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To mitigate the negative impacts of hydrocarbon fuels on climate change complementary decision tools should be considered when selecting or evaluating the performance of a certain production scheme. The exergy analysis can give valuable information on the management of the oil and gas reservoirs. It can also be used to calculate the CO2 footprint of the different oil recovery mechanisms. We contend that the concept of exergy recovery factor can be used as a powerful sustainability indicator in the production of the hydrocarbon fields. The exergy-zero recovery factor is determined by considering exergy balance of full cycle of hydrocarbon-production systems and defines boundaries beyond which production of hydrocarbons is no longer sustainable. An example of the exergy analysis is presented in the paper.