The G20 countries granted a record level of subsidies to fossil fuels in 2022, more than twice as much as in 2021, underlines a report from BloombergNEF (BNEF) published on Tuesday ten days before the opening of COP28.
In a context of soaring energy prices, the governments and public companies of these 19 states more than doubled their support for fossil fuels last year, to nearly 1,300 billion dollars (the G20 includes 19 states as well as European Union and the African Union; the study concerns only the 19 countries).
Some 830 billion went into price support for consumers. The rest went to gas, oil and coal producers, even though many of them reaped record profits (+84% in 2022), underlines BNEF.
In 2021, these subsidies were 583 billion, indicates the group of experts, which is based on data from, among others, the OECD and the International Energy Agency.
In 2023, these subsidies should decline slightly compared to 2022, but remain above the level of previous years, he estimates.
A number of governments have maintained their support for the energy crisis into 2023, meaning levels of support for fossil fuels are likely to remain higher than the average pre-2022 trend, Victoria Cuming, co-author of the report, told AFP. .
However, we expect the 2023 level to be lower than the 2022 level, at least in terms of subsidies for per capita fossil energy consumption, she adds.
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