Big Oil are not Climate Change Denialists

Seems like most threads discussing climate change inevitably have someone talk about how evil Big Oil secretly funds all the Climate Change denialism going on. Therefore, I decided to look it up myself. Here’s what I’ve found out, essentially any company you would possibly thing of as Big Oil seems to openly agree the climate change as a result of human activities is real and that efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions are important.

Don’t believe me? Well, here’s the proof.

Here’s what the major integrated oil companies have to say.

ExxonMobil
Website

[QUOTE=Exxon]
Effective strategies must include putting policies in place that start the world on a path to reduce emissions while recognizing that addressing GHG emissions is one among other important world priorities, such as economic development, poverty eradication and public health.
[/QUOTE]

BP
Website

[QUOTE=BP]
warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and is in large part due to an increase in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from human activities
[/QUOTE]

Royal Dutch Shell
Website

[QUOTE=Shell]
CO2 emissions must be reduced to avoid serious climate change
[/QUOTE]

Chevron
Website

[QUOTE=Chevron]
The use of fossil fuels to meet the world’s energy needs is a contributor to an increase in greenhouse gases (GHGs)—mainly carbon dioxide (CO2 )—in the Earth’s atmosphere.
[/QUOTE]

Total
Website

[QUOTE=Total]
The consensus in the scientific community, especially the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is that greenhouse gas emissions have an impact on climate and that an international effort is necessary to keep the resultant temperature increase to 2°C to 2100.
[/QUOTE]

Eni
Website

[QUOTE=Eni]
Eni has defined a Carbon Management Strategy to reduce climate changing emissions in compliance with the principles set forth in international conventions, including the principles of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol.
[/QUOTE]

Repsol, SA
Website

[QUOTE=Repsol]
Repsol has been recognised for its policy on transparency and the adoption of best measures in the fight against climate change.
[/Quote]

Here’s what the large independent oil and gas companies have to say.

ConocoPhillips
Website

[QUOTE=Conoco]
We recognize that human activity, including the burning of fossil fuels, is contributing to increased concentrations of greenhouse gas (GHG) in the atmosphere that can lead to adverse changes in global climate.
[/QUOTE]

Occidental Petroleum Corp
Website

[QUOTE=Oxy]
Oxy continues to pursue measures to manage and control GHG emissions
[/QUOTE]

EOG Resources, Inc.
Website

[QUOTE=EOG]
EOG supports efforts to understand and address the contribution of human activities to global climate change through the application of sound scientific research and analysis. In addition, the company believes that the reduction of air emissions throughout its operations is both in the best interests of the environment and a prudent business practice. A safety and environmental update that includes climate change issues is presented to the EOG Board of Directors annually.
[/QUOTE]

Anadarko Petroleum Corp.
Website

[QUOTE=Anadarko]
At Anadarko, we recognize the need to reduce GHG emissions, particularly CO2 and methane (CH4), which have emerged as concerns in the global community.
[/QUOTE]

Apache Corp.
Website

[QUOTE=Apache]
At Apache, managing and reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions has become an important part of our operations.
[/QUOTE]

Devon Energy Corp.
Website

[QUOTE=Devon]
Devon has also established a GHG Issues Team to monitor greenhouse gas emission and global-warming issues. Representatives of Devon’s Environmental, Health, and Safety Department serve on the team and provide advice to senior management and the Board of Directors on global climate change issues. The team also provides updates on emission reduction efforts and initiatives that could potentially affect our business.
[/QUOTE]

Hess Corp.
Website

[QUOTE=Hess]
We recognize that climate change is a global environmental concern with potentially significant consequences for society, including the energy industry.
[/QUOTE]

Here’s what the large state owned national oil companies have to say.

Saudi Aramco
Website

[QUOTE=Aramco]
Saudi Aramco shares the world’s concern that climate change is a long-term challenge
[/QUOTE]

Gazprom
Website

[QUOTE=Gazprom]
Protecting the environment and countering the adverse global climate change has become a business our company is conducting.
[/QUOTE]

Pemex
Website

[QUOTE=Pemex]
Climate change: Pemex is carrying out direct mitigation actions (reduced gas flaring, more energy efficiency and cogeneration) with which it managed to cut CO2 emissions
[/QUOTE]

Kuwait Petroleum Corp.
[Website](file:///C:/Users/dbutler/Downloads/KPCHSESuitabilityReport2011%20(1).pdf)

[QUOTE=KPC]
We will maintain a strong commitment towards reducing our greenhouse gas emissions and overall environmental footprint.
[/QUOTE]

Petrobras
Website

[QUOTE=Petrobras]
Several studies indicate that increased greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated to the energy and transport sectors is a consequence of the surging consumption of energy, especially coming from fossil fuels. Therefore, we are committed to understand the impact our activity has on climatic conditions and to deploying measures to mitigate them.
[/QUOTE]

Qatar Petroleum
Website

[QUOTE=QPC]
Ratification of the UNFCCC agreement in 1996 and Kyoto Protocol in 2006 obligating Qatar to take up voluntary actions to minimize Climate Change Impacts.
[/QUOTE]

Lukoil
Website

[QUOTE=Lukoil]
Just like the entire global community, we are deeply concerned about the man-caused environmental impact and climate change.
[/QUOTE]

Statoil
Website

[QUOTE=Statoil]
Statoil acknowledges the scientific consensus on human-induced climate change, and supports the efforts of the UN and its member states to agree on and implement necessary climate measures to reach the required global ambition level to prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.
[/QUOTE]

Have I shown every oil company in existence? No, I basically made a list and systematically went through it until I was convinced. Who else that you consider Big Oil do you want to see?

So, I guess I’d like it to be considered settled that Big Oil agrees that climate change is real. Any disagreements with that?

You’re entirely correct on the main point. Certain people in this debate are not a big fan of facts, however. What they want is a convenient villain.

I suppose Philip Morris has probably made statements on how much they care for their patrons’ health, too.

What’s your point? Padding your post count with a meaningless one-liner?

Talk is cheap, what I want to know is what they do with their money.

His point is that talk is cheap. Assuming* that each and every statement was made, it’s as useful as your average politician.

What are they doing beyond sound bites? Are they actively investing in R&D on non-carbon-emitting technologies? Carbon sequestering technologies? Diversifying and working with politicians to get into nuclear back-bone alternatives? Diversifying and getting into (and staying into after the subsidies fall off) wind or solar instantaneous generation alternatives? Battery R&D?

What is it that they are doing that correlates with these words?
*Assumption because I didn’t bother researching the statements for context.

Well, I think they mostly use their money to drill oil and gas wells. Is that in question by anyone on Earth?

Lay off on the insults. There was nothing meaningless about a comparison: a tobacco company that has invested a limited amount of high-profile public service announcements pointing out the problems with tobacco while simultaneously continuing to develop new markets for cigarettes was compared to a number of petroleum companies that have stuck small feel-good PR messages on their websites while some number of them may or may not have actually funded the various pseudo-scientific research efforts into disproving climate change–just as the tobacco companies spent years funding “science” that denied that cigarettes were a health risk.

If you have information that proves that petroleum companies are not spending money to support the “science” denying climate change, you may provide it. Alternatively, you may dig up earlier citations by those who have made disparaging remarks about the oil companies and provide evidence that their claims are in error.

Your response was not particularly persuasive.

You are also engaged in nothing more than well poisoning. There is probably enough overstating or misrepresentation of facts to go around, but pretending that that issue is one specific to one side of the discussion is silly and unworthy of being proposed this early in the discussion.

So they say that what they are doing is bad, but they continue doing so.

There’s a word for that. “Hypocrisy.”

That would be me. Damn, I hate facts! :smiley:

Actually, no. Here are some facts.

Thanks to Longhorn Dave for all the work you put in to getting the cites. The facts, however, are that the oil companies are just reacting to the sea change in public perception, and doing it in the most self-interested subtle way possible. Is there any doubt that Exxon Mobil has been among the most egregious of the spreaders of disinformation and FUD on climate change? This letter from Senators Snowe and Rockefeller telling them to cut the crap and that they were an embarrassment to the nation pretty much says it all. There was a similar injunction from the British Royal Society telling them to stop contradicting solid science.

Having been embarrassed into cutting back on their most egregious claims, they’re now doing two things. One, they’re hedging the question with statements like the one you quote, “…putting policies in place that start the world on a path to reduce emissions while recognizing that addressing GHG emissions is one among other important world priorities, such as economic development, poverty eradication and public health.” IOW, “this is NOT a big problem, folks, let’s understand that there are much more important priorities, such as buying more of our oil!” And secondly – and don’t for a second overlook this – a lot of their funding has gone underground – but it’s still there. One of the most effective PR techniques in modern times is to develop a PR image that says “hey, we’re not the problem, we’re part of the solution!” no matter what bullshit that may actually be in fact, while continuing behind the scenes to fund the self-serving FUD.

I don’t think so. The general consensus opinion of your average Straightdope Democrat seems to me to be that action on climate change is being withheld due to some evil misinformation campaign funded by Big Oil to deceive the public. If Big Oil openly agrees that Climate Change is real and that human caused releases of greenhouse gasses is the primary cause then this seems to blow a hole in that specific talking point.

As you might expect, actions vary. Some of these companies are simply complying with existing regulations, some are going steps beyond that, and some are actively seeking to help shape future regulations.

Nothing is stopping them from hypocritically pretending to support “green” changes while actively funding both anti-science “research” and elections that will put more people into government who will oppose actual green policies–pointing back to the quietly funded anti-science to support their legislation.

Have you any evidence that this is not the case? Demonstrations of support for green candidates over climate change deniers? Evidence that they are not finsncing the anti-science? Anything that provides evidence that they are not simply spinning PR in contradiction to their actual behavior?

I’m failing to see the hypocrisy. Their is a need for our product, no immediate substitute, it is expected to exist for a long time, and we’re going to fill it. However, based upon science, a byproduct of our product is a bad thing in the long-term, so regulations should exist in how it is procured and in what quantities. Seems reasonable to me.

I’m pretty sure that they are all “actively seeking to help shape future regulations.” Can you show any regulation that they have supported that actually promotes a cleaner environment?

I completely disagree. It seems incredibly meaningless to compare one product that is purely recreational in purpose to another that fills a basic human need. Such a basic need that nearly every single person alive pushing for climate change regulations still willingly uses oil and gas on an each and every day basis.

Furthermore, that specific response doesn’t even address the specific point of the topic which is that Big Oil does not deny climate change. At best, the response was basically another way of saying, “so what.”

It’s not persuasive evidence that Exxon is not a climate change denialist to show a quote from them saying that climate change is real and man-made?

I’m sure they’re not all actively seeking. I’m 100% sure some of them don’t spend one penny on lobbying of any type.

To your question, how about this from link 1.

[QUOTE=Exxon]
It is rare that a business lends its support to new taxes. But in this case, given the risk-management challenges we face and the policy alternatives under consideration, it is our judgment that a carbon tax is a preferred course of public policy action versus cap and trade approaches.
[/QUOTE]

Most of the funding for the climate denialism industry has unknown origins.

But ExxonMobil was a big funder of denialism until just a couple years ago. I thought that was pretty well known.

I doubt it’s just big oil though. Big coal, big gas, petrochemicals, anyone who would have to retrofit or build new factories to meet new regulations, basically anyone with a stake in greenhouse gas emission legislation should toss a couple million to a denialism think tank. It would be irresponsible of them not to.

“Our”? What are your affiliations, sir?

Additionally, there is a substitute: Nuclear. There might be some crazy future substitute, assuming we don’t melt off the earth’s crust trying to make it work: Fusion.

But nuclear failing was left alone by oil companies instead of them advancing it (both the technology and the safety to avoid some of the crazier bureaucracy that currently exists in regards to it) quicker in the last 50+ years and having themselves become “energy” companies instead of oil companies. Additionally, the few that have ventured into Wind and Solar have abandoned those technologies as soon as the subsidies they purchase them under ended.

If they “believe” than they, as members of the human race, would be seeking a new platform to subsist upon. They aren’t even doing the seeking. Should Exxon or one of it’s brothers stumble across some form of energy or energy collection that is as cheap or cheaper than oil, they would become not only rich beyond their shareholders’ dreams, but also be the champion of whatever country’s green movement they belong to.

If they show up, use facts to battle them. If they refuse to accept facts, burn them each time they post in facts that counter them

Pretty much. Just like it’s not convincing to me that some politicians says they hate drugs and then you find out that they have been selling drugs to school children for 50+ years and actively works to sabotage drug laws.

Which would you believe? His statements or his actions? Because there is an old axiom that is on point, here: “Action speak louder than words.”

Much like what you linked from exxon:

“We want taxes so that the consumers feel the pain and we continue to give profits to our shareholders unabated.”

Note that they haven’t advocated for anything that would make them clean up after themselves or their products? I go back to my word of the day: “Hypocrisy.”

What do you honestly expect? Do you expect them to be on the forefront of the science of climate change? They’re at the forefront of the science on finding and producing oil and gas. That’s their reason for existence. Are they reacting to a sea change in public perception? Possibly. They’re more probably reacting to the indisputable mountain of evidence that is piling up.

The basic takeaway that I get is that when the science was less clear (on a multitude of fronts) we know they contributed relatively very small dollars to groups that were studying the alternative, likely with the goal of finding out that the problem is not as real or severe as it has turned out to be.

Why don’t you actually read some of the sites that I put out. Their statements are not as “hedging” or downplaying as you make them out to be.

I think it would be fair to say that for at least a part of the time that Exxon was funding research/“research”, big parts of climate change were far less understood. For example, whether it was actually occurring, whether it was man-made, what percentage of it was man-made, how severe it was, what could be done about it. Because of this, dollars spent I think in some respects would be better called research or skepticism for most of that time. With the evidence now clear, dollars spent denying it can be more reasonably called denialism.

Furthermore, the dollar amounts that Exxon was funding was nothing. Calling them a big funder seems completely crazy. One of those links is talking about $2.9 million spread across 39 different groups.

I highly doubt much of that money is coming from the likes of Exxon. Although I do not want this thread to be limited to them, what kind of sense does it make that back when they were openly questioning climate change they donated small dollars but now that they openly agree with Climate Change and have active shareholders pushing them to do more on the Climate Change front, that they would funnel massive dollars underground?