Welcome back. The COP26 climate conference seems like a long time ago. When policy makers agreed—with many a qualification—to accelerate the decline of fossil fuels, they didn't promise a smooth energy transition, but they probably didn't expect it to get quite this complicated, quite this quickly. 

The price of oil rose above $100 a barrel for the first time since 2014 as Russia's invasion of Ukraine threatened Europe's gas supplies🔒 and added fuel🔒 to the global inflation surge. In Europe, which depends on Russian natural gas, how people view the recent price shock often reflects their existing view of the energy transition. "Accelerating the build-out of the new clean energy system is the only viable long-term solution to the double crisis facing Europe in terms of both energy security and the climate emergency," wrote pro-renewables research group RMI. 

But policy makers worrying about keeping the lights on will find it tough to focus on that long-term vision, and their actions may incentivize investments in fossil-fuel infrastructure that will exist for decades. Energy researcher Wood Mackenzie wrote this month that European efforts to quit Russian gas would send a bullish signal to developers in the U.S. and elsewhere.

Energy-security concerns already contributed to the European Union's controversial endorsement🔒 of some natural gas and nuclear power as green investments. More tough political decisions await. In the U.K., for example, an argument is brewing over whether new offshore oil-and-gas licenses would align with the country's climate goals.  

This week: SBTi's new CEO aims to improve governance; HSBC's climate targets; a malodorous gold rush. 

SBTi to separate standard-setting from target validation. The new chief executive of the Science Based Targets initiative, a fast-growing standard-setter for corporate climate action, said that it is considering ways of allaying concerns over its governance. 

Luiz Amaral, who was named on Wednesday as SBTi’s first chief executive, said one of his priorities is to strengthen the organization’s governance structure. “There are possibilities for us to consider how to separate that,” Mr. Amaral said, referring to the target-validation work.

HSBC targets omit capital markets. HSBC, one of the largest lenders to the oil and gas sector, set out targets to reduce its exposure to the sector. The plan would see emissions from oil-and-gas companies that HSBC lends to falling by 34% by 2030 from 2019 levels. For the power and utility companies it lends to, HSBC said it would reduce financed emissions by 75% relative to the companies’ power consumption. 

But the bank’s targets excluded fossil-fuel financing from capital-markets activities such as helping companies issue stocks and bonds. That exclusion “should raise questions about the credibility of its strategy,” said Jeanne Martin, senior campaign manager at ShareAction, a nonprofit group that has worked on an investor effort pushing HSBC for tougher climate targets. HSBC said industry standards for capital-markets emissions are still being worked out. 

Green investors buy dirty coal. The pressure on conventional energy companies' shares is creating an opportunity for environmentally focused investors to buy them with an eye on speeding up their decarbonization. 

Canada's Brookfield Asset Management and tech billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes, an outspoken advocate for clean energy, made a $3.5 billion offer for Australia's biggest emitter, AGL Energy. The bid was rejected, but investors should pay attention to how the situation unfolds, Jacky Wong writes for Heard on the Street.🔒 

The consortium said it would spend around $14.4 billion to shut down AGL’s coal-fired plants ahead of schedule and replace them with clean energy and storage—a bet that replacing polluting assets with cleaner alternatives isn’t just a greener choice, but a profitable one, especially if shutting down coal plants is inevitable and building out renewables and storage are getting cheaper. 

White House seeks to address logistics problems. Transportation department officials said the nation’s reliance on a handful of ports is a risk, and alternative routes will become more important as severe weather events caused by climate change become more frequent.🔒

The warning came as the Biden administration outlined measures to strengthen freight transportation and infrastructure following almost two years of supply-chain turmoil. 

Take Lake Charles in southwest Louisiana, for example. In the past two years the city has been hit by🔒 two hurricanes, an ice storm and a severe flood. The region's chief industries—petrochemical plants and liquefied natural gas operations—recovered quickly. But small and midsize businesses continue to struggle, partly due to fears of more severe weather.

Meanwhile, new research from the United Nations predicted an increase of up to 57% in the number of wildfires by the end of the century.🔒 

Auditors say it will take years to develop reliable checks on companies' sustainability claims. (Reuters) 

German fund manager Allianz Global Investors will vote against European companies that don't link pay to environmental, social and governance performance. (Financial Times)

The world is producing twice as much plastic waste as two decades ago and only 9% is recycled, new research found. (OECD)

Los Angeles startup ChargerHelp is training a diverse workforce to repair electric-vehicle charging stations. (Canary)

Men are more skeptical about ESG investing than women, a survey found. (Bloomberg)

Chile plans to issue a sustainability-linked bond, which would come with emissions and renewable-energy targets attached. It would be the first country to do so. (Responsible Investor)

An advert for Innocent, a Coca-Cola-owned smoothie brand, was banned in the U.K. for exaggerating the product's environmental benefits. (Independent) 

Small and midsize enterprises largely want to reduce their environmental footprint but lack the knowhow, a survey found. (Edie) 

Methane emissions from oil, gas and coal production are significantly higher than world governments claim, the International Energy Agency said. (Energy Voice) 

A deep dive into the politics of Eskom, South Africa's creaking, coal-guzzling national power company, and the energy transition. (Phenomenal World)