NGO reports bash oil & gas/petrochemicals industry

Two reports have recently been published by NGOs blaming the oil/ petrochemicals industry for hindering the transition to climate-neutrality and contributing to plastics pollution. The “Big Oil and gas buying influence in Brussels” report published by Corporate Observatory Europe, Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace criticise oil and gas companies for their “climate-destructive lobbying”, while “the Plastic Atlas” accuses the petrochemicals industry of being the main cause of plastics pollution.

Cefic is mentioned in Corporate Observatory Europe report in the following context “The top five [of oil companies] are all members of CEFIC, which has a long track record of climate-destructive lobbying, including lobbying in favour of fracking and to open Europe’s doors to US shale gas.” The member companies that are referred to are: Shell, ExxonMobil, Total and BP:

“BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil, Shell and Total, which together were responsible for 7.4% of all global greenhouse gas emissions between 1988 and 2015, declared spending €123.3 million on lobbying the EU between 2010 and 2018. Their 13 fossil fuel-related lobby groups declared an additional €128 million.”

The Plastic Atlas published by the NGOs, Heinrich Böll Foundation and Break Free From Plastic, clearly blames the petrochemical industry for the plastics pollution problem: “The market is controlled by a few major multi-national corporations that are collectively investing over 200 billion US dollars in additional capacity to produce even more petrochemicals, the majority of which will become plastic.” “However, plastics and petrochemical companies are increasingly nervous about the growing war on plastics. And although some companies are beginning to at least acknowledge their responsibility for this pollution, they still maintain, aggressively and publicly that the consumer is at fault for plastic pollution.”

Petrochemicals Europe will continue to monitor the publication of such reports and campaigns and will answer media requests on these topics when required.