COTERRA ENERGY INC
CTRA
Energy
2
exclusion reasons
2 themes
This page is part of our public exclusion list — a transparency tool that shows which companies we screen out and why. It is not investment advice, and it is not an accusation. But it is subject to change as our understanding of the facts evolves.
Coterra Energy is an independent natural gas producer whose operational emissions intensity significantly exceeds its sector peers. The company’s 2025 Climate Transition Pathway assessment by the Transition Pathway Initiative (TPI) places it in the lowest performance category, indicating it is not aligned with any benchmarked climate scenario, including the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting warming to well below 2°C. This reflects a systematic failure to implement a credible, managed transition away from high-emission operations.
This poor performance is underscored by a pattern of serious environmental violations directly linked to its core extraction activities. In March 2025, Pennsylvania authorities filed 100 criminal charges against Coterra related to a 49-hour uncontrolled shale gas well incident during fracking operations, which involved significant methane and pollutant releases. This follows a November 2024 settlement where the company paid penalties for federal and state Clean Air Act violations. Further, Coterra pleaded no contest in 2022 for contaminating residential well water in Dimock, Pennsylvania, resulting in a $16.29 million settlement. ViolationTracker documents 13 environmental enforcement actions against the company, totaling over $17 million in penalties.
Collectively, these incidents demonstrate that Coterra’s high emissions profile is coupled with operational failures causing direct community harm. The company’s trajectory shows neither the emissions governance nor the operational discipline required for a credible climate transition.
Coterra Energy Inc. is an independent exploration and production company focused on the upstream extraction of oil and natural gas. Its operations are concentrated in the Permian Basin, the Marcellus Shale, and the Anadarko Basin. In 2025, the company reported producing approximately 610,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day, with oil production increasing by 18.6 million barrels year-over-year. The company’s business model is explicitly centered on the development and production of fossil fuels.
In May 2024, Coterra pleaded no contest to violations of Pennsylvania’s Clean Streams Law related to its operations. The company’s 2026 guidance and capital plans remain focused on hydrocarbon production, with no corporate strategy or public commitment to phase out its core fossil fuel extraction business. While the company cites outperforming an upstream peer group on certain emissions intensity metrics, this relates only to the efficiency of its extraction process and does not address the significant Scope 3 emissions from the combustion of the oil and gas it produces.
Research Sources
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Companies appear on our exclusion list based on our investment judgment — not because they've done anything illegal. This is a difference of values and opinion, not an accusation of wrongdoing. Exclusion does not constitute a recommendation against investing in any company, and absence from the list does not constitute a recommendation to invest.
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