{"id":12606,"date":"2026-05-07T12:28:31","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T12:28:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/2026\/05\/07\/trumps-iran-war-may-stymie-climate-gains-with-boost-to-big-oil-experts-say-the-guardian\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T12:28:31","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T12:28:31","slug":"trumps-iran-war-may-stymie-climate-gains-with-boost-to-big-oil-experts-say-the-guardian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/2026\/05\/07\/trumps-iran-war-may-stymie-climate-gains-with-boost-to-big-oil-experts-say-the-guardian\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s Iran war may stymie climate gains with boost to big oil, experts say – The Guardian"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

The billions in profits big oil is reaping due to the Iran<\/a> war may stymie the energy transition, experts and advocates fear, incentivizing oil and gas expansion and boosting the sector\u2019s funds for political lobbying.<\/p>\n

\u201cWindfall profits from Trump\u2019s war will allow big oil to build a wall of money around its Trump-era political victories,\u201d said Lukas Shankar-Ross, a deputy director at green group Friends of the Earth.<\/p>\n

The deadly conflict in Iran has created a historic energy shock<\/a> due to attacks on fossil fuel facilities and the blockage of the crucial trade vessel the strait of Hormuz. Amid the chaos, energy prices \u2013 and oil companies\u2019 earnings \u2013 have soared.<\/p>\n

ConocoPhillips last week reported $2.3bn in profits for the first three months of 2026, up 84% from before the war began. Meanwhile, top petroleum refiner Valero Energy announced quarterly profits of $1.2bn, beating<\/a> estimates. Liberty Energy, founded and formerly run by Donald Trump\u2019s energy secretary Chris Wright, saw quarterly earnings of $10m, up 32% from before the war began. And BP said it had seen \u201cexceptional\u201d performance, more than doubling<\/a> its profits during the year\u2019s first quarter.<\/p>\n

The oil majors Chevron and ExxonMobil both saw their profits drop<\/a> during the first three months of 2026, executives reported in earnings calls. Yet in short order, that trajectory will shift, analysts say. Consensus estimates<\/a> shows ExxonMobil\u2019s second-quarter earnings will more than double from a year ago, while Chevron profits are expected to increase by 56% for the year.<\/p>\n

As oil companies rake in billions, Americans are suffering at the pump. On Wednesday, the US average price of gasoline soared to $4.52 per gallon<\/a>, the highest price since July 2022.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe reason why oil companies are doing so well right now, or at least are projected to do very well in the near term, is exactly because Americans are hurting,\u201d said Kelly Mitchell, executive director of Fieldnotes, a watchdog organization tracking the oil and gas industry. \u201cTheir business interest is to extract as many dollars out of a barrel of oil as possible, and the folks on the other side of the equation are Americans who are just trying to fill up their gas tank and get to work.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump has dismissed concerns about gas prices, telling reporters<\/a> this week the spike is a \u201cvery small price to pay\u201d. Since entering office, his administration has also made it clear that they are prioritizing the industry \u2013 which poured record donations into his campaign<\/a> \u2013 over the American people, said the representative Sean Casten, a Democrat from Illinois. For instance, Trump ended a Biden-era ban on liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports, which has put \u201cupward pressure on US gas prices\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you are a US oil producer, you are really happy right now, and if you\u2019re a US oil consumer, you\u2019re really not,\u201d said Casten, who in March unveiled<\/a> a legislative package aimed at lowering energy bills by prioritizing affordable renewable energy and modernizing the grid. \u201cThere are a lot more oil consumers than producers in the United States, and this White House seems to be ignoring the overwhelming majority of Americans.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fuel price spikes could end up being a \u201chuge boost to the oil industry\u2019s political efforts\u201d, said Mitchell. The windfall earnings come as the sector has achieved major policy wins.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s 2025 One Big Beautiful Bill Act alone, said Shankar-Ross, represents \u201cthe biggest expansion of fossil fuel subsidies in a generation\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cReversing this damage doesn\u2019t get easier if the industry being subsidized is flush with cash,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a concern that Isabella Weber and Gregor Semieniuk, economists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, raised in the wake of the last major fuel shock<\/a>, resulting from Russia\u2019s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.<\/p>\n

\u201cCash flows are up, so there\u2019s more money to go around, including for lobbying,\u201d said Semieniuk. \u201cIn the US, there\u2019s also the narrative that the US is lucky to have its own fossil fuel supply right now [to serve as a backstop to supply shortages]. So they are helped by the ability to capitalize on being the saviors of the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/gu-island><\/figure>\n

During the Russia-Ukraine fuel shock, the US oil industry ramped up its political lobbying<\/a>, using the war to demand more oil and gas leasing and arguing that more domestic production was needed for energy security. Oil majors also scaled back their climate plans<\/a> as profit opportunities in fossil fuels grew. And high profit margins also \u201cencourage capital to go into an industry\u201d, said Weber.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is exactly the opposite of what we want from the perspective of climate change mitigation, as it strengthens the fossil fuel industry as a political a constituency,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

There are countervailing trends at work, said Weber. Renewables have become even more economically competitive than they were in 2022, and in March, the US for the first time generated more of its electricity<\/a> from renewables than gas over the course of a full month. Meanwhile, high gas prices are undermining Trump\u2019s popularity, potentially paving the way for a pro-environment president to take his place in 2029, said Weber.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe may not see the very same trends we saw during the last shock,\u201d she said. \u201cBut is this a big boost to big oil? Of course, absolutely.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The billions in profits big oil is reaping due to the Iran war may stymie the energy transition, experts and advocates fear, incentivizing oil and gas expansion and boosting the sector\u2019s funds for political lobbying. \u201cWindfall profits from Trump\u2019s war will allow big oil to build a wall of money around its Trump-era political victories,\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12607,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12606","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12606","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12606"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12606\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12607"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12606"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12606"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12606"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}