts of the world.
“They are not interested in looking at other solutions to the climate challenge, other than phasing out oil and gas. They relish painting a doomsday picture of the oil and gas industry, an industry on whose back they rode to become what they are today, and in so doing deliberately distorting scientific facts,” the APPO stated.
