Paper short abstract:

Finding oil has been described by US hydrocarbon financiers and ‘oil men’ alike as “the greatest” pursuit of value. In this paper, I explore how they ethically and financially value energy by drawing on ethnographic field research that I have conducted in Houston, Texas, since late-2018.

Paper long abstract:

Finding oil has been described by US hydrocarbon financiers and ‘oil men’ alike as “the greatest” pursuit of value. As both a future-oriented financial desire and moral ambition, finding oil is revered as the fulcrum on which the industry (and some say the world) turns. The moral value of oil exploration and production (E&P) involves a tangle of entrepreneurial prowess and ‘wildcatter’ settler-frontier notions of ‘making something from nothing’. The financial value it generates, meanwhile, is the source of dynastic family fortunes and corporate wealth that exemplify capitalistic success that aspiring oil men yearn for and financiers hope to claim a piece of. In this paper, I explore how US oil and gas financiers and independent ‘oil men’ ethically and financially value energy. I explore what they judge to be right and good, how they craft imaginaries of the future, and how notions of value and values come to bear on their evaluations. I argue that these two sets of inter-dependent interlocutors are moral agents who apply ethical frameworks to evaluate what energy projects, companies and futures should be materialised. To do this, I draw on ethnographic field research that I have conducted in Houston, Texas, since late-2018. At a time when oil prices are surging and breathing new life into E&P activities as concerns about anthropogenic climate change are greater than ever, the moral evaluations of these interlocutors are as important to understand now as they have ever been.