I participated in Innovation Day @Shell today at their Technology Center in Houston. As part of that, I moderated a discussion with 4 of their chief scientists.
IMPORTANT: ALL FOUR SAID THAT SOLVING CLIMATE CHANGE IS A CRITICAL GLOBAL CHALLENGE.
IMPORTANT: ALL FOUR SAID THAT SOLVING CLIMATE CHANGE IS A CRITICAL GLOBAL CHALLENGE.
I think there is a caricature out there -- for many reasons, some legitimate -- that oil & gas companies do not want to tackle climate change. But there is also pretty consistent commitment among technical staffs at O&G companies that climate change is THE problem to solve. /2
I mostly deal with the technical folks at O&G companies, not their lobbyists, so I would say that these sentiments are widespread. They feel that climate change worth solving and that O&G companies should be and could be part of the solution. /3
O&G companies are an obvious part of the team b/c they can implement solutions at a global scale. And we're going to need all hands on deck to solve this. /4
My friend @MarkSBrownstein once said that sometimes people are afraid of a solution at the scale of the problem. Climate Change is a global-scale problem so we need a global-scale solution. That means enviros and anti-corporates can't shut out O&G from helping to solve this. /5
It also means the O&G industry needs to be more vocal about its support for doing something. Rather than lobbying against taking serious action, O&G needs to let coal be the last man standing (alone) among those who pretend climate change isn't real. /6
O&G should fight hard to make sure the policy solutions are sensible, rather than fighting to keep them from existing. By sensible, I mean market-based, with a price on carbon, without command-and-control mandates, with support for R&D, etc. /7
O&G has a LOT of good ideas and smart people. We want all of them available as tools in our toolbox, and companies that bring forth solutions should be properly compensated. /8
Personally, I was really pleased by @Shell's outspoken acknowledgements of the world's big problems and happy to see their serious R&D commitments to solve them. With O&G throwing its might in this direction, I am optimistic we're going to solve this. /END
