Equinor Doubles Down on "Low Carbon" Energy Strategy
Energy company Equinor is reaffirming its strategy to deliver "safe, high value, low carbon" energy. The company is using its balance sheet to invest in hydrogen, renewables, and the decarbonization of its existing assets, including promoting hydrogen's role in helping the UK reach its net-zero emissions goals.
- CEO Anders Opedal has recalibrated the company's energy transition strategy, citing inflation and regulatory uncertainty. The company is halving its planned investment in renewables and low-carbon solutions for 2025-2027 and has eliminated its goal to allocate 50% of capital expenditure to this area by 2030. - Concurrent with the renewables cut, Equinor plans to increase its oil and gas production by over 10% between 2024 and 2027 and continues to explore for new resources, with a goal of drilling 20-30 exploration wells annually on the Norwegian continental shelf. - The company's 2030 target for installed renewable energy capacity has been lowered from a range of 12-16 GW to 10-12 GW, and its ambition for reducing net carbon intensity has also been weakened. - Despite the strategic shift, flagship projects are advancing, including the Empire Wind 1 project off the coast of New York, which secured over $3 billion in project financing and is expected to power over 388,000 homes. - In the UK, Equinor is a key driver of the Humber Hydrogen Hub, with its H2H Saltend project designed to produce low-carbon hydrogen to decarbonize one of the region's most carbon-intensive industrial sites. - The strategy has drawn criticism from environmental groups, who note that over 99% of the energy Equinor produced in 2024 came from oil and gas and accuse the company of greenwashing. - Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) remains a strategic priority, with a goal to develop storage capacity for 30-50 million tonnes of CO2 per year by 2035, supported by projects like the Northern Endurance Partnership in the UK. - The upstream CO2 intensity of Equinor's oil and gas production was 6.7kg CO2/boe in 2023, which is less than half the industry average and on track to meet its 2030 target of 6.0kg CO2/boe.
