“We don’t plan to lose money,” the Shell analyst told me. When I met him, he was a young man, still completing his transition from geoscientist to bean counter. We talked over drinks as he explained how he ended up working at the multinational oil conglomerate—Shell acquired the small firm where he’d been a researcher—and how he hoped that switching to the energy industry’s finance side would provide job security as the oil and gas sector contracted. His role involved analyzing what kind of return Shell could expect from new wells if and when the company is compelled to relinquish them by climate restrictions. Of course, the wells would not then shut down. Rather, the analyst explained, they’d be sold to shadier operators who would continue to pump the wells at lower costs by evading safety and environmental regulations. The firm is incapable of aspiring to abandon its assets; as the analyst said, “We don’t plan to lose money.”