The US federal government has made the decision to bail out the oil and coal powered industries with a coronavirus rescue package of $750 billion. Tanzia Haq reports.
Companies such as ExxonMobil, Chevron and Koch Industries are lining up to receive a massive bailout from the federal government of the US, with at least ninety other companies. The bond buyback scheme is said to benefit coal and oil companies and coal and oil based utilities companies by the end of September 2020.
These findings come from a study conducted by Jason Disterhoft of the Rainforest Action Network who claims that the taxpayer’s money funding this bailout should focus on helping communities affected by the coronavirus rather than helping these big companies pay off their debts.
The halt in global economic activity and falling oil prices have set these companies scrambling but a lot of fuel and coal companies had been struggling since before the pandemic due to mass appeal of green energy alternatives. Disterhoft claims that this bailout would’ve been a chance to channel funding into green initiatives to strengthen them enough to replace already struggling oil and fracking companies.
“Recovery funds have to go to workers and environmental clean-up first, not bonuses or dividends, and companies should be required to stop expanding fossil fuels and phase out their fossil business – otherwise we’re just lighting public money on fire and locking in the coming climate crash into the bargain,” said Disterhoft.
