by Andreas Malm, Will Carton. London: Verso, 2025 ebook £15, hardback £25
A scathing critique of proposals to geoengineer our way out of climate disaster by the bestselling author of How to Blow Up a Pipeline …
Book review by Alan Morton
In 2026 what can we expect on climate change as world powers retreat from their commitments?
In Overshoot, Andreas Malm and Will Carton delve behind the rhetoric to uncover the underlying economic drivers of fossil fuel interests. Their message is that only effective opposition to fossil capital will allow us to deal with climate change.
Around the time of the Paris COP, many oil majors acknowledged the risks of climate change and foresaw a reduction in the use of fossil fuels. They invested in renewables as a tentative step in diversifying away from fossil fuels (remember BP’s rebranding as ‘Beyond Petroleum’). They found that renewable energy was not for them. The returns were small, not what they got from oil.
Oil companies invest huge amounts just to keep production going. If they stop, production dramatically slows and their investments become worthless ‘stranded assets’. To justify investing in expensive assets that are only profitable if used for 30 years or more, the oil industry wants business as usual for as long as possible. Drill, Baby, Drill – unhindered by any real concern for the climate.
To head off accusations they are causing climate breakdown, oil companies have a new strategy, the authors call Overshoot Ideology. Now industry promotes technologies they claim will actually reduce carbon dioxide levels. CCS, carbon capture and storage, or direct air capture of carbon dioxide. But these technologies are experimental and very unlikely to be deployed at scale quickly.
But this subterfuge allows the oil companies to claim that carbon dioxide levels can go above any limits set through COP. After we “Overshoot” these limits, these magic technologies will claw back excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. This is wishful thinking – on a disastrous scale. But it allows the oil companies and their allies, the makers of petrol and diesel cars, airlines – and governments to continue with business as usual. Global fossil fuel production continues to grow.
The dead weight of their capital investments compels the oil companies to act as they do. The oil industry will not fade away in a diminishing cloud of carbon dioxide. The economic logic of their business will drive them to produce fossil fuels until the bitter end – either theirs or ours. We must bring them to a halt much sooner. That’s the big idea of the authors of “Overshoot”.
Alan Morton is one of the founder members of MHSG and en10ergy limited. His interest in energy and climate issues is long-standing from his upbringing in a coal-mining area in Fife, Scotland, to being Curator of Energy and Modern Physics at the Science Museum for many years. The PV panels in the background of his picture played a part in setting up MHSG.
Order How the World Surrendered to Climate Breakdown through All Good Bookshop
(£23.75 Hardback, £15 e-book)
