fossil fuel BS

When the Big Oil CEO Blames You for the Climate Crisis His Industry Created

Spread the love

https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/exxonmobil-ceo-blames-public-for-climate Despite being published on Common Dreams it’s not under a CC licence so it’s only an excerpt.

Exxon CEO Darren Woods speaks at an international energy conference on March 7, 2023. (Photo: Mark Felix/AFP via Getty Images)

We simply “waited too long,” said ExxonMobil’s top executive last week. But never mind, the important thing is that we made “above-average returns.”

…

[L]ast week the CEO of Exxon gave an interview that amounts to an attempt to pawn off the climate crisis on everyone else, and also to map out the road he sees ahead—a road that involves wasting huge amounts of money subsidizing the fossil fuel industry. Darren Woods was talking to Fortune magazine reporter Michal Lev-Ram and editor Alan Murray, who began by explaining that Exxon was a group of charming “Texas tough boys” before teeing up one of the classic softball questions of all time. Some people, he said, were thinking that perhaps Exxon wasn’t entirely “serious about addressing climate change. Tell me why they’re wrong.”

Well, Woods explains, Exxon is a molecule company, by which he means it’s interested in transforming molecules—’and they happen to be hydrogen and carbon molecules’—to ‘address the needs of our society.’ What he’s saying, quite explicitly, is that Exxon is not an electron company, i.e. a company interested in building out wind or solar power. And when Fortune asks him why not, he lets slip the basic truth of our moment: “we don’t see the ability to generate above-average returns for our shareholders.”

For everyone who’s ever asked themselves, why isn’t Exxon (and Chevron and the rest) leading the charge to renewable energy, there’s the answer: you can make money doing it, but not as much as they’ve made traditionally. That’s because the sun and the wind deliver the energy for free, and all you need is some equipment to turn it into electrons. But Exxon controls the molecules—that’s what oil and gas reserves are. And that control means they can make outsize profits—as long as they can persuade the world to keep burning stuff.

And it’s the story of that persuasion where Woods’ words go from galling to really really gross. Because he explains to his nodding interlocutors that the world “waited too long” to start developing renewables. Or, in his particular brand of corporate speak: “we’ve waited too long to open the aperture on the solution sets terms of what we need as a society.”

…

https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/exxonmobil-ceo-blames-public-for-climate

Continue ReadingWhen the Big Oil CEO Blames You for the Climate Crisis His Industry Created

Oil Change International’s Reaction: Al Jaber’s science-denying statements are alarming

Spread the love
Dr. Sultan al Jaber. Image: Arctic Circle, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Dr. Sultan al Jaber. Image: Arctic Circle, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

https://priceofoil.org/2023/12/03/reactive-al-jabers-science-denying-statements-are-alarming/

In response to COP28 President Al Jaber’s science-denying comments at the She Changes Climate Event, as reported by The Guardian, Romain Ioualalen, Oil Change International’s Global Policy lead, said: 

“COP28 President Al Jaber’s science-denying statements are alarming and raise deep concerns about the Presidency’s capacity to lead the UN climate talks, at a time when leadership and a clear vision are most needed. Of course, denying science has been part of the fossil fuel industry’s playbook for decades. But science is not up for debate: we must phase out fossil fuels to have a livable planet. 

“The science is clear. Not only do fossil fuels need to be phased out, but the phaseout needs to start now. The latest reports from the IEA and the IPCC show that maintaining a 50% chance of limiting global warming to 1.5°C requires an immediate end to investments in new oil, gas, and coal production and hazardous liquid fossil gas infrastructure.

“Instead of casting doubt on climate science, we expect the COP28 president to facilitate an outcome on a full, fast, fair, and funded phaseout of fossil fuels at COP28. Over 100 countries have now called for a phase out of fossil fuels and science is clear that limiting warming to 1.5°C without relying massively on dangerous technological distractions such as CCS requires eliminating fossil fuels from the global economy.”

…

https://priceofoil.org/2023/12/03/reactive-al-jabers-science-denying-statements-are-alarming/

Image contains protest banner readng You will die of old age, our children will die of climate change - Melbourne climate strike
Craig Bennett says the way recent and current older generations have allowed environmental degradation will be viewed harshly by people in the future who will have to live with consequences that, in many cases, will be increasingly devastating. Image: A1Cafel Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic via wikimedia.
Continue ReadingOil Change International’s Reaction: Al Jaber’s science-denying statements are alarming