Greener fossil fuels

SIR – If Tony Hayward, former chief executive of BP, would like us to learn to love the fossil fuel industry, there is only one thing the industry needs to do: stop the products it sells from causing further global warming (“The UK will pay the price for demonising fossil fuels”, Comment, January 16).

Who cares if the industry also invests in renewables? Renewables are profitable anyway. What it needs to invest in is permanent disposal of the carbon dioxide generated by the products it sells, and stop just hoping someone else will sort it out.

Applying the principle of extended producer responsibility to fossil fuel imports and extraction in Britain would balance demand for fossil fuels with commensurate investment in geological carbon dioxide storage – the only way to guarantee that our continued fossil fuel use is compatible with our Paris Agreement obligations.

How would it work? The Government regulates fossil fuel producers to recapture and permanently store a rising fraction of the carbon dioxide generated by their activities and products. A 10 per cent storage target by 2030, for example, would add less than 0.2p per kWh to the cost of delivering natural gas in Britain. To frighten politicians, the industry will claim all this cost would be passed on to the consumer, but with profits and taxes almost 50 times higher, would it and the Treasury really not be able to absorb any of this cost for the sake of a more secure future for themselves, never mind the planet? The fossil fuel industry has the resources and expertise to reach 100 per cent storage by 2050. What it lacks is the incentive, without policy to level the playing field.

Mr Hayward is right that we should be prepared for the transition away from fossil fuels to be slower than anticipated. He is wrong to imply we must forego our environmental responsibilities. Chris Skidmore’s net zero review highlighted the need for a geological storage target in British policy. With it, Britain would stop its use of fossil fuels causing further global warming by 2050. Without it, it won’t. It’s as simple as that.

Stuart Jenkins

Myles Allen

University of Oxford