Is the Oil Industry Becoming “Less Aloof?”
I’ve long believed that Royal Dutch Shell is the least obnoxious of the big oil companies (though I may be wrong).
Here, Ben van Beurden, Shell’s CEO explains why he thinks the oil industry needs to take a more active role in the conversation about climate change and become “less aloof.” He suggests Big Oil’s acknowledging that climate change isn’t a hoax, supporting legislation that would put a price on carbon (via a “well-executed” system), and admitting that renewables are “an indispensable part of the future energy mix.”
He goes on to say, “But no, provoking a sudden death of fossil fuels isn’t a plausible plan.” He continues: “The issue is how to balance one moral obligation, energy access for all, against the other: fighting climate change…. We still need fossil fuels for a lower carbon, higher energy future…(the) global energy demand indicates that fossil fuels won’t disappear overnight.
To start with the obvious, no one believes that fossil fuels should disappear overnight; I’m willing to bet Mr. van Beurden knows that.
Then let’s talk about his use of the word “aloof,” meaning detached, uninterested, cool, uninvolved. To suggest that the oil companies have been “aloof” is like saying, “The U.S. government was aloof in its treatment of native Americans.” If you want a word/phrase that more honestly describes the oil industry’s approach to climate change, renewable energy, environmental ruin, etc., let’s try “actively, but usually covertly hostile.”
There are hundreds of examples I could cite, but here’s one that I remember quite well because I happen to live in California: Texas-based oil giants Valerio and Tesoro, also supported by Occidental Petroleum and Koch Industries, and their big-bucks attempt to pass “Proposition 23” in 2010. This would have nullified all progress this state has made in its position as a vanguard for environmental protection and climate change mitigation in particular, by undoing California’s Global Warming Solutions Act (Assembly Bill 32), which:
…stands as a landmark piece of bipartisan clean energy legislation and is a model for federal action. A.B. 32 has catalyzed billions of dollars in private sector investment in clean energy in the state, creating jobs, businesses, and new technologies that are leading the nation toward a cleaner energy future.
At least Shell is starting the conversation (though it should have begun 45 years ago).
It used to be that we would have to go to great literature or classic political speeches to find powerful examples of Rhetoric, language intended to convince. But I truly have to give this one to the oil companies. They are supreme masters of the phrase.
Unfortunately such a skill can also easily lead to self deception. They believe their Rhetoric. So when the petrochemical companies issue statements that sound so very sincere they probably are in as much as they “believe” what they are saying, “sadly fossil fuels are the only way for now.” They can’t afford to think that there are present alternatives.
But this is also the thinking pattern of a willful teenager who wants to stay out with their friends past a curfew. They can’t admit to fault and they can’t see another way…until threatened. For oil companies also a deadline is also approaching that threatens profits, investor interest and even the valuation of oil company assets in the ground.
So how sincere are oil company pronouncements? They are as real as the mounting opinion against them and their products.
I believe the oil industry (with the blatant exception of the country of Norway) is largely populated (mainly in its management) by what is termed “subclinical sociopaths”. They know that what they are doing is wrong as it is bad for the planet but are unwilling to work for legitimate alternatives or even set aside the profits from their unsustainable enterprise to mitigate the damage or support the alternatives.
I am not a psychologist but I am a scientist that believes in climate change. So, just sayin’.
That’s an interesting viewpoint. Probably you are right. Sociopaths are not exactly unknown in big business.
The term “legitimate alternatives” suggests that what the oil companies do is illegal. Sadly that much of it is within the law is part of the problem. The fact that oil companies through political contributions and resulting influence dictate the law only begins to suggest the strangely warped world around us.
I believe we will always need oil. The reason I hate the Oil Industry is because of their constant fight against renewable energy using the United States Government to do it. We (the tax payer)have subsidized the oil industry for 40 years now in the trillions. Yet these hypicrits critisize even the smallest subsidy for renewables and tout the free market should dictate everything, as long as Big Oil continues to receive their government handouts, but not the competition. We all know why we spend trillions of American Tax payer dollars in defense spending in the Mid East. The war mongering neo-cons continue to find any excuse to send our Soldiers over their to die except for the truth. BIG OIL.
Most of the Lawmakers are serving two masters and it is so hard for them to take decisions that will demolish their own bread.
The list of oil rich nations across the globe reads like a ‘Who’s Who’ of historical American military ‘intervention’ – “aloof” would not be the word I’d choose.
Way back in the 1920’s, after the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the USA, Britain and France carved the Middle East into manageable bits, deliberately drawing each new border to divide local cultures and encapsulate a mix of rival ethnic elements.
From the 1930’s through the 1960’s, US oil and automobile companies spent great sums of money lobbying state and federal governments to fund a national transportation system based on the exclusive use of their products.
Back before CU v FEC, from beginning of the 2000 election cycle to 2006 alone, the major oil corporations supplied $52 million in campaign contributions. Of this stack of dollar bills, which would reach three-and-a-half miles high, 80% was given to Republican campaigns.
Following the widely criticized “Energy Task Force” strategy meetings that Mr. Cheney held with oil company executives, the “public servants” in the Bush Administration refused to release the content of those discussions, citing “executive privilege.”
These oil corporations pocketed an unprecedented 79% upsurge in Mr. Bush’s terms of office. Yet the 2005 Bush “Energy Plan” gave over $6 billion in “corporate welfare” to these wealthy major oil companies, allegedly to help them increase their oil refining capacity.
Of course, Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney have long oil industry histories. Mr. Bush’s oil ties are well documented – as are his family’s decades-long ties to the Saudi royals. Enron’s Ken Lay was consistently a top Bush campaign contributor. Mr. Cheney still receives “deferred compensation” from the oil services company he headed, a subsidiary of which, Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR), received vast un-bid contracts for base construction and supply in Iraq.
Why did the younger Mr. Bush choose to invade Iraq against his father’s best (and quite public) advice? The answer is common knowledge, and has been freely admitted by members of his “administration” time and time again – oil, pure and simple. Saddam Hussein had committed the ultimate sin of shifting the base price of his nation’s vast oil reserves from the US Dollar to the Euro, and that could simply not be tolerated.
Our government’s purpose in the Middle East has never been the self-determination of its people. Democratic republics representative of the people there would throw all the western oil industries out on their slick and slippery asses. To convince one’s self otherwise requires either stunning naiveté or a gougingly willful blindness.
Considering what Royal Dutch did in the delta area of Nigeria, I’m not so sure that its ethical standards are what they should be.
Thank everyone for some very Thoughtful Posts – and the sentiments resonate with my over 38 years of energy and & environmental life’s work Journey.
I too once held Shell a notch above most of the majors as being the more decent one. BP also for a time was pursuing a more balanced portfolio of energy sources. over look the Gulf blow out, They ditched Beyond petroleum motto too!
The irony of all this and it validates further some of the other Posts in this discussion is the following:
Subsidies that was well said how they play the free market game when in reality the large capital intensive markets are not FREE and Never have been. It is politically rigged. However the oil industry has been getting subsidies since the turn of the century over 100 years. Nuclear is well over 1 trillion and not totally counted either.
The global subsidy’s are enormous the last time I looked and one could allocate 40 or 50 % of the US defense budget to the ongoing support of the oil industry in all the damaged countries mentioned. Silly Tea Baggers protesting taxes , the military spending they cheer for is subsidizing cultures they Rail against but Cognitive Dissonance is a real domestic condition.
The Nigerian sins are well known and the growth of terrorist groups or those natives who are tired of being exploited and remaining dirt poor, having their water polluted, etc., is just the tip of the iceberg. Shell is guilty of arming private armies that brutalize the locals. It is both overt and Covert and not just them either.
The Tale of the Tale :
Paradoxial Irony is that both Shell and BP had complete R & D control and serious investment in Solar and also Wind. They actually were in the manufacturing business in the US . They saw the future they developed alternatives and they had some good early stage solar pv and wind. systems. Their Boards divested them of the manufacturing and resale sector. The need to stick to their CORE business was noted??? Though both still operate large wind farms. Both are one of the insider trading reasons why fossil fuel dependent state of Texas has the lead in Wind in the US! They and other Oil co’s had large tracts of under performing leased lands. so because they were oil co they were given the State government assistance, and regulatory treatment that resulted in large build out of wind.. That so called Invisible Hand that rules the market place ! at work overtime.
Texas likes to brag about the wind- well it was Not Gravitas or Environmental Vision it was how do we turn under performing leased lands into productive ones that could co exist with future oil development when the market conditions were favorable once again.
A Inconvenient Truth of the Wind in Texas – As of today with thousands of more megawatts of wind in various development stages the Gas industry 1st cousins to OIL are lobbying the State to slow it down to stop further erosion of revenues! So some money is changing hands once again.
Nothing to do w good public resource policy just where the money flows from and who gets it !
Shell published a report looking into the World future of Energy it is called the LENS or LENSE. I suggest you read it with a Discerning mind and IF one is not Tethered to the flow of the money, they will conclude easily after reading it that the OIL company’s and this applys to all of them.
1. They have already entered a stage in the economic cycle where the Laws of Diminishing Returns and Negative returns is their Future, it.is shaping their business. They can see the writing in the higher and higher costs of extraction and reduced recovery of reserves , rapid depletion rates and severe environmental consequences of mining for money game. .
So in the LENS they call them selves the Mountains and the people who advocate for Renewable s are the Oceans They say yes by 2050 we the oil company’s will be focus-sing most of our work on Renewable s and the environmental impact in respect to Global warming will only be slightly worse than if the OCEANS win the debate and we go all out renewable. now! Greed induced Rationalizations. So they rationalize sociopaths actions , so the earlier person was right on when they labeled them suffering from that affliction.
They claim economic ruin for the World if the Oceans ( renewable s) side rushes too soon.
What they don’t like is that those of us who promoting sustainable and alternative energy solutions are reducing their revenue streams and reducing the need for excessive oil. Yes we need oil for finished goods but electrical and fuel production can be reduced dramatically and the damages to Earth limited. Water supply too.
Gasoline usage in America peaked in 2007 and has gone down every year since and the fleets are getting more efficient etc. Total oil in US was 22 million a day in 2007 now it is around 16 million and the economy has not collapesed !!!
2. The report ends with a 2100 forecast of solar providing the greatest level of energy , followed by wind and other renewable sources. Oil is way down to the teens or less I forget exactly coal is miniscule. cheers !
So the SHELL forecast states what really informed people already know we can go all out w renewable s and be fine and transform things. We reduce oil usage for the fuel usage and power production then finished products etc. Then grow substitutes like HEMP !
Shell colors and trys to Spin the reader, cloud the issue. but the real reason for the delay to 2050 for greater push to switch to RE is so They and The Others can extract all the resources they have speculated on and recovered all the investment and pay their willing enablers the banksters off too.Politicians included! So it is all Collusion and people who think that this is an emotional position don’t know and are Clue Less to the real details or issues to any degree of accuracy..
3, Shell and Statoil ( Norway) and Total ( France ) announced last Fall 2014 that future investments in Tar sand extractions are being put on Hold! That Law of diminishing or Negative Returns folks at work in the Board rooms. All are Keystone players so that Looms more shadows over that Red Herring project.
let the Saudis pump all they can and so we save our water over here .
There is a better Pathway for the world but as others stated it is engrained into most of the political systems to continue the tread Mill and Doublespeak , as we tumble and stumble to a harsher future for the World.
Trust this is in line with the Flow of thoguhts expressed earlier. Best to all , later and take care thank you.
To speak directly to the question of Aloof ness by big Oil, No theeeeey are not aloof at all. Just trapped in their Web of vested investments and need to make more money and keep the gig going to the bitter end. Aloof no,
Institutionalized greed and old habits YES.