30th July 2024, London –
As BP today reports Q2 profits of £2.2 billion ($2.8 billion), new Global
Witness analysis reveals the firm has paid out a staggering £11.7 billion
($14.8 billion) to shareholders since June 2023 - the month which marked the
start of the world’s first year-long breach of the key 1.5 degree warming
limit.
Alice Harrison, Head of Fossil Fuel Campaigns at Global Witness, said:
“As the world faces record-breaking heat, most of us are desperate to see urgent action on the climate crisis. Unfortunately, it’s clear that BP couldn’t care less. While millions of us struggle with high temperatures and high bills, BP are raking in billions of profits, paying out massive dividends, and doubling down on dirty new oil and gas projects.
Big oil companies like BP know their fossil fuel products are behind more deadly heatwaves, storms, and wildfires around the world, but instead of investing in clean energy, they are continuing to profit from people’s misery.
Fossil fuel companies like BP are turning a blind eye to climate breakdown, so now governments must act. Rather than propping up the climate-wrecking fossil fuel industry, we need them to make polluters pay for the damage they have already caused, and steer us towards a cleaner, greener future.”
The analysis shows how big fossil fuel firms like BP and their shareholders have benefitted from the war in Ukraine, which has killed tens of thousands of people, and from an energy crisis that pushed millions of families around the world into energy poverty.
BP today announced it has made £4.3 billion ($5.5 billion) in profits so far this year, further proving that vast profits for polluters are an enduring feature of the fossil fuel energy system. In the same period BP repurchased shares valued at £4.2 billion ($5.3 billion) and paid dividends totalling £2.9 billion ($3.7 billion).