An Inconvenient Spoof!

Oil companies have been known to be in denial over the apparent global warming crisis. And it appears some of them have taken the campaign a step further by funding PR agencies and Think tanks to question scientific evidence about climate change.

If you've following the news lately, you may have heard of a film produced by the former US Vice President and global climate change activist Al Gore. "An Inconvenient Truth" is an Academy Award winning film that documents the earth's climate crisis.

Sometime last year however, a spoof video titled "Al Gore's Penguin Army" appeared on Youtube poking fun at Al Gore and his global warming campaign. On first sight, it was just like any of the amateur videos posted by thousands of people everyday.

However an investigation by a US journalist discovered that the film had actually came from a Republican public relations firm called DCI, which coincidentally happens to have oil giant ExxonMobil as a client.

Ofcourse Exxon denied any knowledge about the movie. But it is well documented that Exxon and other oil companies in denying the threat posed by climate change have gone as far as funding fake citizens' groups and bogus scientific bodies to back their claims that science of global warming is inconclusive.

You can check out the spoof video via: http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=2270587

Is Global Warming a threat to big business?

While many organisations in the UK appear to have accepted a recent conclusion by top scientists that human activity is partly is to blame for global warming, and have apparently adopted policies to reduce their carbon emissions, a number of American corporations are still in denial.

Some of them view the climate change debate as an alarmist scare campaign by those who hate capitalism and love "big government". I came across a website by a US "think tank" known as the Competitive Enterprise Institute that is campaigning against what they describe as alarmist global warming theories.

The organisation produced two 60-second television spots focusing on the alleged global warming crisis and the calls by some environmental groups and politicians for reduced energy use that have been airing in 14 U.S. cities.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sGKvDNdJNA

I think this proves that there are a number of sceptics out there who do no believe or even care about this phenomenon that has been described as the greatest threat facing mankind. I'll try and check out some corporations that are not buying into this green fad.

PRofiting from Climate Change

Today I came across an article by Michael Gunter a renewable energy enthusiast who writes about his backyard technology experiments.

According to Gunter, corporations have now determined that there is a "tipping point" in terms of new business ventures to spawn and this is what is driving the recent climate change hype.

He answers the question I've been asking. What's in for these companies? Are they genuinely concerned about the environment? Anyway here are some extracts from his article:

"I would not be surprised if apparent grass-roots advocacy groups were getting support from mining and energy corporate interests. Banks will now lend; governments keen to appease a restless public will provide "corporate welfare" out of the public purse.

So of course, the market is signalling in flashing dollar signs, and the more they scare us the more money they think they can make out of our fear.

Emissions trading, Clean Development Mechanism ventures, geosequestration (burying carbon dioxide underground), uranium mining, nuclear fission reactors, and tree plantations are all just new business opportunities for amoral corporatists everywhere.

When civilisation collapses prematurely, having been led down the wrong energy-intensive overpopulated path, it will be the last failure of free markets.
Consumer society, consumptive planet".

Some of Michael Gunter's initiatives can be found on www.voltscommisar.net

Going Green: A Rebirth of Corporate Social Responsibility?

I recently wondered aloud why more and more organisations are adopting green policies as part of a fad that appears to be taking the corporate world by storm. I gave examples of such companies that include; Tesco, Marks and Spencer, HSBC, and even some politicians like Tony Blair and Conservative MP Tim Yeo.

I also wondered whether "going green" is not just another PR stunt that will be adopted by organisations inorder to deflect public scrutiny. Just like they did in the 1990's with corporate social responsiblity or CSR programmes.

How genuine are these green programmes? do these organisations or politicians really care about the environment or are they just adopting these policies inorder to make their companies look good? And who cares whether Tesco is investing £100 million in sustainable environmental technology and has plans to build the most environmentally-friendly store in the UK. Or whether Tim Yeo gets to Glasgow by train or by plane? Do the public really care about global warming and its effects on the environment?

In Rethinking Public Relations, Kevin Moloney argues that CSR came on to the PR agenda because of concern about the social, environmental and politial impacts of big business.

Ralph Tench and Liz Yeomans in Exploring Public Relations argue that "organisations in developed economies are today influenced by public opinion, shareholders, stakeholders and the political process". These organisations cannot afford therefore to ignore their operational environment.

Could this then explain the trend - going green? How is the debate surrounding climate change likely to affect the practice of Public Relations? And what about those skeptics who do not believe that global warming is a result of human activity? Those who maintain that the issue has been over exaggerated. How has this phenomenon risen to capture media headlines and government agendas?

These are some of the issues I will be examining over the next couple of weeks.