Big Oil’s Fallback Plan Is Falling Flat

Big Oil’s Fallback Plan Is Falling Flat

The oil and gas industry is in crisis. Crude prices plunged into negative territory at the start of the coronavirus pandemic, and oil giants in recent months cut dividends to shareholders and wrote down the value of their assets by tens of billions of dollars. Utilities this week abandoned a major gas pipeline as wind and solar smashed records. As of last month, 17 countries had set targets to phase out internal combustion engine vehicles. 

Yet petrochemicals “• the sector producing everything from plastics to polyester fabrics to paint “• looked like a safe bet. Exxon Mobil Corp. is spending $20 billion on chemical and refining plants across the Gulf Coast. Royal Dutch Shell PLC is constructing a massive complex in Pennsylvania to churn ethane, a component in fracked natural gas, into polyethylene plastic. China's state-owned Sinopec Corp. last month opened its third petrochemical facility in 18 months. 

There is, however, a "hole in the hedge,“ as The Economist magazine declared in a print headline last month. The price of plastic resins dropped amid the pandemic, and cheap oil is undercutting the United States' natural gas-based petrochemical buildout. Regulations are mounting as new research shows plastic pollution is so severe and ubiquitous