• In his statement to the Group of 20 summit hosted by Saudi Arabia, President Donald Trump panned the Paris climate accord, calling the agreement that President-elect Joe Biden intends to rejoin “unfair and one-sided” and claiming it “was designed to kill the American economy.” In contrast, President Xi Jinping of China, the world’s biggest emitter, said the G-20 should take the lead in combating climate change, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the phenomenon should be fought “in an integrated, comprehensive and holistic way.” (The Associated Press)

• Acting Comptroller of the Currency Brian Brooks, a Trump appointee tasked with regulating Wall Street, proposed a rule that would require banks with more than $100 billion in assets to provide service to any customers that pass their risk assessments, including oil companies and others that the industry has shunned in the past. The proposal, which faces an uncertain path to finalization with the Biden administration set to take office in January, seeks to address what Brooks called “a creeping politicization of the banking industry.” (Bloomberg)

• Officials from U.S. biofuel companies and trade groups have joined representatives from the agriculture, auto and electricity sectors in drafting a letter urging Biden to set a nationwide clean fuel standard, according to five sources familiar with the matter. This push reflects the biofuel industry’s hope that the country retains a role for products such as ethanol in the coming years, despite concern that Biden’s efforts to slash emissions could upend energy markets. (Reuters)

• House Democrats are investigating whether developers of the controversial Pebble gold and copper mine in Alaska played down the size and duration of the project to Congress and the Army Corps of Engineers. The leaders of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure sent a letter Thursday to both the developers and corps officials asking them to turn over all documents, emails and other records related to the project since 2017 by Dec. 10. (The New York Times)

A Push Emerges for the First Native American Interior Secretary
Coral Davenport, The New York Times

A coalition of Democrats, Native Americans and liberal activists is urging President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. to nominate one of Congress’s first Native American women to head the Interior Department, putting an American Indian in control of vast swaths of the continent and the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

A destructive legacy: Trump bids for final hack at environmental protections
Oliver Milman, The Guardian

Donald Trump is using the dying embers of his US presidency to hastily push through a procession of environmental protection rollbacks that critics claim will cement his legacy as an unusually destructive force against the natural world.

G20 members pledge to ensure stable energy supply throughout pandemic
Katie McQue, S&P Global Platts

Leaders of the G20 member states have pledged to ensure “a stable and uninterrupted supply of energy” as the world recovers from the pandemic, according to a declaration published at the close of their summit in Riyadh Nov. 22.

FTI axed by clients in fallout over oil industry work
Billy Nauman et al., Financial Times

MSCI, First Sentier and CDP sever links with public relations consultancy while others review position.

Oil Rises to Twelve-Week High on Covid Vaccination Optimism
Saket Sundria and Alex Longley, Bloomberg

Oil touched its strongest level since early September as signs that Covid-19 vaccinations in the U.S. could be underway within three weeks improved the demand outlook.

Oil versus climate change: The economics of drilling in the Arctic
Andrea Miller, CNBC

The Arctic is not a barren, frozen wasteland. It’s home to some of the most unique ecosystems in the world. More than this: it’s home to people. Those people are at the center of the controversy over drilling for oil in the Arctic.

Climate Warnings on Gas Pumps Will Soon Appear in the First U.S. City
Dharna Noor, Earther

Cambridge, Massachusetts is placing cigarette-style cautionary labels onto gas station pumps, per an ordinance the city passed in January. Officials hope the move will help consumers better understand the risks associated with the continued use of fossil-based fuels like diesel and gasoline.

Biden faces uphill battle to ‘permanently’ protect Alaska wildlife refuge
Rachel Frazin, The Hill

President-elect Joe Biden faces several obstacles to fulfilling his pledge to work toward “permanently protecting” the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, but he’ll also have a few executive tools at his disposal that could thwart drilling across large parts of the Alaskan wilderness.

Why The Oil Industry Doesn’t Fear Biden
Camila Domonoske, NPR News

U.S. oil and gas companies will soon be facing a climate-conscious president who has vowed to transition away from the oil industry. So you might expect a sense of existential dread in the oil world about President-elect Joe Biden. Instead, there’s a surprising amount of optimism.

Propane supplies feel heat as Covid drives dining outdoors
Gregory Meyer, Financial Times

Retail customers replenishing gas tanks at fevered pace causes shortages in stores.

Abu Dhabi boosts oil reserves with 22bn-barrel find
Simeon Kerr, Financial Times

The Gulf producer pledges $122bn in capex for the state oil group over the next 5 years.

Ohio PUC Chairman Samuel Randazzo abruptly resigns four days after FBI searched his home
John Funk, Utility Dive

Samuel Randazzo, the former chairman of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio, resigned Friday morning, four days after the FBI conducted an early morning search of his Columbus home and less than a day after FirstEnergy revealed in a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing that it paid $4 million in early 2019 to end a six-year contract with a consulting company believed to be linked to Randazzo.

Green Is Good for Power Traders Chasing $430 Billion Market
Lars Paulsson et al., Bloomberg

The itch is back for Paul Mead. After almost a decade investing in vineyards and startups in his native New Zealand, the former Barclays Plc and Enron Corp. trader wants to return to the power market.

Billionaire Miner Forrest Aims to Be a Global Clean Energy Giant
James Thornhill et al., Bloomberg

Billionaire Andrew Forrest broke into the ranks of the world’s top iron ore exporters, now he’s targeting an entry into renewables in as soon as two years under an ambitious plan to produce more energy than giants like Chevron Corp.

Tesla Shatters Records in Climb to Nasdaq’s Top Performing Spot
Esha Dey, Bloomberg

Tesla Inc. is wrapping up its biggest week in three months as news that Elon Musk’s electric-vehicle maker will enter the S&P 500 Index next month sparked a global buying frenzy throughout the electric vehicle sector.

Why Tesla’s market cap is soaring far past GM’s
Ben Geman, Axios

Tesla is soaring past General Motors in market capitalization — even as electric vehicles remain still a tiny slice of vehicle sales and FM’s overall sales far outstrip Tesla’s.

Why are nuclear plants so expensive? Safety’s only part of the story
John Timmer, Ars Technica

Should any discussion of nuclear power go on for long enough, it becomes inevitable that someone will rant that the only reason it has become unaffordable is a proliferation of safety regulations. The argument is rarely (if ever) fleshed out—no specific regulation is ever identified as problematic, and there seems to be no consideration given to the fact that we might have learned something at, say, Fukushima that might merit addressing through regulations.

Environmental Groups Celebrate Plan To Retire 5 Of Colorado’s Largest Coal-Fired Power Plants By 2028
Logan Smith, CBS Denver

Colorado’s Air Quality Control Commission gave preliminary approval Friday to plan to accelerate the retirement of the five of Colorado’s largest coal-burning power plants by the end of 2028. Coal industry representatives, meanwhile, questioned the civilian commission’s ability to force early retirement of the units, most of which were already voluntarily slated to cease operations by the utilities who own them.

Satellites Are Slowly Getting Better at Measuring Sea-Level Rise
Elizabeth Elkin, Bloomberg

We need data over time to protect communities along the coast and better understand global warming.

Wasserman Schultz pitches climate plan in race to chair Appropriations
Rebecca Beitsch, The Hill

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) told colleagues she’d use the power of the House Appropriations Committee to advance legislation on climate if she’s handed the gavel. 

Climate Change Is Making Winter Ice More Dangerous
Veronica Penney, The New York Times

A new study has found that cold-weather drownings are increasing sharply in warmer parts of the Northern Hemisphere.

Johnson, Seen as a Trump Ally, Signals Alignment With Biden
Mark Landler, The New York Times

The prime minister wants to show that Britain remains a vital ally. On climate change and military spending, he is promising major steps that will be welcomed by the president-elect.

Microsoft’s next phase of climate lobbying
Ben Geman, Axios

Microsoft has brought on the government affairs firm Lot Sixteen to lobby on sustainability and climate change, a newly public filing shows.

The carbon footprint of a traditional Thanksgiving meal
Amanda Shendruk, Quartz

This is tough to swallow. A traditional Thanksgiving dinner for an eight-person family—the turkey, the stuffing, the hours of oven time—is as harmful to the planet as a three-hour car trip.

Natural disasters are increasing. The world’s poorest are left to fend for themselves.
Jariel Arvin, Vox

More than 100 disasters — many of which were climate- and weather-related — have affected more than 50 million people around the world since March, when the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic. And though the money needed to protect against these disasters in the countries at risk exists, it’s not getting to those who need it most.

Middle East Deals Should Include Nuclear Energy Collaboration
Jacob Nagel and Mark Dubowitz, Newsweek

Civilian nuclear energy collaboration is not yet on the table, and never was before, but it is an area ripe for progress.

Crude Oil Markets: Effects of the Repeal of the Crude Oil Export Ban
U.S. Government Accountability Office

With U.S. crude oil production nearly doubling from 2009 to 2015, Congress repealed the crude oil export ban in December 2015—allowing the free export of U.S. crude oil worldwide.