Susan O’Keeffe: Oil executives being held to public account is welcome and overdue

For the first time ever, the mighty and powerful companies will sit before a Congressional Committee in Washington and be probed about their extensive information campaigns as they relate to carbon emissions and climate change

‘If the oil executives have to march in and face tough questions at the Oversight Committee, a tectonic plate in one of the greatest oil-guzzling nations on the planet will have shifted – in plain sight.’ Picture: Getty

Funding to drive carbon emission reductions is the least we might have expected and we were not disappointed in Budget 2022. But, overall, the announcements on climate change hardly caused a ripple and certainly cannot yet be seen as a gamechanger for our collective behaviour in relation to reducing emissions.

Small projects on recycling, waste management and protection of inland fisheries matter, but they are very much background activities – essential but not motivating wider ...