Fossil fuel giants make historic decision to write-down assets – but trillions still to go

Large investor groups commit to pressure other global oil companies to follow BP’s lead and write-down their bad fossil fuel assets, Ben Chu reports

There could be hundreds of billions of dollars of asset write-downs to come from other global oil companies as the reality of peak demand for oil becomes apparent (AP)

Pressure is mounting on global oil companies to clean up their balance sheets to reflect a world finally acting to prevent runaway global warming in the wake of BP’s historic decision to write-down its fossil fuel assets.

The UK-headquartered oil giant took the decision to take the $17.5 bn (£14bn) accounting hit this week after judging that the future price of a barrel of oil will be considerably lower than it previously estimated.

This reflected a view from the company’s bosses that the coronavirus pandemic will accelerate the world’s transition to a low-carbon economy and that the price of oil is not returning to its pre-crisis levels.