Big Oil Comes to Africa

According to the American Energy Society, here’s what’s happening in Africa with respect to oil exploration and extraction:

Uganda, Kenya and Total are building a pipeline to carry Ugandan oil to the Kenya coast.

South Africa’s offshore Luiperd Block might be larger than 500 million barrels.

Zimbabwe is expected to approve drilling of its first exploration well.

Gambia granted PetroNor a 30-year drilling license.

Mozambique’s entire inventory of offshore oil blocks are fully subscribed (though exploratory drilling has been temporarily suspended due to the pandemic).

Angola has approved plans to expand exploration activities to 1 million bpd.

This is regrettable in several respects.  First, it’s well known that the rampant corruption in Africa will mean that the people themselves will receive little if any improvement in the quality of their lives as a result of any of this, and the rulers of these countries will get even wealthier and more powerful than ever before.

Second, and most obviously, this shows essentially zero effort to phase out fossil fuels in favor of renewables and other low-carbon energy sources.  The world is heating up, and our governments and private enterprises are not doing their part to avert this disaster.