As wildfires rage across Europe, T&E calls for a permanent tax on the windfall profits being made off the back of European drivers
Just eight oil companies[1] have made €7.5 billion in excess profits[2] in Europe in the first half of 2026, new T&E analysis shows. With oil prices shooting back up, T&E calls on the EU to tax excess profits on a permanent basis and use the revenues to reduce drivers’ exposure to volatile fossil fuels.
Six of the eight - BP, Shell, Eni, Orlen, Repsol and OMV - more than doubled their EU profits in the second quarter of this year compared to the same time last year off the back of volatility in the Middle East, while TotalEnergies and Moeve also made healthy profits. Because oil companies can shift profit across jurisdictions, T&E’s analysis ignores where profit is booked but instead uses companies' country-by-country reporting of revenues to allocate group-level profit to the EU27. Excess profits were highest in Poland, followed by Spain, Germany and France. As these excess profits stem from revenues earned within the EU27, they could be captured by a permanent windfall tax, if designed correctly, says T&E. (....)