Ten oil and gas industry bosses called for an “effective” Paris UN climate deal, recognised that current global emissions were inconsistent with the 2C goal and pledged to strengthen their actions to cut the GHG intensity of the global energy mix.

The CEOs made a series of declarations under the banner of the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative. They included pledging to work within existing public-private programmes such as the Global Methane Initiative, but they contained no specific abatement targets or references to carbon pricing.

The joint pledge came from the CEOs of BG Group, BP, Eni, Pemex, Reliance Industries, Repsol, Shell, Saudi Aramco, Statoil and Total.

The companies provide almost 10% of the world’s energy and their joint statement is an unprecedented show of unity weeks ahead of the Paris talks. US oil majors Exxon Mobil and Chevron did not join.

The move follows a June call by the six EU-based firms out of the ten for a global CO2 pricing system, which some observers said was a move to get lawmakers to promote gas at the expense of more-polluting coal rather than a genuine attempt to account for their climate impact.

The 10 firms said they have also made “significant” investments in natural gas, carbon capture and storage (CCS) and renewables – areas that would benefit from a global carbon price.

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