Making the Future – Shell's Greenwash Festival Exposed

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A large white oil storage tank with the yellow and red Shell logo and a thick band of rainbow stripes around it
Shell's Pernis refinery in the Netherlands. Credit: Steven Lek, CC BY-SA 4.0

Make the Future – Shellโ€™s festival of greenwash – kicks off this weekend. Over the next few days you can โ€˜close the gender gap in technologyโ€™, โ€˜make London buses run on coffeeโ€™, or โ€˜make gas coolโ€™. You can even pretend that everything is totally fine, and Shell and Big Oil have a major role in the worldโ€™s energy future, while listening to Pixie Lott and other slick pop stars. You may even bump into Londonโ€™s mayor while youโ€™reย there.

Shellโ€™s Olympic Park event has been heavily advertised around the capital for several weeks, emphasising the companyโ€™s interest in green tech. The festival is part of an international PR push under the Make the Future banner, aimed at convincing young people that the oil industry is a desirable employer. A 2016 report by McKinsey showed that millennials are shunning the oil industry more than any other sector, as they look for careers that make a positive contribution to society. The report provoked a spasm of PR and a desperate attempt to win overย millennials.

But young people donโ€™t seem to be buying it, and Make the Future may be in danger of backfiring badly for Shell &ย Co.

Campaigners point out that while this weekendโ€™s festival is all about green tech, that doesnโ€™t reflect accurately the business model of theseย companies.

Although Shell recently announced they would increase their investment in clean tech, it still amounts to only a small fraction of their overall investment. In November last year, Shell bowed to shareholder pressure and increased investment in their new energy division from $1 billion a year to $1-2 billion, less than 6 percent of their $25-30 billion total annual investment. To put this in further context, Shell plans to invest ย $5 -$6 billion a year in deepwater drilling, and $2-3 billion a year for shale oil andย gas.

Campaigners are gearing up to highlight Shellโ€™s greenwash at the event. Alethea Warrington from Fossil Free Londonย said:

โ€œThis whole Make the Future campaign is sickeningly cynical and transparent. Shellโ€™s investment in clean tech is tiny compared to their work extracting and burning fossil fuels, including deepwater drilling. When we heard about the event happening in the Olympic Park we were furious at Shellโ€™s blatant hypocrisy, but we figured the best way to react against it was with a laugh, which is why we decided to take on Shell by playing dodgeball. Itโ€™ll be a fun day out in the park, and let Shell know weโ€™re not buying theirย greenwash.โ€

Camilla Zerr from Divest Hackneyย said:

โ€œShell is playing games with our planet and we’ve had enough. Shell aren’t just working to burn a load of fossil fuels that we know have to stay in the ground – that, in itself, is bad enough – but they are searching for whole new sources of fossil fuels. And they’re doing that in some of the most dangerous and ecologically delicate places on Earth. We, the local people in East London, aren’t taking their greenwash. We’re ready to divest from fossil fuels, invest in a just transition to renewables, and build climateย justice.โ€

As DeSmogโ€™s Graham Readfearn has previously pointedย out:

โ€œIf you watch the pop videos, or hang around Shellโ€™s YouTube channel, or see much of their marketing material, or visit their very flashy tumblr site, youโ€™ll see very little of what Shell spends most of its time and money actually doing โ€“ drilling for lots and lots of oil andย gas.โ€

Heย continued:

โ€œSo what is Shellโ€™s actual contribution to the accumulation of CO2 in the atmosphere from burning fossil fuels and releasing methane that is helping drive dangerous climateย change?

Shellโ€™s contribution in 2017 was 664 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (for context, looking at figures gathered by the World Resources Institute, there are only 11 countries in the world with a footprint bigger than that). In 2011, Shellโ€™s footprint was 570 millionย tonnes.โ€

Thatโ€™s the kind of future Shell is reallyย making.

But Shell isnโ€™t greenwashing alone. Emails between Shell and the London Mayorโ€™s office obtained by campaigners Culture Unstained through a freedom of information request, and seen by DeSmog UK, show how eager the cityโ€™s representatives are to help Shell greenwash itsย image.

Shell invited Sadiq Khan to speak at a conference running alongside the Make The Future event, with the opportunity for him to join the extravaganzaย afterwards.

The Mayorโ€™s office replied that they are keen, but think they can only persuade the mayor to go if there is an announcement related to Shellโ€™s supposed good work in London. The official said in anย email:

โ€œI said iโ€™d try to get the mayor to this and particularly if thereโ€™s potentially something to shoutย aboutโ€.

After some back and forth talking about hydrogen fuelling stations and EV charging points, it becomes clear Shell has no major announcement to make that the Mayor can piggy-back on. So Shellโ€™s representatives start to pitch its emphasis on โ€œfemalesโ€ in the industry at this yearโ€™sย event.

โ€œIt might be useful to know that our campaign around Shell Eco-marathon is focused on females in engineering this yearโ€, they said. โ€œMight be worth adding to our reasons to attendโ€, the Shell representativeย notes.

Thatโ€™s the best future Shell could find to pitch – some EV charging points and a few more โ€œfemalesโ€ in engineering. And the Mayorโ€™s office is depressingly happy to playย along.

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