Earlier this month, the world's largest PR firm Edelman ended its decade-long relationship with the world's largest oil lobby, the American Petroleum Institute (API). A welcome step, and high time too, as climate change activists would likely assert.
API's contracts with Edelman had been big; so massive that it amounted to 10 per cent of the PR firm's revenues. Its Blue Advertising subsidiary helped API run commercials that promoted the idea that oil and gas were plentiful, and were viable too. In many ways, Edelman was seen as promoting climate denial, and unwarranted exploitation of natural resources.
The severance that was broken on the Holmes Report website was probably in the offing all this while, especially since August 2014, when it attracted some unfavourable media attention that could have been best avoided. Edelman suffered a PR disaster over its callous response to a survey of large public relations agencies, conducted by The Guardian and the Climate Investigations Center, about representing clients that deny climate change.
Many of the top 25 global PR firms told the survey that they would no more represent clients who deny man-made climate change, or take campaigns seeking to block regulations limiting carbon pollution. Companies included WPP, Waggener Edstrom (WE) Worldwide, Weber Shandwick, Text100, and Finn Partners. The list excluded Edelman.
The Guardian report said:
The US-based Edelman, which is the world’s largest independently owned PR firm, did not explicitly rule out taking on climate deniers as clients.
“Expanding the dialogue in a constructive manner, and driving productive outcomes to solve energy challenges are the key criteria for evaluating client engagements,” said spokesman Michael Bush.
The report noted that Edelman was among those companies that had in place an in-house programme for reducing carbon footprint, yet:
But even those firms with robust internal carbon accounting systems, such as Edelman, were reluctant to go on record.
Edelman’s client list includes the American Petroleum Institute, the main energy lobby, which opposes Barack Obama’s climate change agenda. Edelman also carried out campaigns supporting the Keystone XL pipeline, a proposed pipeline to carry tar sands oil from Canada to refineries on the Gulf coast of Texas.
An initial response to CIC from Edelman inadvertently included an internal email which said: “I don’t believe we are obligated in any way to respond. There are only wrong answers for this guy.”
The faux pas made for real bad press. Three days later, Edelman said it would not take on campaigns that deny global warming. A statement on its website read: “Edelman fully recognises the reality of, and science behind, climate change, and believes it represents one of the most important global challenges facing society, business and government today. To be clear, we do not accept client assignments that aim to deny climate change.”
Kert Davies of Climate Investigations told the Guardian, “Edelman’s position on climate change before this statement was at best opaque. Now they might be the first big PR firm to actually have a published ‘position’ on climate change and rejecting climate science denial. This is a big step … and it might pull the rest of the industry along to take a firm stance on climate change.”
There was no let up for Edelman. On November 18, 2014 came an expose – this one showed that Edelman was helping TransCanada, operator of the controversial Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, with campaign-planning meant to subvert local activism in Canada. In documents that were obtained by Greenpeace, Edelman proposed that the pipeline company should investigate opponents of Energy East (a plan to convert a natural gas pipeline to Eastern Canada to carry oil sands production), and to extend it to a new tanker port in Quebec. It also advised the company to use front groups, relying on third-party surrogates to disseminate unflattering findings.
The report said:
The campaign group Avaaz, one of the potential targets of the opposition research, called on Edelman to sever its connections with the campaign.
“Edelman’s cynical plan to smear citizens groups shows how low fossil fuel companies will stoop to protect their profits in the face of rising seas, melting ice caps and millions calling for climate action,” Alex Wilks, a campaign director in New York, wrote in an email. “Edelman must cancel its TransCanada contract and stop promoting one of the world’s dirtiest oil pipelines.”
The Council of Canadians, another targeted group, said the ambitious scale of the PR pitch suggested TransCanada was concerned about growing opposition to the project. “What this speaks to is that they are losing,” said Andrea Harden-Donaghue, climate campaigner for the council. “What these documents reveal is that they are bringing tea party activists into the equation in Canada combined with a heavy-handed advertising campaign. They are clearly spending a lot of time and thought on our efforts. I’d rather see them address the concerns that we are raising.”
A week later, TransCanada let go of Edelman. In working for organisations engaged in unsustainable and unabashed exploitation of natural resources, it was Edelman that was emerging villain. Certainly not the shady image that a leading PR firm would want for itself.
Edelman’s decision, arguably a fallout of the above, will be welcomed by climate change scientists and environmental activists who have been insisting that fossil fuel companies and groups have been disseminating misinformation about climate change and global warming.
With many leading PR firms, Edelman included now, refusing to greenwash climate change deniers, it would be interesting to see the propaganda run-up to the December climate change summit in Paris where world leaders may broker a global treaty on tackling global warming.
