We're excited to bring you this miniseries 

about Norway's complicated relationship with its identity as both a progressive leader and an oil state, from host of the Communicating Climate Change podcast, Dickon Bonvik-Stone, created in collaboration with Norwegian non-profit, Klimakultur. 

, we meet the Norwegians and explore how social norms and cultural values shape their identity as a good, caring, and nature-loving people. We also learn what happens when those values come into conflict with the reality of Norway’s outsized impact on climate change, and discover how and why oil influences peoples’ response to this dilemma.

https://communicatingclimatechange.com/the-black-thread

Listen here, or wherever you get your podcasts (transcript below)

 Norway... a country whose name conjures images of fairytale fjords, mighty mountains and northern lights. A place known for its great adventurers, its sagas about Thor and the Vikings and its cultural treasures, like paintings by Munk, plays by Ibsen, and music... like this by Grieg: A beautiful soundtrack for a nation famous for its natural wonders, clean energy, electric vehicles, and wealth.

So much wealth invested in its citizens' wellbeing, happiness, and positive impact on the world today. Norway tops all kinds of global rankings for life, quality, happiness, democracy, political participation, press freedom and more. In fact, it's hard to imagine a more perfect utopia. And yet, Norway remains a country curiously at odds with its international reputation and indeed with its own [00:01:00] identity. Despite being legally committed to global climate goals, acknowledging the risk of climate change impact within its borders, and maintaining a self-image as a responsible nature loving nation, and a champion of human rights, Norway continues to drill for oil. In 2025 alone, the Norwegian state's earnings from its petroleum industry are expected to reach around 68 billion US dollars, most of which will be funneled to Norway's Sovereign Wealth Fund, known colloquially as the oil fund, an investment portfolio of around $1.9 trillion that promises to assure Norwegian wealth long into the future with nearly a hundred active oil fields in the North Sea, 78 additional discoveries earmarked for future activity and about half of all the oil that's ever been found on the Norwegian Continental Shelf still estimated to be in the ground. The industry shows no signs of slowing down.

None of this fits with the world's view of Norway or how most Norwegians see [00:02:00] themselves.

So what's really going on here? How do identity and action come to clash so significantly? And what forces keep this contradiction in place, from flagrant fossil fuel advertising and the revolving doors between the oil industry, politics, and the boards of major institutions to oil-funded science exhibits for children and a widespread reluctance to fully face the consequences of their actions.

A black thread-- oil-- runs through Norwegian society and culture stitching together a complex patchwork of myths, money, manipulation, and denial. As a result, wherever you look in Norway, oil is not just present, it's accepted as normal, reasonable, and even right. Hello and welcome to The Black Thread, a podcast series unraveling Norway's complex relationship with prosperity, identity, and responsibility in a warming world.

I am Dickon, a Brit based in Oslo, the Norwegian capital. As a [00:03:00] climate communications expert, and having published research about how narratives shape public opinion and support for climate policies in Norway, I've spent a lot of time pondering over the curious dynamics on display in this place I've come to call home. Over the next four episodes, I invite you to follow the Black Thread with me as, guided by a range of experts and industry insiders, I try to understand how these conditions are maintained and how Norwegians try to square this circle. We'll discover where the logic does and doesn't stand up to scrutiny and even hear how Norwegians might move forward towards a future beyond oil and gas.

In this first episode, we'll meet the Norwegians and explore how social norms and cultural values shape their identity as a good caring and nature loving people. We'll learn what happens when those values come into conflict with the reality of Norway's outsized impact on climate change and discover how and why oil influences people's response to this dilemma.

So [00:04:00] let's begin to pull on the black thread.

 You're not the only one wondering why. No way has had such a good reputation and it is strange, of course.

 That's Anna Karin Sæther, author, journalist, and project manager at the Norwegian Climate Foundation, Norway's green think tank.

 You could say that we have been an um, ev frontrunner. The sales of electric cars now are up at 96%.

That's a good thing. And we have donated to forest preservation in the world. We are doing international climate to nature diplomacy, and we try to tell ourselves and the world that we are helping the climate, but we do profit on a product that is devastating for the climate and the emissions from Norwegian oil and gas adds up to about 10 times as much as the national emissions.[00:05:00]

 A real problem Indeed, scientists agree that the world is hurtling in the wrong direction when it comes to climate change, which is causing extreme weather events, rising sea levels, and the devastation of nature and biodiversity all around the world. Across the globe, it's costing lives, impacting human health, driving mass migration, and even according to the International Monetary Fund, risking economies too.

The main driver of this global challenge is rising carbon dioxide, or CO2 in the atmosphere, primarily driven by the burning of fossil fuels like oil and gas. As a result, the United Nations has called for an end to fossil fuels, and instead for a rapid transformation towards renewable energy sources like solar and wind.

Even so the Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre says there is no contradiction between Norway's climate efforts and the country's continued expansion of its fossil fuel industry.[00:06:00]

 Norwegians like to think of themselves as the good guy, a force for good in the world, a small country doing great things. And some of it's true.

We do spend a lot of money on international aid and development and we try to participate on the international scene as a diplomat and so forth. We are a country pushing the environmental agenda internationally to some extent. So it has worked really well to think of oil and gas as something positive.

It's almost as we're doing it just to help the world become a better place.

 According to Anna Karin, Norway sees itself as a force for good in the world. A nation striving to make a positive difference. But how do you reconcile that with selling a product that's driving a global crisis?

Back in 1989, Norway was among the first countries to set a climate goal.

[00:07:00] Inspired by the concept of sustainable development, which was spearheaded by Norway's first female prime minister, Gro Harlem Brundtland, Norwegians took real pride in their ambitious commitment to stabilize their emissions. However, according to Anna Karin, once the reality of that commitment sank in, essentially meaning no further expansion of oil and gas production on the Norwegian Continental Shelf, both politicians and the public stepped back from it. Nevertheless, with a country electrified largely by hydropower and driven by a faith in technological solutions, Norway strove to cut emissions inside its borders, ultimately becoming a poster child for green growth and sustainable development. Decades later, and despite the ongoing expansion of their fossil fuel industry, Norwegians continue to express their deep concern for climate and the environment. Recent polling from research and advocacy organization Oil Change International shows that they rank climate and environmental issues above the likes of education, immigration, and employment.[00:08:00]

Meanwhile, oil and energy concerns rank far lower. Only 11% of people see them as top priorities. Something here doesn't add up. If Norwegians feel so strongly about protecting the environment, and they know oil is a major part of the problem, since they've worked hard to transform their own society away from using it, what's behind the disconnect? To explore this, let's turn to sociologist Kari Norgaard whose book Living in Denial sheds light on the cultural challenges Norwegians face as they grapple with their role in the global climate crisis.

 What we do and don't think about is very much shaped by our collective context, both our social interactions and the kinds of cultural stories that we tell ourselves about how the world works, about what's happening and the kind of cultural tools that we use or have access to, if we don't wanna think about something. What's socially acceptable and what's not?

 [00:09:00] So what is it that's within the source code of Norwegian society and culture that allows this contradiction to continue?

Let's dig into the academic literature for a bit of background on this place, its inhabitants and particularly their relationship to nature.

Norway is about the same size as Poland or Vietnam, 324,000 square kilometers. But with a national population of just five and a half million people, it's mostly wild.

Only 3% of the land is suitable for farming. Around a quarter is forest, and less than 1% is actually urbanized. The rest of the country-- about 70% of it-- is made up of mountains, lakes, and bogs. And that vast, untamed landscape is a huge source of national pride. In fact, for many Norwegians, nature isn't just scenery, it's identity, it's heritage.

Nature is often seen as a birthright, something every child should grow up with and within. There's even a word for that, [00:10:00] 

, the outdoor life: hiking, skiing, climbing, canoeing, et cetera. Being in nature isn't just a pastime. It's part of being Norwegian. The late sociologist Thomas Hylland Erickson claimed that a Norwegian who doesn't get out into nature might be seen as a poor specimen by their fellow citizens.

The special Norwegian relationship to the outdoors is summed up often in the classic saying, "Det finnes ikke dårlig vær, bare dårlig klær," there's no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothes. Basically, being prepared, understanding the elements, and having the skills and the grit to endure them no matter what they might be, is deeply ingrained in the Norwegian psyche and in the way outsiders think about Norwegians too. As Kari Norgaard explains, Norway's connection to the outdoors is rather unique.

 This is a place where, to me it does seem really clear that the natural world and the longtime connection with the natural world is a distinct thing for Norwegians and certainly is [00:11:00] something that's different. You know, sure, Finland and parts of Russia and Sweden have a lot of contact with the natural world, but if you look throughout Europe, not everybody has so much as people do in Norway. I think it's immediately apparent and it's immediately apparent when you look at things like, you know, the amount of time that people still spend doing outdoor activities.

Going to huts, going to the ocean, going to the mountains, going skiing. This creates a kind of self-sufficiency in people, a values around self-sufficiency. There is a sense of connection to the natural world that is affirmed through activities like walking in the mountains sometimes by yourself for days at a time.

This sense of simplicity, this sense of innocence that can come from both culturally recreating it, but experiencing oneself in this way. It can be a strong jumping off point. Those connections with the natural world is an opportunity to care about it, to know about it, [00:12:00] to make observations, to have your sense of security and your sense of identity rooted in the winter, in the summer, in the activities that you do.

Even the bodily sensations of jumping into the ocean or the bodily sensation of, you know, knowing how to dress in the winter for skiing and knowing how to move your body across snow in the winter, that creates a very strong sense of identity and community.

 With a long history of public access to land and natural resources, today, Norwegians right to roam, what they call 

Everyone has the right to walk, swim, camp, and forage pretty much anywhere. Even on private property. There's a real sense that Norway and its resources are for everyone. That means if you're out in the woods and you find a patch of wild berries or mushrooms, you can pick them.

Of course, initially my British instinct was to grab every single chanterelle mushroom I saw, because why not them's the rules [00:13:00] and finders keepers.

But as my pockets filled up and I rummaged in my backpack to make space for more, my Norwegian wife stopped me. What are you doing? She said. We don't need more. Just leave the rest for the next person that comes along.

It was a moment that stuck with me ever since because it speaks to something deeper: that there are unspoken rules here.

A quiet ethic of fairness, of sharing, of prioritizing the collective over the individual. And that brings us to 

, a silent set of rules that Norwegians live by. You can think of 

 as a social code that works to keep people humble. Nobody should be so bold as to think that they're better than anyone else or deserving of more.

It's a culture where people don't tend to show off, don't speak up unless they have something to say. Don't push themselves forward and rarely make bold claims. That might sound cold from the outside, but in Norway, it is part of a strong, quiet social fabric. One where [00:14:00] fitting in matters more than standing out.

 Janteloven would be, again, sort of a cultural code around not sticking your neck out, around not thinking too much of yourself. It's a code that creates, uh, conformity and humility and, you know, it's harder to critique. If you make a social critique, it's seen as rude. It's seen as inappropriate.

It's seen as thinking that you're smarter than other people, and I'm sure that that is part of what can make breaking out of the box around conversations on climate change just seem more inappropriate. In the best of circumstances, the very best of circumstances, talking about climate change is terrifying.

It's very difficult. It's beyond difficult. It's very disturbing at every level. And then if you have it that it's socially inappropriate, that you're breaking social norms on top of it. It becomes a way of dismissing the point of view, right? [00:15:00] In order to have the conversation, there's just a much narrower set of things that are acceptable to talk about. Ways that it is acceptable to approach a problem, and that would be a major limitation. It's not that Norwegians are not thoughtful kind people, it's just that that's just not how things are done in most cases.

 could contribute to people not sticking their necks out, not wanting to rock the boat.

But not only are Norwegians absolutely kind and thoughtful, they're also highly cooperative. Norwegian identity is typically described as practical, calm, conflict shy and emotionally reserved, but it's also built on a strong sense of collective responsibility and collective action for the greater good of the group or for society at large.

There's even a word for that too, dugnad.

 So dugnad, just to define it, is this idea of collective purpose of that you contribute to volunteer actions that we have, that [00:16:00] people have to take care of each other in some way. It's a way of creating a sense of responsibility to participate in a project. I mean, the first way that I was introduced to it was in the community where I was staying when I did the work on Living in Denial and there was a, a barn that needed to be taken down.

And so all the neighboring farmers brought their tractors and other equipment over, and by the end of the day, the barn was on the ground and then everybody was eating food and drinking and celebrating together, and having a wonderful community experience.

 It's an old tradition shaped by the landscape itself.

In a country of scattered settlements and challenging terrain, communities had to rely on each other. You couldn't go it alone. So dugnad isn't just about getting things done, it's about being part of something, doing your bit, whether it's cleaning local beaches, tidying up shared apartment gardens. Or going into lockdown during the pandemic.

Nobody is above it. In this way, dugnad is also anti class, which [00:17:00] really speaks to the sense among Norwegians of egalitarianism and equality. Everyone benefits from the collective commitment. But like so much in Norway, it's rarely spoken about, but it's there. Part of the quiet social code alongside 

So that was your crash course into some of the fundamentals of Norwegian society and culture. But Kari's work in Norway specifically sought to uncover the mechanics of climate denial. So how is it that deeply rooted rules, norms, and ways of being like those we've just discussed, can contribute to what seems like such an obvious paradox?

 When you study sometimes something that's a threat to society, it becomes a moment where you can see how things work. And so taking climate change as an example of how the social organization of denial operates, we can see, in a Norwegian context, there's values of egalitarianism, there's [00:18:00] values of human rights, there's values of connection to nature.

Um, there's a strong sense of moral code. There's a sense of collective purpose, and those are wonderful things, absolutely wonderful qualities that I wish more countries had. But I think one thing that's important to realize is as much as these are potentially very positive qualities, really critically essential qualities.

When it comes to solving a large global environmental human rights problem, like climate change, that if we think about psychological principles like cognitive dissonance for example, we can also see where they can be like an Achilles heel.

 Cognitive dissonance is the feeling of being stuck between what you believe and how you feel, often in relation to some actions that you've taken.

It's kind of a mental tension that makes it hard to fully face a problem or take strong action to fix it. Sometimes [00:19:00] learning new information-- for example, that the emissions associated with your national oil industry are driving climate change-- can lead to the discomfort of cognitive dissonance. People sometimes deal with this by finding ways to justify their behaviors or finding ways to discredit or ignore that new information.

This may explain the great confidence many Norwegians have in a slew of as-of-yet unproven technological solutions to the challenge of rising emissions and the fact that in recent years, at the same time as ranking environmental issues highly in its list of priorities, Norway has also ranked as having some of the highest climate denial rates in the world.

Let's hear from Kari Norgaard about how their national virtues, values, and norms come back to bite Norwegians.

 If you take at the individual level how those are in conflict with emotions that people share, come up for them, talking about climate change such as guilt, such as fear about the future, such as a sense of [00:20:00] helplessness.

You have these three emotions that really come into conflict for people with these ideas of how they see themselves as morally good, as strong environmentalists. So circling back to the idea of

and that it's socially unacceptable to break out of a mold, that becomes a cultural tool that you can wield.

To attack someone by their personality rather than having to deal with the uncomfortable thing that's being proposed. Sociology talks about three levels of social organization and the processes of denial cuts across these three levels, which are the individual level where we have psychological constructs, the cultural level where we have social interactions and cultural norms and cultural tools that we use to recreate culture. And then the larger macro level, which is kind of the political economy and where you have things like in Norway that it's a capitalist society that's organized around fossil [00:21:00] fuel production and how those levels of social organizations shape what people do and don't think about and what is potentially problematic to think or not think about.

 So according to Kari, Norwegians are proud of being kind and caring about each other, about nature and about being a force for the greater good. But their role as an oil nation driving global climate change can bring up feelings of guilt, helplessness, or fear. It clashes with how they see themselves as good and responsible people, leading them to potentially reject the reality, due to cognitive dissonance, or otherwise discredit those who voice that there might be a problem as being culturally deviant and thinking they're smarter than the rest. As we've learned, that's a big no-no in Norway. Something else that's worth adding is that Norway's small communities, even within its major cities, create overlapping social networks where almost everyone is connected in some way. As a result, you might hesitate [00:22:00] to criticize the service at a restaurant because the waiter is friends with someone in your extended family, or avoid commenting on a new local development because your neighbor is involved.

In casual conversation, people often leave out identifying details like company names or surnames because the people on the adjacent table or next in line or sitting nearby on the bus might share social connections in some way. The result is a pervasive self-censorship that I simply haven't encountered anywhere else.

While this can make everyday interactions smoother, it also means important, but difficult conversations-- for example, dissatisfaction with a colleague's conduct or indeed critiques of the oil industry-- often never happen. But the story doesn't end there. These inner conflicts are made even more complex by the fact that oil isn't just an abstract problem.

It's also a huge part of everyday life. Let's take a step back and hear how it all began.

[00:23:00] In 1969, oil sprung into the picture on the website of Equnor, Norway's National Oil Company, it reads: "the same year that humans landed on the moon, taking their first steps out into the stars, what was then the world's largest offshore oil field was discovered in Norway's subsurface universe on the continental shelf."

The discovery of Ekofisk, that oil field, southwest of the city of Stavanger, on Norway's West Coast, offered vast opportunities for little Norway. To expand on our understanding of those early days, here's Jannik Lindbæk, executive Vice President for communications at Equinor.

 Oil, uh, was discovered in late sixties, and then the parliament set the principles for the development of natural resources that was found.

These principles have served Norway really well. The political choices that were made was able to make sure that the resources was developed in a way that benefited the whole of society. And that was the political aim at the time. And as part of that, it was also a [00:24:00] choice to establish a national oil company, which was Stat Oil at the time, which is now Equinor, obviously. For as long as it was a hundred percent state owned, it was obviously every Norwegian's property. Now the Norwegians, uh, share that interest with some other shareholders, but still it's perceived to be a company of the people owned by the people and is supposed to act in favor of public ambitions and goals.

 You can really hear how oil fits into the Norwegian sense of the nation's resources being for everyone's benefit. Berries, mushrooms, fossil fuels. Same, same. But of course, oil didn't just mean resources, it also meant jobs. According to Norsk Petroleum, almost 7% of the Norwegian workforce was directly or indirectly employed in the petroleum industry in 2023.

What kind of impact might that have on the way that Norwegians think and talk about oil? Silje Ask Lundberg heads up North Sea activities at research and advocacy [00:25:00] organization, Oil Change International, who work to expose the true costs of fossil fuels and facilitate a just transition to clean energy.

Silje shares some insight on the influence of oil on Norway's workforce and society.

 Norway's such a small country, so it's been like 56 years since we found the first oil, and during that time, since we are such a small country, almost everyone in Norway knows someone who works within the oil industry, who works offshore, or who benefits from the oil and gas industry in some way.

And then in addition, the fact that our oil and gas industry is happening offshore, that also is kind of like outta sight out of mind. But what we do see is the money flowing in. We see how people that we know earn a lot of money, how they work very good hours. The social license of the oil and gas industry in Norway is super high.

I mean, it has been even higher than what it is today. [00:26:00] Close to 20 years ago you had some polling of offshore Norway. One of their questions were like, are you proud to be Norwegian because of Equinor? Uh, or because of StatOil, as it was called then. 80% or something of who they asked was like, yes, super proud. And that was because we all knew someone who worked there and I mean, they did a brilliant job and they were good.

And we also had the money. So I think it's so, uh, into like the Norwegian soul almost for the past 50 years.

 But it wasn't just the oil workers and their families who were enjoying these boom times, as Anna Karin Saether explains.

 For the politicians, it was like living a dream when you could open all these new hospitals and kindergartens and so forth.

It was hard to say no to all this money coming in. So, um, then I guess this pride was growing and people were noticing to a greater extent, and that was sort of the Christmas [00:27:00] present of all times.

 So a big social norm developed around working in oil too, and that reaches through to the present day. In fact, Equinor, the Norwegian National Oil Company, was awarded most attractive employer in Norway last year, and not for the first time. To many outsiders, particularly those deeply concerned about the worsening trajectory of climate change, this may sound bizarre, even obscene. But it's really just the tip of the iceberg of how visible and normalized fossil fuel employment, advertising and activities are in Norway. Just this summer, for example, I came across a huge set of info boards in the middle of a small town in the north of the country.

These boards were promoting another major oil company, Aker BP. The boards explained that it was a great place to work, that it had ambitious plans to employ more women, and that it was excited about a project where fossil fuel production begins in 2027 and will stretch to quote "2040 and beyond." They also [00:28:00] stated how proud they were of the work that they were doing.

This is in public, out loud and proud. It sort of makes sense then that the very idea of shutting off the pumps, as advocated for by scientists, the UN, vulnerable nations bearing the brunt of climate change, and so many others, remains unthinkable to many Norwegians who still see oil as a lifeline, and not just for the country itself, but for the world.

Here's Silje Ask Lundberg from Oil Change International again to explain.

 Ibsen wrote that if you take the lifeline from an average man, then you take his happiness as well. And I think that is very true about the Norwegian relationship to the oil and gas industry. One of our former PMs Gro Harlem Brundtland, which has a insane amount of status symbol in Norway, she was dubbed "the nation's mother." She said it's typical Norwegian to be good. And I think those two kind of go very well together because we've been told [00:29:00] over and over and over again that we're good. We only have good intentions. We only do the right thing. We have beautiful nature and we're so nice. We spend a lot of money on aid.

We're good. Our oil and gas industry. Well, that's wonderful. It's clean. It's brilliant. We have had very good regulations of the oil and gas industry so that when kind of regulating the industry, the politicians have done a lot of good choices. We have had a lot of tougher environmental demands than in any other country.

I mean, that is why the emission per produced barrel is so much lower in Norway, but that still doesn't make it right.

 Norway's discovery of oil began a new chapter in the nation's story. For many, oil became more than just a resource. It became a source of pride and identity through work, through community, through resources that would benefit everyone.

The Black Thread

 [00:00:00] Hello and welcome back to Drilled. I'm Amy Westervelt. This is our 14th-- 14th!-- Season, and we're doing what I like to think of as the opposite of the Ezra Klein approach. We're digging deep and trying to understand the moment that we're in. Because we're at a really bad time on climate right now and you know, democracy and justice and all sorts of other things, and we're only just starting to really understand some of the forces that have worked really hard to bring us to this moment.

So, you know, it's time to do the reading. For me, understanding the lack of political will to act on climate has always begun with talking to social scientists. So for this season, I wanted to talk to some of the best, the folks behind an incredible new book from the Climate Social Science Network at [00:01:00] Brown University that pulls together everything we currently know about climate obstruction, how it's happened all over the world. In the first four episodes of the season, we looked at how obstruction works. So we looked at PR and media and the psychology of this stuff.

In the next few episodes, we'll focus on who's doing it. Which industries are working the hardest to obstruct climate action.

First up, no surprise, the fossil fuel industry, they're not the only ones doing it, of course, but they are certainly one of the biggest obstacles to climate action. Joining me today is a voice that might be familiar to longtime listeners, Kert Davies, the investigator who read to us from so many great documents that he'd found back in season one of the podcast.

Kert is at the Center for Climate Integrity these days. We also have Geoff [00:02:00] Dembicki, global managing editor of D og, and author of the book, the Petroleum Papers, and Christopher Ekberg from the University of London in Sweden. Let's get into it.

 Hi, I'm Kert Davies. I am the Director of Special Investigations at the Center for Climate Integrity in Washington DC.

 Hi. I'm Kristoffer Ekberg. I'm associate Senior lecturer in Human Ecology at Lund University in Sweden.

 Hi, I am Geoff Dembicki I am Global managing editor with the Climate Investigation Site DeSmog.

 I want to start out talking about this thing that, that you guys start with in your chapter, which is the, oil and gas industries, sudden embrace post Paris, of Net zero and all that it [00:03:00] entails. There's this, this line from an email that came out during the government's investigations in the US on climate disinformation. That's from the BP Global Head of Sustainability and Climate Policy. And Kert, I'm gonna ask you to, to do what I always ask you to do, which is read documents. Could you read this line? From this guy, he kind of references embracing net zero and backing the Paris Climate Agreement is the most obvious course of action to take.

 Yeah. I was reading the whole thing again earlier, and so it's an internal discussion within BP about Trump. What Trump is gonna do with Paris in March of 2017. And that's important 'cause the, the, we really didn't know what they would do yet. And there's an article they're referring to where it says Trump administration might stay in Paris, but kill the Obama pledge. [00:04:00] So effectively be in the agreement without agreeing to do anything. And so the discussion within BP is Paul Jeffress writes to Bob Stout and about six other people. Um, he says, interesting. Obviously I don't know what will happen, but this looks like the most obvious course of action to take. All of the benefits and few of the risks. This is really why the Paris Agreement was designed the way it was to enable flexible transition from one political regime to the next. No one is committed to anything other than to stay in the game. And that last line

 really applies to, you know, the oil companies, right?

They don't have to really commit to anything, but they want to stay in the game.

 Right, Okay. so why were oil and gas companies so into the idea of, of net zero commitments ?

 Well, I, I think it was a period when the [00:05:00] global consensus really was in favor of climate action, aggressive climate action perhaps, or just the appearance of it. And the, the oil and gas industry always wants to look like it's on the side of what all global governments and everyone is is going to do for climate and the economy.

And so during this period, the companies are all coming out and saying, yeah, we like, we like net zero too. This is, this is great. Um, we're going to transform our operations with all sorts of new technologies. And it was also a period when. A bunch of internal documents from the industry had been unearthed by journalists at the Los Angeles Times and other outlets, and a bunch of lawsuits were beginning to be filed against the industry that really scrutinized its past history of climate change, denial, and [00:06:00] other obstruction tactics. And so this, this was a period when it, it just really made a lot of sense for a whole bunch of reasons for the industry to try to portray itself as a climate leader.

 The only thing I would add to that I think is that the net zero concept actually starts a few years earlier with the IPCC, with the scientists, and they are trying to figure out. Climate change is debating the 1.5 or 2 degrees limit. It's originally a chart that shows if you're gonna get to a safe climate, you have to have net zero emissions by some point in time to get there. And so governments adopt that language and then the corporations say, well, if we're saying the same thing, that'll be cozy. So I, I feel like it was of convenience that they started using the same verbiage. To seem like they were in sync with the [00:07:00] scientist commandment and the government, you know, effort.

 I think it also relates to something that we probably will come back to, but there's focus on, on, emissions specifically that there was a, this was also a way to talk about climate action without having to talk about, well, extraction of fossil fuels basically, or scope three emissions in, in more specific ways.

Uh. So it was a sort of way out of more, difficult discussions for fossil fuel companies.

 Yeah. Okay, so you guys talk, in this chapter about climate obstruction in a few different ways, and specifically about three categories of obstruction tactics, denial, delay, and co-optation. Can I have you [00:08:00] define those terms for us and talk a little bit about the interplay between them?

I thought this was really, important, this point that you make that, it wasn't like first there was denial and then there was delay, and then there was this, it's sort of like all this stuff happening all the time. So would love to have you explain that a bit.

 I think this is actually one of the most important thing that we contribute with is just to focus on this, that the responses from fossil fuel companies aren't really, they're not linear in that sense, but very dependent on context. And we can show that. Yeah. All companies in different regions use these different tactics throughout. Well, basically from the 1970s and onwards, but depending on, on context. So it's not sort of this obvious development from denying scientific facts to delaying, sort of obstructing the environmental policy or climate change policy [00:09:00] discussions. But rather that these strategies change depending on the challenges, specific challenges that oil industry face.

And I think with the three categories, it was one way to divide it. But I mean, there's a lot of different concepts, uh, floating around in these discussions. But I would say that perhaps with denial, we're talking specifically about, well denying the scientific facts of, uh, climate change, global warming. And with delay, our focus is primarily on the sort of economic scare tactics of fossil fuel company and sort of this idea that climate change action or action against climate change, uh, will hurt different people regions in different ways. And with co-optation we trace basically the way that fossil fuel companies have been involved [00:10:00] in, uh, framing the issue and, uh, coming up with suggestions on how to perhaps tackle the question or not tackle the question.

 What I would add to that is there's, there's sort of like two overriding things that are key to understanding these tactics. One is that no matter what tactic the oil and gas industry is using at any given time, the ultimate goal is to allow the industry to keep producing as much oil and gas as possible, and what allows the industry to shift.

and forth between these tactics, depending on whatever the political or economic context is, um, is that the industry is always right on the vanguard of doing all of the research and establishing the expertise it needs to lead any given debate. So, oil and gas companies were able to deny the science because they had studied the science [00:11:00] for so long.

They were able to use convincing sounding economic scare tactics. 'cause they were some of the first organizations to really study the economics of climate change. And they were able to co-op the process because the process of international climate negotiations, because from day one they were involved with it.

Learning all the nuances of it. And so I, I think that's really, um, key to all of this as well.

 Yeah, totally. And I think pointing out that these things are shifting around all the time and constantly being used helps people understand this resurgence of denial. Now

you know that it's not this like, I dunno, um,

 Yeah. That was, I think we worked hard at that in the, in the chapter to sort of break that, as you said, linear. Logic that people have used like it, that it went from a period of denial into a period of [00:12:00] along, feel good, uh, co-optation. And it really is whatever tactic is needed at any given time, they can play it. And, and that's what happens. And here we are now, and you don't see any greenwashing because they don't need to have greenwashing right

anymore. Yeah. Yeah. You do talk about the, the evolution of denial a little bit too, and, not just denial of climate change and the science behind what drives it and all of that, but also of, even more basic concepts like, I don't know, this, this thing of, um. We're, yeah, we're totally committed to this stuff while continuing to increase production volumes and things like that, which, as you point out, has just become so normal that it's, people don't even pay attention to it anymore. So, um, yeah. Would love to have you expand on that a little bit. What are, what are some of the other ways [00:13:00] that they use denial of basic science to their benefit?

 Yeah, I think the, the point here was that it's not just

flat denial, it's not happening greening earth, you know, which we still see, we see again, even in the Trump report that just came out, but it that we can ha denial can be. Just denying the urgency, denying what scientists are saying needs to be cut to save us.

And the slowing down is a form of denial. And uh, you know, ultimately, you know, as we were saying that the, you know, denying helps them avoid the real discussion of. The need for a fossil fuel phase out the need to cut production of their products, and that's what they really don't want. So they look for every other pathway that allows their business to continue. And that includes, you know, carbon capture [00:14:00] mythologies and trading with natural carbon credits and all these other schemes that are in fact denying what the scientists say is urgently needed.

 I was just, thinking about bringing it back to this Stanley Cohen, who's sort of been very influential in the discussion of denial and the, his idea of obligatory denial. That is very much. What we see, basically, people not acting. Others have talked about Yeah. Refusal or other words. Just to describe what we also show in the chapter that even though we have these promises of, climate action, we see that, yeah production just goes up and there's like in their own annual reports, there's no sign of cutting production. So.

 Yeah. And, and what I would say is like with, with the implicit denial, it's, it's basically like the same obstruction mechanism, like in, in the hardcore denial days in like the [00:15:00] nineties, industry would be like, climate change isn't happening. And then they would, keep producing more and more oil and gas at the same time.

So obviously they got a, a lot of flack for that. They looked kind of, um, crazy to the public eventually. So the company's just like deleted that, like really, um, in your face Denial, but just kept doing basically the exact same things. So now they say, oh yeah, we, we acknowledge climate change is real and urgent.

And then their production keeps going up and up and up. So despite a lot of rhetorical change over the years, the, the sort of material circumstances of what they're doing remain almost exactly the same.

 and it might be also important to say that this sort of more, uh, obvious science denial hasn't disappeared. I mean, it might have disappeared from the fossil fuel company, um, strategies or rhetoric, but [00:16:00] it has appeared in other places, like in far rights environments. And I mean, with Trump and others like we see. See those kind of claims still there, but perhaps not as much from fossil fuel companies as before.

 Well if, if you consider that the current energy secretary, Chris Wright, used to be a fracking executive until very recently and now he

 sponsoring a report saying that the human contribution to climate change is uncertain. I think we're we're like back, um.

 and, and adding to that, I would, I would credit. Exxon's money and Koch Industries money with keeping denial alive. You know, Exxon paid a fortune to keep these voices active in the late nineties and into the two early two thousands. Koch industries paid a lot of money to these same organizations. So the whole reason that Chris Wright is, has learned those things is because of [00:17:00] megaphones that the oil companies bought.

 Yeah. Yeah. Well, Chris writes, been broing down with the Cokes for a long time

too. Um, okay, so I, I realize that this question could take like the whole hour to answer, so, feel free to just give me the headlines, but I do wanna talk a little bit about the role that industry- led and industry- funded research has played into all of this as well, like the extent to which they have tried to use credible seeming science or cred, credibly adjacent science, to, earn themselves a seat at the table. And then use that seat to mess things up along the way.

 I think it's actually different for each company. We don't, we don't know a lot about what the individual companies were studying except for Shell and Exxon especially. We have evidence that the American Petroleum Institute [00:18:00] as a body was monitoring the science very, very broadly.

And through the GCC, they were sending people to the. Intergovernmental panel and climate change meetings, who were reporting back to all of them, what was going on in the science. But as far as their own research, we know, you know, Exxon was doing its own modeling. It knew what was going on. We know Shell looked at all the science in the early eighties and determined that by the time the science was unequivocal. It would be too late in their words, which is kind of grim. And they actually proposed a more precautionary approach internally, but never said that out loud to the world. She, um, but this is kind of crucial that they were playing along. And part of what they started to lead research on was things like carbon capture, which is the ultimate. Holy grail now for the oil industry is that [00:19:00] we can keep burning fossil fuels as long as we capture some of the carbon and tuck it back in the ground, and which they've never done effectively, but that's that on the horizon. Um, dream has allowed them to keep producing and selling oil because they're working on it, because they're researching it.

 Yeah, and I, I would give the example of Exxon and carbon pricing. So in part of the, the period that we're looking at in the chapter following the 2015 Paris talks. Exxon, was part of organizations that were calling for a price on carbon and said, you know, that this is the type of policy we could potentially support.

And then of course the Exxon lobbyist, Keith McCoy, was secretly recorded by, um, Greenpeace researchers saying that the company only supports a carbon price. 'cause it gives it a nice talking point and it actually knows that this is probably never gonna happen. [00:20:00] In the US and that was just such a, a fascinating admission 'cause it, it sort of confirmed what a lot of people.

Thought, but it also came as Exxon was going to war with basically every major substantial climate policy that was proposed in the U.S. and then as a, as a defense, it could say, well, we support this carbon pricing thing. And so of course Af after that interview came out, Exxon kind of dropped any pretense of that.

But I, I think, I think that shows what this co-opting dynamic is all about.

 I was thinking about also another example with, uh, that Leah Aronofsky has looked at the Shell sponsored research by James Lovelock, for example, which is I think that adds another bit to it. That is not always, and this is historical research, so it's not always that the industry led research have been like, instrumental or specifically targeting [00:21:00] climate change or climate science. But, but sometimes it's sort of a broader perspective where they can sort of pick and choose, later on, specific things that they bring to the fore. So in this case, the adapt, adaptability of natural systems or the fact that some organisms emit, CO2, that later on could be used as a part of science denial. So I think it's also important to, like, not everything is very instrumental. They have a lot of resources, so can actually fund quite, broadly in a sense.

 Yeah, to just sort of shape basic understandings of things too. Actually, relatedly, can I have you guys speak to, how important it was for these companies to get academics, especially academics connected with elite universities to carry water for some of their ideas or, or even just to, to do research along with their scientists.

 I [00:22:00] think starting with the GCC, we see that they were participating in scientific processes, industry, especially Exxon scientists were co-authors and part of the IPCC process, it was important for them. They felt to, to, be in that room, to know what, where the science was. They heavily focused on the modeling. They still do, um, because they know that the forecasting is really what drives the urgency and they. They start to form partnerships with, with academic institutions. BP at Princeton, Exxon, at at Stanford. Exxon at MIT, to bring those, those, logos next to theirs. But then they also have third party surrogates like Richard Linson at MIT or Pat Michaels, who was at UVA, who will say the things that they don't want to say, but they have. An incredible [00:23:00] academic, label. And they were more useful than just the pundits at the think tanks because it made it look like serious people disagreed with the urgency of climate change or the Jim Hansen. Uh, it was a counter to the Jim Hanson mode of, of speaking about the issue or Steve Schneider.

So it was a, I think a very deliberate effort to. Again, just cast doubt. All their whole objective is to have some shred of doubt around the issue, which gives somebody in the policy arena some politician, the ability to say, let's wait and study this. Let's, let's look at this a little bit more.

It's not that urgent. Look, this guy at MIT just said it's not that bad. That's ongoing and has been going heavily for 30 years now.

 Yeah, I would argue it's maybe even increasing now that public funding is getting cut too. Ugh. Anyone else wanna [00:24:00] add to that?

 Yeah, I'd say, having these prestigious academic institutions attached to denial really helps influence policy makers. But from the, the very, um. Earliest days of public denial. A lot of these spokespeople were encouraging Americans and whoever else to, to spread these ideas in their own, social or family networks.

So some of the earliest, denial ads on the radio, people would say change begins at like the dinner table. You should, you should share these ideas with, people close to you because it's such an important discussion to have. So I, I think the, the only way that you can really convince a ton of people to accept something as crazy as what the companies were pushing with denial is if it comes from, someone you trust.

And so I think that's, that's what this, this whole process is all about. And then of course, when this whole discussion [00:25:00] shifted online, um, onto big digital media platforms, I think that really allowed all of this to, to supercharge. It wasn't necessarily some big evil oil company telling you to, distrust scientists.

It was like, your uncle who you meet with once a week posting something on Facebook.

 Right, right. Okay. We mentioned economics before and how the industry was amongst the earliest, if not the earliest, to study the economic implications of climate policy. So would love to talk about that a little bit more, what they did and how important that was to obstruction efforts.

 Well, I, I always point to this, study that Exxon's Canadian subsidiary Imperial Oil, created in the early 1990s. And so Imperial and Exxon were like so far ahead of the curve in understanding climate change that they were. Hiring consultants and [00:26:00] actively studying solutions to climate change. In the early nineties, and this was only a few years after James Hansen had given his testimony to Congress and turned climate change into sort of like a big mainstream issue.

And so in one of these reports that Exxon and Imperial commissioned, they determined that a price on carbon emissions in Canada could potentially stabilize greenhouse gas emissions in the country without a hugely negative impact on the economy because governments would have so much additional revenue from taxing carbon.

The company and its, consultants determined however, that carbon pricing would be specifically bad for Imperial's bottom line. And therefore, they came up with a strategy to portray carbon pricing and any other climate solution in the worst possible light to media. Policy makers. And so this was, this approach [00:27:00] was, was tried out, um, in kind of an experimental sense in places like Canada and other regions, and then it really started to go mainstream throughout the nineties to the point where any discussion about climate change always contained this reflexive response from industry saying that any solution will destroy the economy.

 I know it's like the consistent talking point, even from a lot of people who say that they think we should act on climate.

they wanted to feather this in because it allowed. Even people who cared to hedge by saying, but we shouldn't hurt the economy. And that's also the basis of really the bird hagel stuff. And the stuff that the American Petroleum Institute pushed after Kyoto was, yes, but we shouldn't hurt the American economy.

Um, and. That's really a powerful [00:28:00] message and of course resonates more with average people than, than environmental benefit if you're gonna hurt the economy. And it, it even came down to, very deliberate scare tactics when they started doing these so-called economics reports where Alec, the American Legislative Exchange Council did a report that showed, all the bad things that would happen state by state. I think it was Alec, you know, that. You, if you do Kyoto, it's gonna raise the price of energy by $1,212 in Iowa and total made up numbers, but very effective local headlines they could create with these economic. So-called studies. And one of the people who did those studies admitted in a documentary recently that they failed to include the economic downside of climate change, the damages in their equations. So not very good math [00:29:00] in the end.

 as coming from, uh, from history always. I have a PhD in history, so that's why. I, the, it might be weird that I said I'm in human ecology, but I'm a historian by training, and I think this is sort of a anti-environmental, talking point already from the 1970s, I guess, with, already with the oil crisis that, if something hurts, basically energy industry. Largely then that will affect your possibility for transportation, for heating, for electricity. So it's a very close by topic or, I don't know how to say it correctly in English, but yes, you can sort of feel it right away. So I think that's the way it has been very effective. And it's been used, I mean, now we talked about the us but as we show in, in the paper, as we talk about the, basically, basically oil industries attacks on, the [00:30:00] suggestion to have a joint carbon tax in. The European in early 1990s where, yeah, basically the same talking points were used. So it's a effective, around the world tactic, I guess.

 Making it look like sacrifice instead of progress is really

 And I think another important part of that was dismantling this conservative consensus that protecting the environment is also good for the economy, which took a lot of deliberate work on the part of oil and gas, because even up into the, the nineties, um, you know, some of the most consequential environmental initiatives came from conservative politicians, Republican. Administrations and so the oil and gas industry, by using these scare tactics, it wasn't just rhetorical, they could reorient [00:31:00] an entire side of the political spectrum to get the kind of anti-regulatory policies that they wanted.

 Yeah. I mean, I feel like we could almost point to the current abundance discourse as the ultimate success story here.

I just came back from a conference and we talked about this, like, should we understand climate change denial as, primarily an environmental issue or something developed in relation to environmental issue or if we should see it as a energy issue. I think that really makes a difference in how we see that. We can see that. Well, basically some parts of the conservatives could actually agree on en environmental stuff, but when it came to questions on energy and basically economic growth and those kind of issues, then yeah, uh, there's a much stronger pushback.

 It harder than solving the ozone layer or toxic waste or other things that [00:32:00] other environmental challenges.

 Right. So not at all unrelatedly. Can I have you walk through a quick history of the Waxman Marquee Act and how, I don't know, sort of a combination of these obstruction tactics work to kill it?

 Yeah, I can take this. I mean, the, the evolution of Waxman Markey, of course it's, it's in 2009, so Obama has just been elected. There's been a, a bit of a sea change in the US in the second bush term where more climate action is inevitable. Um, so. Obama gets elected and both the House and the Senate are in democratic hands.

So we're gonna, I heard someone say we're gonna run the table on climate, and the first play was, uh, of course they went after healthcare first, and that was a mistake. So it, it, uh, got the enemy riled up, including the Koch brothers. But Waxton, [00:33:00] Markey was constructed in the, the, same form as. All other climate policy at the time, a sort of cap and trade mentality of, you know, putting a cap on carbon and then figuring out a way to, to, get to those goals. Um, the mistake was that many, the people who ran the game thought that the coal, uh, fired utilities and coal interests were gonna be, be the biggest obstruction and therefore needed the biggest handout to get them to not. Try to kill the bill. So there were a lot of handouts for, uh, coal-fired power plants if they could get to carbon capture, and I'm calling them handouts, but the smart people who wrote it probably thought they were really clever devices to get some action out of those industries and there was nothing in it for, for big oil.

Um, so. After the bill passed the house in the early summer, then the oil industry got [00:34:00] really mobilized and, and, uh, went after it. And, um, we see the, the birth of the energy citizens, uh, campaign by American Petroleum Institute with Edelman prs help. They went after it hard and they basically knew they could kill it in the Senate and that's where it died.

It, it never evolved. The importance of 2009 can't be underestimated because we were headed towards the Copenhagen meeting of the UNF Triple C, and that was gonna be what Paris eventually was, was a. Rebirthed after Kyoto fizzled. Um, and it was supposed to be then, and then because the Obama administration had nothing to bring because Waxman Markey didn't evolve into law, um, then that meeting fizzled also climate gate.

But it was, um, it was really a failure of the US to lead. And, then we're, [00:35:00] you know, of course into a whole mess the next year with the deep water horizon. But the Westman, Markey, you know, the concept was good and it was the first major attempt at an economy wide, you know, law in the us And it didn't, didn't, get there.

 And, and another important piece of that. And that's, that's a great summary, Kurt. Um. Is that this, this really came during a moment when a, a lot of conservatives were sort of cautiously embracing climate action publicly, including even Rupert Murdoch who said he wanted to use his media empire to push out pro climate messages at one point, which just seems insane now.

Um, but you had the heads of oil companies coming out saying climate change is real. Um, Lindsey Graham was, was backing the, the cap and trade effort. And so the, the smart oil and gas people realized they needed [00:36:00] to, to break that emerging consensus on the right. And so when all of these tea party protests started erupting around healthcare, that's when, um, Koch Industries and other oil and gas money kind of got involved in trying to steer that grassroots right wing movement against climate action.

And they were very successful in doing that. And as the tea party progressed, one of its major policy goals was to re repeal Waxman Markey. And in, in the process of all of these, like angry revolts and far right people screaming at their representatives, um, Lindsey Graham got spooked. He pulled his support for the bill.

Fox News, um, went fully in bed with the Tea Party and was pulled even further to the right. A lot of these, um, sort of conservative thought leader people, um, backed off and started embracing climate denial again, [00:37:00] and, and within a a few years, this, this consensus that we needed to do something about climate change, even among conservatives, was sort of like lying in tatters on the ground.

Transcription

 something the fossil fuel industry does, but they’ve certainly spearheaded and masterminded a lot of efforts. In this ep, an academic (Kristoffer Ekberg, University of Lund), a nonprofit researcher (Kert Davies, Center for Climate Integrity), and a journalist (Geoff Dembicki, DeSmog) walk us through what we know so far about those efforts.

S14, Ep5 | How the Fossil Fuel Industry Sabotages Climate Action

Petroganda

Climate Obstruction

Carbon Bros

SLAPP’d

There’s no avoiding it: Things feel pretty bleak. To witness venture-capital-fueled AI domination, democracy’s steady drift toward authoritarianism, state-sanctioned genocide, and, of course, the collapse of one climate boundary after another, is to encounter a profound, at times overwhelming, sense of despair.

But what if the path forward lies in accepting, rather than resisting, this despair? In his new book, 

Learning to Live in the Dark: Essays in a Time of Catastrophe

, climate activist and journalist Wen Stephenson argues that the 

 way to confront the crises of our time is to meet this despair head-on—to see it for what it is, to feel it, and to accept what it means about where we are and where we must go.

 spoke with Stephenson about how he processes his own climate despair; what scholars of totalitarianism like Hannah Arendt and Albert Camus can teach us about fossil fascism; and whether a mass movement for climate action might not come together until enough people are desperate enough. This conversation, as Stephenson describes the book, is about “how to 

 this era of climate and political and social catastrophe…while holding on to our humanity.”

The written Q&A below has been condensed and edited significantly for clarity and accuracy. 

 The audio version of this conversation briefly discusses suicide. If you are in crisis, please call, text, or chat with the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988, or contact the Crisis Text Line by texting TALK to 741741.

Prefer to listen? Check out the podcast version of this conversation here, or wherever you get your podcasts: 

Something that weaves throughout the book is this idea of despair. You go to great lengths to differentiate despair from nihilism or, on the other end of the feel-good spectrum, optimism and hope. Can you talk about how you think about despair in the context of the climate crisis?

Absolutely. I mean, this is the title of the book. My essay on Hannah Arendt in the time of Trump and climate was 

, back in 2017. I was looking for someone who could help me look into the abyss. There are few who did that more productively than Arendt.

I guess the first thing that’s important to say is that given what we’re up against, despair is warranted. That’s really central for me. I say this kind of flippantly, but not really: It’s not a sin. I’m not Catholic, but I was raised in a conservative Christian family. Despair is not a sin, as some would say. It’s not, like, moral weakness or a flaw in your character. It’s entirely understandable. In fact, it’s rational on some level.

The Black Thread

What Should You Do with Climate Despair?

75,000 Endangered and Exotic Animals, SLAPP Suits, and Zero Oversight

Exxon and Shell Sue The Netherlands in Secret Tribunals for Closing Europe’s Biggest Gas Field

The Golden Age of Oil-Funded Influence

Petroganda

Climate Obstruction

Carbon Bros

SLAPP’d

S14, Ep5 | How the Fossil Fuel Industry Sabotages Climate Action

We are a global team investigating the obstacles to action on climate change, all over the world

The Black Thread

What Should You Do with Climate Despair?

75,000 Endangered and Exotic Animals, SLAPP Suits, and Zero Oversight

Exxon and Shell Sue The Netherlands in Secret Tribunals for Closing Europe’s Biggest Gas Field

The Golden Age of Oil-Funded Influence

Petroganda

Climate Obstruction

Carbon Bros

SLAPP’d

Support our reporting,subscribe today!

S14, Ep5 | How the Fossil Fuel Industry Sabotages Climate Action

We are a global team investigating the obstacles to action on climate change, all over the world

Support our reporting,
subscribe today!