Maintain or reduce, not expand, current levels of offshore oil drilling
Energy and environment
Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
Why shareholder democracy is pivotal
Federal leasing is the government's decision, but expansion happens only if companies choose to bid, invest and drill. Owners contest exactly those choices: As You Sow's review counted 160 climate resolutions at 24 U.S. oil and gas companies between 2012 and 2018 and pressed the conflict between expanded production and climate goals, and As You Sow and the Church of England asked ExxonMobil and Chevron to report on aligning their plans with net-zero. Both halves of the problem now run through the companies. Their trade groups asked for the expansion: the American Petroleum Institute hailed the 2025 plan for 30 mandated Gulf lease sales as a historic step, and the Independent Petroleum Association of America urged that every offshore area be included. Their capital then delivers it: BP, Woodside and Chevron led $279.4 million in high bids at the first mandated sale in December 2025. Companies that declined to expand would end the expansion by themselves, as the empty Arctic Refuge lease sales showed. Majorities of both parties want current drilling levels held or reduced. No obstacle to that outcome stands apart from what these companies seek and spend. We judge their conduct and political influence together the linchpin: owners can direct both the bidding and the lobbying, and changing them releases the block.
How this was scoredPivotal
Pivotal. Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
We have not yet written down the two answers behind this rating. Recording them on every item, so a reader can check the reasoning and not only the conclusion, is work in progress.
Every rating is the higher of two answers, one for what companies do and one for what they spend to stop the outcome, because the same vote reaches both. See the full method.
Sources
- Majorities of Republicans and Democrats Support Keeping Tax Credits for Clean Energy and EVs, Limits on Offshore Drilling, Program for Public Consultation / Voice of the People, survey March 12-18, 2025
- 2020: A Clear Vision for Paris Compliant Shareholder Engagement, As You Sow, 2020
- SEC Allows Exxon and Chevron to Bar Shareholders' Request to Report on Alignment With Global Climate Goals, As You Sow, 2020
- Big Oil vs climate advocates on US offshore leasing plan: Key to energy security and jobs or coastal economy threat, Offshore Energy, 2025
- US Gulf Lease Sale Draws $279.4 Million in Apparent High Bids, Journal of Petroleum Technology (SPE), 2025-12
What civil society organizations are helping owners on this
Filed resolutions at ExxonMobil asking for reporting on net zero alignment and on the financial effect of declining fossil fuel demand on the company's production plans.
Co-filed the 2020 ExxonMobil resolution asking for reporting on whether and how the company would reduce its carbon footprint in line with net zero by 2050.
Filed the 2020 Chevron resolution asking for reporting on alignment with net zero by 2050.
3 campaigns on record
Adopt a policy to avoid development in ecologically sensitive and biologically rich areas such as the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Result: Board recommended a vote against; vote result not stated in source
ExxonMobil stated it held no active leases, was pursuing no developments and had no exploration plans in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Report how declining fossil fuel demand under the IEA net zero 2050 pathway would affect the company's finances.
Result: 52 percent in favor
Shareholders win majority support for climate proposals at Exxon, Chevron, Grist, 2022-05
Report on whether and how the company intends to reduce its total carbon footprint in alignment with net zero emissions by 2050.
With The Church of England
Result: SEC allowed ExxonMobil and Chevron to omit the proposals for a second consecutive year
Related subjects on other maps
How this rating was made
Every item on every one of our maps is read against one question: how far does this depend on the people who own companies voting their values? We answer it twice, once for what companies do and once for what they spend to stop the outcome, and take whichever answer is higher, since the same vote reaches both. The score carries its reasoning and its sources so that a reader can check it rather than take it.
- Pivotal. Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
- Necessary. Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes, and others must also act.
- Helpful. Owners voting their values help, and others carry most of it.
- Independent. This moves without owners. Other levers carry it.
The advocacy record on this page holds only what a source we opened says happened. Where we searched and found nothing, the page says so rather than leaving a silence. Where a campaign names a filer the source does not name, it says that too. Ratings are ours; the list of subjects is Common Ground of the American People's, and we link to their original.
How we score dependency, in full.