Tempting as it would be to ignore activism planned by environmentalists in the US this month, the oil and gas industry should pay attention. Groups organizing theatrics in the streets also fight pipelines in court and won't be discouraged by US President Donald Trump's reversals of their Keystone XL and Dakota Access conquests.
"Resistance Recess," as the activists call their program for the April congressional break, should remind the whole industry-not just pipeline companies-of the multitiered strategy required nowadays to defend important work.
'Bold action'
During April, activists will confront lawmakers in meetings with constituents, "urging them to challenge the Trump administration's destructive, climate-denying agenda," according to a press release from 350.org. They also will seek participants in an Apr. 29 march in Washington, DC. Organizers hope "to bring tens of thousands of people to DC in support of bold action for climate, jobs, and justice." The press release gives members of Congress two options: "Either they will protect the people by supporting the just transition to a clean-energy economy, or they will abandon their constituents by aligning with Trump to prop up and profit with polluting fossil-fuel billionaires."
For 350.org, this rhetoric is tame. The word "transition" reveals uncharacteristic patience. "Stop all new fossil fuel projects," the group's web site demands, spiraling into tirades such as this: "We need to take back the power that the fossil-fuel industry has over society. Fossil-fuel companies are the wealthiest and most powerful corporations on the planet, and their core business model threatens all of us. For decades, they have corrupted our governments, ravaged our planet, and treated the atmosphere like an open sewer while the impacts of climate change devastate the people who've done the least to cause the problem."
Thoughtless extremism? Yes. But it influences policy. Former President Barack Obama rejected the Keystone XL border crossing to appease groups like 350.org. The group also helped persuade delegates at the Paris Climate Summit of 2015 to stretch the target for warming abatement.
In Paris, 350.org and its partners in obstructionism made clear that their main goal is to stymie development of hydrocarbon resources. Pipeline opposition is just a tactic. Since Obama's acquiescence on Keystone XL, pipeline approvals have been increasingly difficult to secure in the US and Canada. Trump's rescues of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access projects won't stifle the agenda. An industry given to specialization and focus must expand its understanding of the problem.
Activist opposition to pipelines isn't about pipeline safety; it's about production. Activists have learned that constriction of transportation capacity can lower wellhead values of oil and gas and thus discourage development. Yet not all opposition to pipelines originates in keep-it-in-the-ground extremism. Some of it reflects reasonable concern about surface disturbance and the potential for leakage or explosion. Because the industry faces two distinct species of pipeline opponent, it needs two distinct strategies for response.
The industry tends to respond to all political challenges with facts attesting to the safety and value of its work. That approach can be partly effective against resistance to pipelines based strictly on concern about safety. It's certainly necessary. The best antidote for fear about safety, of course, is accident-free performance. Since that's not part of the record, the industry must make its case with demonstrated and relentless commitment to improve-supplemented by facts.
Responding to activism
Against activism, facts have much less potency. Activists aren't trying to win an argument with the oil and gas industry; they want to strangle it. They won't be swayed by facts. They have to be discredited.
Opposition to pipelines won't disappear because the White House has a new occupant who likes oil and gas. It requires response from all the industry-not just pipelines. And for those opponents wanting "to stop all new fossil-fuel projects," responses should expose motive, emphasize the costly futility of energy extremism, and proceed with zeal appropriate to an industry convinced of its own legitimacy.
