Six of the biggest fossil fuel companies are projected to earn $2,967 a second in profits in 2026, according to new research by non-profit Oxfam, even as the first global conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels is underway in Santa Marta, Colombia.
This marks an increase of almost $37 million a day compared to the 2025 profits of these six corporations — Chevron, Shell, BP, ConocoPhillips, Exxon and TotalEnergies, noted a statement by Oxfam. Their total projected fossil fuel profits of 2026 are $94 billion: enough to provide solar power for the energy needs of almost 50 million people in Africa.
“In the context of the global energy crisis, Oxfam commissioned new polling in seven countries. It found that three times as many citizens supported greater government investment in renewable energy compared to increasing fossil fuel extraction, and approximately two thirds (68 per cent) supported increasing taxes on the profits of large oil and gas corporations to help fund the transition to renewables,” read the statement.
The organisation added that currently, families around the world continue to be pushed into energy poverty as geopolitical instability, the impacts of escalating violence in West Asia that has already taken many lives, and the sharp increase in the wealth of the super-rich in contrast to everyone else is leaving ordinary people struggling to make ends meet.
A huge proportion of the profits from fossil fuels are going straight into the pockets of the wealthiest 1 per cent, based mainly in the Global North, who are profiting from the subsequent climate destruction these corporations cause while working to maintain global dependence on fossil fuels by monopolising wealth and political influence.
“A just transition away from fossil fuels must support people in poorer countries, who face the brunt of climate disasters while their governments are forced to spend more money on repaying debts than on education or health, let alone climate adaptation,” the statement quoted Mariana Paoli, Climate Policy Lead at Oxfam. “Taxing the richest polluters who have no intention of investing in a clean future is central to a just transition. At Santa Marta, governments must end the pollutocrat era.”
According to Oxfam, fossil fuel corporations and the super-rich that profit from them are entrenching inequality and turning their backs on the people most impacted by the fossil fuel-driven climate crisis.
It cited the example of ExxonMobil, which last month announced a significant reduction of a third of its planned investment in low-carbon energy projects and TotalEnergies refused to adopt a net zero transition plan aligned with 1.5 degrees.
Oxfam has urged government at Santa Marta to:
1. Scale up public climate finance.
2. Introduce measures to tax corporations and the super-rich profiting from fossil fuels and the cost-of-living crisis, including through a Rich Polluter Profit Tax on fossil fuel corporations and an Excess Profit Tax across all sectors.
They must tackle unsustainable sovereign debt through debt cancellation, fair restructuring, and by adopting a UN framework on sovereign debt.
3. Put justice at the heart of the energy transition through principles of responsible divestment. States and fossil fuel corporations must address the environmental damage and livelihood loss they’ve caused and centre the rights and participation of those communities most impacted by extractive industries.
4. Implement an equity-based roadmap to end fossil fuels that reflects the historical responsibility, financial capacity and fossil fuel dependence of different states.
