Since late 2009, there’s been a slowly-growing wave of attacks from the unconventional oil and gas industry on media outlets that cover the controversies surrounding hydraulic fracturing (fracking) and other shale gas practices. Reporters who write for publications ranging from Rolling Stone to Reuters to the New York Times have
Continue readingTag: API
DeSmogBlog: Oil Sands Fact Check: New API Front Group
shutterstock_48011344.jpg How do you sell a rotten bag of goods? Rule number one of effective propaganda: repackage it into something seemingly less grotesque. In that spirit, the Houston Chronicle recently reported the American Petroleum Institute (API) has created yet another front group, this one to promote tar sands crude, one of the dirtiest sources of fuel in the world, as a
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: New Documentary "Rational Middle": Oil and Gas Advertising in Disguise
Rational Middle Logo.jpeg The "Rational Middle Energy Series," directed and produced by Gregory Kallenberg, is hot off the film rolls and has already been screened at an influential venue: the 2012 Aspen Ideas Festival. Kallenberg also directed and produced the documentary film "Haynesville: A Nation’s Hunt for An Energy Future,"
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Howarth and Ingraffea: Gas Industry Fracking Study So Biased it is ‘Almost Useless’
Picture 5.png Two of the largest gas industry lobbying bodies in the US, the American Petroleum Institute (API) and American Natural Gas Alliance (ANGA), released a ‘study’ earlier this month claiming methane emissions from natural gas production to be 50 percent lower than the US Environmental Protection Agency’s 2011 estimates.
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Oil and Gas Industry Moves to Silence Critics
shutterstock_49157602.jpg At an industry public relations conference last year, Michael Kehs of Chesapeake Energy described a Wall Street Journal op-ed to gathered oil and gas officials, saying it pointed out the industry's "credibility problem." “And I’m sure some of it relates to defensiveness,” Kehs added. (MP3 Audio) Small wonder. For years,
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: ALEC Wasn’t First Industry Trojan Horse Behind Fracking Disclosure Bill – Enter Council of State Governments
shutterstock_95581429.jpg 19th Century German statesman Otto von Bismarck once said, "If you like laws and sausages, you should never watch either one being made." The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), put on the map by the Center for Media and Democracy in its "ALEC Exposed" project, is the archetype of von Bismarck's truism. So too are the fracking chemical
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Oil Industry Lobbyist / Mushroom Farmer Claims Family Farms Need Fracking
Fracking_Graphic_t670.jpg Because apparently the only way for small American farmers to sustain themselves is not with crops they produce, but by letting the good 'ole gas man tap the reserves under their land. "Agriculture and industry go together, if you want prosperity in these little towns, you need balance, that's the
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Tracking The Origins Of The "Blame Obama For Gas Prices" Talking Point
4+dollar+gas.jpg Since at least last summer, conservatives have been parroting the oil industry talking point that President Obama is somehow the one responsible for the spike in gasoline and oil prices. As we have pointed out, they base this on their assertion that the President has been “hostile” towards the
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Big Oil Rakes In Billions, Still Complains Taxes Are Too High
20080810-violin.jpg The President rolled out his FY2013 budget recently, which includes eliminating $40 billion in tax breaks from Big Oil companies, such as BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, and Shell. Meanwhile, the American Petroleum Institute's response would have you believe that cutting the subsidies would be the equivalent of moving back
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Greenpeace Calls On SEC To Investigate TransCanada’s Inflated Jobs Claims
keystone_xl_jobs.jpg Greenpeace USA President Phil Radford sent a formal complaint this week to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) calling for an investigation into TransCanada’s use of wildly inflated jobs figures in promoting its application to build the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. The letter asks the SEC to review
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Oil Industry Co-Opts Occupy Movement to Sell the Keystone XL Pipeline
99percent.jpg
The AFL-CIO's America's Building Trades Unions and Oil and Natural Gas Industry Labor-Management Committee are attempting to co-opt the Occupy movement with a new initiative…
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: A Best Practice a Day Keeps the Feds Away: API Workshop on Fracking "Excellence"
Picture 2.png
The ongoing American Petroleum Institute (API) workshop “Commitment to Excellence in Hydraulic Fracturing” could be more simply titled “Commitment to Hydraulic Fra…
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Global Financial Leaders Recommend Cutting Fossil Fuel Subsidies
Oil_Money.jpg
Global financial institutions including the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank have released a new set of recommendations for G20 countries to meet their goal of providi…
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Polluters Join Forces To Pressure Obama On Oil And Gas Drilling
Drill_Baby_Drill.jpg
In the wake of President Obama’s speech on job creation last week, major players in the energy industry have banded together to put pressure on the president to speed u…
Continue readingDeSmogBlog - Clearing the PR Pollution that Clouds Climate Science: Oil Industry Steps Up Astroturf Efforts For 2012 Election
astroturf.jpg
The oil industry has put their astroturf and lobbying efforts into overdrive over the last few months, preparing for a bitter fight in the upcoming 2012 presidential election. In a…
Continue readingDeSmogBlog - Clearing the PR Pollution that Clouds Climate Science: EPA Proposes First-Ever Federal Fracking Rules
fracking air quality.jpg
The U.S. EPA is poised to enact the first ever rules on hydraulic fracturing (fracking) with a proposal that would allow the agency to regulate the practice under the Cle…
Continue readingDeSmogBlog - Clearing the PR Pollution that Clouds Climate Science: American Petroleum Institute Dreams Of Placing Lobbyists In Every District
090720_gerard_schwartz_297.jpg
Oil industry lobbyist and president of the American Petroleum Institute (API) Jack Gerard made his industry’s goal clear in a recent interview with Fortune Magazine…
Continue reading