Fossil Fuel Companies Attending Recent U.N. Climate Talks Responsible For Nearly 60% Of Global Oil And Gas Production

GLOBAL – Over 5,350 fossil fuel lobbyists have attended U.N. climate negotiations in just four years, with 90 of the corporations they represent responsible for nearly 60% of all global oil and gas production, according to new research from the Kick Big Polluters Out (KBPO) coalition released ahead of COP30 in Belém.

The analysis, which examined fossil fuel lobbyist participation at COP26 through COP29 alongside newly released data from the Global Oil and Gas Exit List 2025 (GOGEL 2025), reveals the staggering scale of fossil fuel industry presence at the very negotiations that must urgently phase out their products to deliver on its mandate. A minimum of 5,368 fossil fuel lobbyists attended the UN climate talks between 2021 and 2024, representing 859 different fossil fuel organizations including 180 oil and gas corporations.

Just 90 of these oil and gas corporations produced 33,699 million barrels of oil equivalent (mmboe) of oil and gas in 2024 alone, according to analysis of data from GOGEL 2025. This represents nearly 60% of global oil and gas production for the year. To put this in perspective, this volume of oil would be enough to cover nearly all of continental France (minus Corsica) or more than the entire area of Spain.

The same 90 corporations have planned short-term upstream expansion worth 164,957 mmboe as of Sept 2025. These expansion plans are expected to produce enough oil to cover an area nearly the size of mainland France, Spain, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway combined. These companies account for an estimated 63% of the global oil and gas industry's total short-term expansion plans as of September 2025.

“Over the last three years, oil and gas companies that lobbied at COP have spent more than $35 billion each year looking for new oil and gas fields, exacerbating the problem the nations of the world had gathered to solve,” said KBPO partner Fiona Hauke of Urgewald. “These companies have defended their fossil interests by watering down climate action for years. As we head towards COP30, we demand transparency and accountability: Keep polluters out of climate talks and make them pay for a just energy transition.”

The findings come as the world continues to breach temperature thresholds year after year, with carbon emissions at all-time highs and fossil fuel use spiraling out of control. For over three decades, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change has failed to deliver the climate action needed to keep global temperature rise to well below 1.5 degrees Celsius as promised in the Paris Agreement. The primary reason for this failure is no secret—Big Polluters continue to be granted outsized presence, access, and influence at the very negotiations meant to address the crisis they knowingly caused.

Among the world's largest fossil fuel corporations, Shell sent a total of 37 lobbyists to COP26-COP29, BP sent 36, ExxonMobil sent 32, and Chevron sent 20. These figures do not account for additional lobbyists from the fossil fuel industry's associated trade groups.

According to KBPO partner Alejandro Jaimes, from ANGRY: "Fossil fuel lobbyists must carry the blame of present generations living in harsh climate conditions and future generations not being able to live in a world that is safe enough. It's clear that this has made a significant impact on the progress made inside the UNFCCC, which leads to less time to act. And yet, corporate capture is still normalized inside pavilions and negotiations without clear conflict of interest policies. This must not be just a list of numbers additional to the large amount of data that shows we are on the wrong direction. That's why we demand more transparency being implemented to stop greenwashing and corporate capture in UNFCCC spaces, because we won't accept that the fossil fuel industry keeps on influencing our lives and grabbing even more land.”

Despite the scale of fossil fuel industry presence revealed by this data, COP30 is set to proceed with effectively zero protections against interference in place. Thanks to sustained campaigning from civil society, for the first time COP30 participants who are not attending on government badges will be expected to publicly disclose who is funding their participation and confirm their objectives align with the UNFCCC. However, this step does not include actual protection measures to ensure fossil fuel industry presence doesn't undermine the outcomes of COP30. The requirement also does not apply to individuals on government delegations or who are guests of governments, despite the fact that fossil fuel lobbyists regularly enter climate talks through government delegations.

Ahead of COP30 happening in Belém from November 10-21, more than 225 organizations and networks around the world wrote to the COP30 Presidency asking them to commit to a polluter-free COP by ensuring no fossil fuel ties or sponsorship and by advancing an Accountability Framework that protects the integrity and legitimacy of the UNFCCC. In response, little to no meaningful action has been taken to protect these talks from the fossil fuel industry and other Big Polluters.

"Corporate power is at the root of the climate crisis,” said Nerisha Baldevu, a KBPO member from groundWork/Friends of the Earth South Africa. “Fossil, mining and agribusiness giants are seizing our global institutions and turning climate negotiations into trade expos for polluters. For climate justice, we must dismantle the corporate architecture of impunity and kick these Big Polluters out of policymaking. Our future cannot be written by those who profit from its destruction."

Year after year, fossil fuel industry lobbyists continue to make up some of the largest delegations at global climate negotiations, consistently outnumbering delegates from the most climate vulnerable nations. The Kick Big Polluters Out campaign is calling on the UN climate body and governments to establish a robust Accountability Framework to address the problem of industry interference at its root, and to prioritize the millions of lives on the line from the climate crisis and lack of action to address it, following on other precedents from other U.N. bodies such as the World Health Organization.

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Kick Big Polluters Out is a coalition of more than 450 organizations across the globe united in demanding an end to the ability of Big Polluters to write the rules of climate action. 

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