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Top oil firms spending millions lobbying to block climate change policies, says report
Ad campaigns hide investment in a huge expansion of oil and gas extraction, says InfluenceMap
ExxonMobil leads the oil firms in spending on branding campaigns suggesting they support action against climate change. Photograph: Matt Slocum/AP
The largest five stock market listed oil and gas companies spend nearly $200m (£153m) a year lobbying to delay, control or block policies to tackle climate change, according to a new report.
Chevron, BP and ExxonMobil were the main companies leading the field in direct lobbying to push against a climate policy to tackle global warming, the report said.
Increasingly they are using social media to successfully push their agenda to weaken and oppose any meaningful legislation to tackle global warming.
In the run-up to the US midterm elections last year $2m was spent on targeted Facebook and Instagram ads by global oil giants and their industry bodies, promoting the benefits of increased fossil fuel production, according to the report published on Friday by InfluenceMap.
Separately, BP donated $13m to a campaign, also supported by Chevron, that successfully stopped a carbon tax in Washington state – $1m of which was spent on social media ads, the research shows.
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Edward Collins, the report’s author, analysed corporate spending on lobbying, briefing and advertising, and assessed what proportion was dedicated to climate issues.
He said: “Oil majors’ climate branding sounds increasingly hollow and their credibility is on the line. They publicly support climate action while lobbying against binding policy. They advocate low-carbon solutions but such investments are dwarfed by spending on expanding their fossil fuel business.”
After the Paris climate agreement in 2015 the large integrated oil and gas companies said they supported a price on carbon and formed groups like the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative which promote voluntary measures.
But, the report states, there is a glaring gap between their words and their actions.
The five publicly listed oil majors – ExxonMobil, Shell, Chevron, BP and Total – now spend about $195m a year on branding campaigns suggesting they support action against climate change.
But the report said these campaigns were misleading the public about the extent of the oil companies’ actions because while publicly endorsing the need to act, they are massively increasing investment in a huge expansion of oil and gas extraction. In 2019 their spending will increase to $115bn, with just 3% of that directed at low carbon projects.
Shell said in a statement: “We firmly reject the premise of this report. We are very clear about our support for the Paris agreement, and the steps that we are taking to help meet society’s needs for more and cleaner energy.
“We make no apology for talking to policymakers and regulators around the world to make our voice heard on crucial topics such as climate change and how to address it.”
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Chevron said it disagreed with the report’s findings. “Chevron is taking prudent, cost-effective actions and is committed to working with policymakers to design balanced and transparent greenhouse gas emissions reductions policies that address environmental goals and ensure consumers have access to affordable, reliable and ever cleaner energy.”
The successful lobbying and direct opposition to policy measures to tackle global warming have hindered governments globally in their efforts to implement policies after the Paris agreement to meet climate targets and keep warming below 1.5C.
Big Oil’s Real Agenda on Climate Change
An InfluenceMap Report
March 2019
How the oil majors have spent $1Bn since Paris on narrative capture and lobbying on climate
Kindly use this URL only when citing this report.
See the InfluenceMap interview on Sky News.
See coverage in the The Guardian (UK), CBS News, Forbes, National Observer (Canada), The Independent (UK), EURACTIV (the EU), Channel News Asia (Singapore), Huffington Post (US), AFP (France), Les Echos (France), NRC Handelsblad (Netherlands), Japan Times, E24 (Norway), Arab News (Saudi Arabia), Grist (US), Business Standard (India), Forbes Japan (日本語), The Hill (US), The NRDC (US), Greenbiz, Phys.org and Rolling Stone magazine.
This research finds that the five largest publicly-traded oil and gas majors (ExxonMobil, Royal Dutch Shell, Chevron, BP and Total) have invested over $1Bn of shareholder funds in the three years following the Paris Agreement on misleading climate-related branding and lobbying. These efforts are overwhelmingly in conflict with the goals of this landmark global climate accord and designed to maintain the social and legal license to operate and expand fossil fuel operations.
Company disclosures of spending on climate lobbying and branding are very limited. To fill this transparency gap, InfluenceMap has devised a methodology using best-available disclosures and intensive research of corporate messaging to evaluate oil major spending aimed at influencing the climate agenda, both directly and through their key trade groups.
This research will feed into efforts by key stakeholders to bring the oil and gas sector into line with the urgency of action on climate change. These include the global investment community which in 2017 launched the Climate Action 100+ program of engagement with some of the world's largest corporations on climate change.
See full report and infographics downloads below.
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The trillion dollar Norwegian Oil Fund recently proposed to shift away from companies involved solely in exploration and production, allowing oil majors to dodge divestment, for now. Rather than divest, the Finance Ministry has instructed Norges Bank to engage with the oil majors to ensure they invest in renewables and accelerate the clean energy transition, but lawmakers as well as other large fund managers should study closely what oil companies are doing on climate and energy policy in practice. The InfluenceMap study is an important contribution to the serious assessment which must now take place. Remarkably, these five oil majors are forecast to put a mere 3% of their 2019 capital expenditure towards low carbon technologies whilst US$110.4 billion will be put into more oil & gas.
We have 11 years left to stop climate chaos: there can be no justification for oil companies to openly oppose regulation of its products based on emissions. We should not be thanking the Trump administration for rolling back the “avalanche of regulation” on the sector, nor opposing the transition to renewable energy and instead lobbying for expanded oil production. It is simply not the future.
Jan Erik Saugestad
CEO of Storebrand Asset Management
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InfluenceMap’s research confirms a widely held suspicion that Big Oil’s glossy sustainability reports and shiny climate statements are all rhetoric and no action. These companies have mastered the art of corporate doublespeak - by boasting about their climate credentials while quietly using their lobbying firepower to sabotage the implementation of sensible climate policy and pouring millions into groups that engage in dirty lobbying on their behalf.
Catherine Howarth
Chief Executive of ShareAction
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