Adds detail on nature of advisory board
Former BP chief executive and current Oil and Gas Climate Initiative (OGCI) chair Bob Dudley told Argus today that he has accepted an advisory role at this year's Cop 28 UN climate summit in Dubai.
Dudley told the annual Baker Hughes conference in Florence on Tuesday that he had been invited to serve on a Cop 28 advisory board, and confirmed to Argus today that he had accepted the invitation and already attended meetings.
The nature of the board, and its role in the Cop 28 process, is unclear. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Cop 28 presidency have yet to reply to a request for comments.
The appointment of OGCI's Dudley as an adviser could be seen as a further indication, following the nomination of Abu Dhabi's state-owned Adnoc chief executive Sultan Ahmed al-Jaber as Cop 28 president, that the forthcoming talks could mark a change in attitude to the oil and gas industry's inclusion in the climate talks.
OGCI is a coalition of 12 major oil and gas companies — including state-owned Saudi Aramco and the majors — aiming for Scope 1 and 2 operational net zero emissions within the timeframe set by the Paris agreement.
At the conference in Florence, Dudley acknowledged the criticism that the next Cop is taking place in a major oil-producing Mideast Gulf country and that its president is the chief executive of an oil firm.
But he also said that [al-Jaber] "started Masdar City — a big renewable effort there — and he is also the minister of technology and innovation." "[He is] a really broad-scale guy… He has got a really practical view that this cannot be another conference that [just] sets targets," Dudley said.
Dudley said he believed the energy industry needs to get involved directly, so that "all voices" are heard. The oil industry — including Shell's then chief executive Ben van Beurden — had complained of not being welcome at Cop 26 in Glasgow.
"I am a strong believer that the oil and gas industry, and now the broader energy industry, has solved some of the greatest engineering problems on Earth," he said.
