Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Gold/Mining/Energy : Strictly: Drilling and oil-field services -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: hdrjr who wrote (58611)	1/17/2000 9:04:00 AM
From: hdrjr	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 95453

Sorry if this has already been posted. Climate change spells doom for oil - author By KERM YERMAN As the world's weather grows warmer and deadlier, uneasy public opinion is starting to see climate change as the ugly legacy of the oil era. So says oilman-turned-environmentalist Jeremy Leggett, who argues that oil companies are sowing the seeds of their own demise if they continue to dismiss the fight against global warming. "We are seeing the first faint signals of how bad it can get," Leggett told Reuters, referring to the mudslides that killed as many as 30,000 in Venezuela and storms that battered France last month. In a book called "The Carbon War" he says a growing chorus of concern, reaching into financial sectors like insurance, points the finger at Big Oil's inability to embrace clean energy. Unrepentant firms might eventually face disinvestment and punitive class action lawsuits in a parallel with the U.S tobacco industry's troubles with sick smoker damages, he says. "An approaching apocalypse is building," writes the former oil industry lecturer and consultant. "As we approach the end of the hydrocarbon century, the oil companies shuffle for position, patently uncertain of the way forward as their world changes around them as never before." Leggett spent the 1990s as technical adviser to the Greenpeace environmental group at talks that led to the 1997 Kyoto pact limiting emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases. The book, a racily-written diary of those years, portrays what he calls crass disinformation put out by oil lobby spin-doctors to undermine evidence of human-induced climate change. Insurers Feel The Heat He acknowledges ruefully the skill of oil lobbyists and lawyers in brushing aside scientific complexities to present powerful soundbites attractive to conservative columnists. He saw oilmen work closely with OPEC states like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait to delay or skew debate at key gatherings. The oil lobby mostly succeeded in veiling from public view worst case scenarios in which human-induced climate warming could trigger natural mechanisms spewing uncontrollable amounts of methane greenhouse gases from ocean floors, Leggett writes. Such a catastrophe would require drastic steps. "Things that would seem laughable today, like jail sentences for burning coal and oil, might become commonplace," he writes. "But it might be too late. No matter how deep the cuts in human emissions, they might be cancelled out by the natural emissions...we had enforced by raising the planet's thermostat." Leggett went on the offensive for Greenpeace by enlisting insurance company support against what he calls the carbon club. "The consequence of being held liable for some of the damage from climate change could be devastating for the carbon-fuel industry," argues Leggett ally Mark Mansley. They discovered that the world's hottest year, 1998, coincided with the costliest year for insured losses from weather-related catastrophes. The storms, floods, droughts and fires around the world in 1998 exceeded all weather related losses of the 1980s. Leggett's gambit led to robust exchanges such as one between insurer James Anderson and oil consultant J.R. Spradley. "You know the insurance industry could begin to disinvest in oil and coal," he quotes Anderson of Lloyd's as saying. "That's your choice," he quotes Spradley as replying, with Spradley adding in reference to big oil firms: "But I'm telling you, you're not going to bully the Seven Sisters." Last Days Of Oil, Says Arco Leggett found some oilmen to be frank in private. He quotes then OPEC official Sadallah al-Fathi as saying at a 1992 meeting: "You ask me why we are here? I'll tell you. We don't want this convention. There's nothing in it for us." Global warming is a critical issue for the oil industry because fossil fuels -- coal, oil and natural gas -- account for about 80 percent of man-made carbon dioxide emissions. Many scientists believe the gases are contributing to a gradual warming of the earth's atmosphere. Most U.S. oil firms oppose Kyoto's mandatory cuts in emissions -- although some seem to be taking heed of the environmental case. "We've embarked on the beginning of the last days of the Age of Oil," Atlantic Richfield (ARC-N) chief executive Mike Bowlin said last year to a chorus of environmental approval. Leggett says Bowlin's comments indicate disarray in the U.S. oil lobby and a tentative acceptance by some that renewables will one day replace oil as the dominant source of energy. That message has not been lost on Europeans BP Amoco and Royal Dutch/Shell , who have both set up solar units to grab what they see as a lucrative opportunity. Other oil, gas and coal firms could delay the adoption of renewable energy industries, but eventually conservative firms will have to heed opposition to carbon fuels, Leggett says. "They have already lost the pivotal battle in the carbon war. The solar revolution is coming. It is now inevitable," Leggett writes. "The only question left unanswered is, will it come in time?" As always, your feedback is welcome. If you have suggestions or comments, please email them.