LEILA FADEL, HOST:
There's a term for people who choose to leave the oil and gas business because of its impact on the environment - climate quitters. In London, a group is trying to encourage more quitters. Ilya Marritz reports.
ILYA MARRITZ, BYLINE: If Ian Haslam had to pinpoint the beginning of the end of his career in fossil fuels, it was probably back in 2006. He and some colleagues were looking at maps of the sea west of Greenland. It was often covered in sea ice. They discussed whether the warming climate could make it feasible to drill for oil.
IAN HASLAM: And in fact, I think I remember one of them saying, maybe even in, you know, 10, 20 years, this could be entirely ice-free. And that sort of shocked me a little bit because nobody else in the room seemed to see any sort of irony in this.
MARRITZ: Of course, the planet is warming primarily because we're burning so much oil and other fossil fuels. Haslam had 25 years of industry experience and was working for British Gas. But at that point, he hadn't thought about climate change all that much. He did have questions, though, and so he started reading the scientific research.
HASLAM: So I did that for a year, and I decided it was real (laughter) and it was mostly man-made. And nobody was really sure about the impact, but none of them were particularly good.
MARRITZ: Some years later, when he received an unexpected buyout offer, he took it. At his company's send-off party, there was cake and bubbly, and real talk.
HASLAM: And I tell them I'm leaving because of climate change and because I think what you're doing here is wrong.
MARRITZ: Today he's retired. He volunteers and is a member of a new group called Life After Oil. The point of the group is to find and connect people like Ian Haslam and share their stories with the world. They meet at a pub once a month. Around a dozen, sometimes two dozen people, drink pints and exchange war stories. It's the brainchild of this man, Nick Smith.
NICK SMITH: I'm fourth-generation fossil fuel supplier. My great-grandfather started as a pit office boy in the Lancashire coal mines.
MARRITZ: By the time he came along, the family had a heating oil business in Manchester. Nick Smith ran an oil and gas recruitment agency and a trade publication. Then he shifted both to focus on renewables. He hopes to inspire others who are thinking about climate quitting.
SMITH: You can communicate for a while, A, by establishing a connection with somebody, and secondly, by just telling your story.
MARRITZ: No statistical agency is counting the number of climate quitters, but the overall picture for oil and gas jobs is changing. In the U.S., the industry supports 40% fewer jobs than a decade ago, due in part to advances in technology. The number of people getting petroleum engineering degrees is also down, which is significant because not too long ago, this industry was a prime destination for engineering and geosciences grads, like geologist Jo Alexander, who got her degree in the early 2000s.
JO ALEXANDER: So I did the thing that most people do and went into oil and gas, pay off my student loan, get on the housing ladder.
MARRITZ: She joined BP and had some big adventures, like getting in a boat to map the seabed off of Libya. They were looking for oil, of course. After almost 11 years, Alexander felt really uneasy about that. She quit to become a climate activist. Then in 2020, a new CEO took over at BP. He set an ambitious goal to cut oil and gas production while growing clean energy, and Jo Alexander was invited to meet with him.
ALEXANDER: I found myself being impressed and finding myself saying I want to come back and help.
MARRITZ: She went back to BP. Her excitement was big, but not everyone there shared it.
ALEXANDER: People would say things to me like, we like the way you think, but we're not ready for it yet.
MARRITZ: Then, after just three years, BP backed off its ambitious climate targets and Alexander lost heart.
ALEXANDER: I told myself that I could create change in this organization. And I just don't believe that anymore.
MARRITZ: BP and Shell, the company that later took over British Gas, did not respond to NPR's questions for this story. Now Jo Alexander is writing a book about her experiences. She says it's for climate quitters and anyone who has ever questioned the status quo and pushed for change.
For NPR News, I'm Ilya Marritz in London.
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