Illegal Rosebank owner made over £140bn in profits while we chose between heating and eating

Norwegian state oil giant, Equinor (the owner of the now-unlawful Rosebank oil field), has today announced full year global pre-tax profits of £24 billion, bringing the total it has earned since the start of the energy crisis to an enormous £141 billion – that’s around £45,000 a second; more than the average salary.

Rosebank owner Equinor: getting fat off our misery

The Energy Firm Profits Tracker from the End Fuel Poverty Coalition has tracked the earnings generated by oil and gas majors like Equinor since the beginning of the  energy crisis, which has driven millions of UK households into fuel poverty.

The oil major has also announced that it will reduce its global spend on renewables, in an effort to adjust “ambitions to realities”. The rollback follows widespread reports that worsening extreme weather – like Storm Éowyn and the California wildfires – are being driven by climate change.

Equinor is the UK’s largest gas supplier and the majority owner of the Rosebank oil field, whose 2023 approval by the Conservatives was ruled unlawful last week by the Scottish Court of Session.

Despite the court ruling, Equinor remains determined to develop the project, which would hand billions in further tax breaks to the company and mean the UK public would effectively carry almost all the costs of developing Rosebank.

Tax relief for billionaires

The oil giant was last year revealed to be benefiting from a lucrative, obscure tax break that has allowed Equinor to secure £400 million in tax relief over recent years. Analysis by Uplift and TaxWatch shows that Equinor used the Ringfence Expenditure Supplement (RFES) to receive hundreds of millions in relief between 2021 and 2022.

Equinor is also more than one month late in filing its UK accounts to Companies House. The delay has sparked concerns among tax experts about the source of the delay. Equinor is one of Europe’s largest oil and gas companies, and it is unusual for companies of this size and stature to file their accounts late.

Tessa Khan, executive director at Uplift commented:

Equinor is an obscenely profitable company that has dined out on the energy crisis, while millions of ordinary people in this country have struggled with unaffordable energy bills.

Its insatiable appetite for profit means it is pushing ahead with new oil and gas projects – and scaling back plans to expand renewable energy – regardless of the climate costs and the burden this places on people already coping with extreme weather.

There is next to no case for developing Equinor’s Rosebank project, which the Scottish courts ruled unlawful just last week. Its reserves won’t power British cars or industries – but will further line the pockets of the Norwegian government’s massive oil fund.

The vast majority of Rosebank’s oil will be sold on the international market for export, doing nothing to lower energy bills or increase energy security in the UK, and yet the UK public will pick up most of the costs of developing the field thanks to generous tax breaks.

We need to call time on Equinor’s profiteering.

Rosebank Equinor: ‘outrageous’

Caroline Simpson of Warm This Winter commented:

It is outrageous that this one Norwegian firm has made these extraordinary profits, while 6.5 million people in the UK are living in official fuel poverty and billpayers are spending £700 more on energy than we did since the start of the energy crisis.

Today’s profits just show once again how oil and gas firms and their billionaire cheerleaders are attempting to keep us hooked on fossil fuels by pushing for more drilling, which means sky high prices for longer for the rest of us.

The only way to secure the UK’s energy supply and bring down bills for good is by continuing to ramp up our supply of homegrown renewable energy. New oil fields, like Rosebank, will do nothing to help ordinary people.

Featured image via the Canary