Climate-Wise Choices in a World of Oil Abundance

In the last five years, commercial-scale application of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing has opened up large resources of so-called “tight oil�.  At the same time, a decade of investment in unconventional resources such as the Canadian oil sands has allowed production from enormous deposits of low-grade hydrocarbons.  This abundance conflicts with a key long-term challenge: maintaining a stable climate by minimizing greenhouse gas emissions.  How does an era of oil abundance affect the climate challenge? Can we choose wisely among oil resources to minimize climate impacts?  What opportunities exist for oil companies to reduce the impacts of these new resources?  This panel discussion will cover these topics and introduce the “Oil Climate Index�, an open-source effort to model and estimate emissions from global oil resources.

Panel: Joule Bergerson, Assistant Professor, University of Calgary, Adam Brandt, Assistant Professor, Stanford University, Deborah Gordon, Director, Energy and Climate Program, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and Jonathan Koomey, Research Fellow, Steyer-Taylor Center for Energy Policy