this post was submitted on 28 Feb 2024
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“we’ve waited too long to open the aperture on the solution sets in terms of what we need, as a society, to start reducing emissions,” Woods told Fortune

Archived copies of the article: ghostarchive.org web.archive.org archive.today

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[–] thanks_shakey_snake@lemmy.ca 63 points 9 months ago (7 children)

Far be it from me to tell a Lemmy mob not to eat an oil exec, but wow that's not even close to what the article says.

“So we’ve got to find a way to get the cost down to grow the utility of the solution, and make it more available and more affordable so that you can begin the [clean energy] transition.”

As per the article, this exec is saying the exact opposite of "it's too late to transition to clean energy so we might as well not bother." He's saying "it's taking too long because it's too expensive, so we need to focus on making it cheaper so we can get there faster."

Is he lying about wanting to hasten the transition to clean energy? Maybe.

Are there other reasons that he is a fiend that must be eaten by the working class? Likely. Article hints at some of them.

But wow this take is off base. These guys do a good enough job making themselves look bad, we don't have to also make stuff up.

[–] Cris_Color@lemmy.world 18 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I appreciate you doing the work to add more context for folks who didn't read the article (myself included 😅)

[–] thanks_shakey_snake@lemmy.ca 8 points 9 months ago

Lol, thanks. Sometimes I'm the one skimming the comments and skipping the article, so I'm glad I cold be helpful this time. I was expecting to get downvoted to hell based on the rest of the comments, but I'm happy to see that the response has been mostly positive.

[–] Krauerking@lemy.lol 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I mean he also blames the people using electricity and says they need to pay more to cover the carbon offset costs which sounds a lot like he's looking for an excuse to raise prices and push governmental fees on consumers more directly in this same speech.

I read through the article and think him saying it's too late is like the barely visible take when he's flashing a neon sign of "I'm not cutting down production and you fuckers are gonna pay for it!" And blaming governments for not wanting to pay for company infrastructure changes is hilarious when they lobby to make it so there is no more government insight anywhere else but covering the costs they don't want to pay.

He's definitely on the list but yeah title and thing OP tried to pull from this is so not the worst part of it.

[–] thanks_shakey_snake@lemmy.ca 2 points 8 months ago

Yeah, exactly-- There's plenty of oil exec bullshit right there in the article, but I was surprised to learn that he was actually talking about clean energy as an important thing to hurry toward, and investing large sums in carbon capture and stuff. A far cry from cartoonish climate denialism and trying to stop decarbonization.

I saw another post on the same article that had a title like "oil exec tells the public that it's their responsibility to foot the bill for clean energy..." And while I think that's lacking a little nuance, it's at least one area (of several!) that represents an actual claim that deserves criticism.

[–] Gabu@lemmy.world 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

He’s saying “it’s taking too long because it’s too expensive, so we need to focus on making it cheaper so we can get there faster.”

Which is a lie and a bogus statement. They want it to be cheaper so they can get more profits, as usual.

[–] thanks_shakey_snake@lemmy.ca 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Is it? Solar, for example, is getting cheaper, and as it gets cheaper, more people adopt it, which broadens its impact. Electric cars were prohibitively expensive until companies put R&D money into building cars that people could afford, and now they're starting to gain traction.

Not to say that companies producing solar cells and EVs aren't also trying to profit... But both things can be true.

[–] Gabu@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

The fact electric cars exist to begin with is an abomination. Cars don't need to exist at all.

[–] thanks_shakey_snake@lemmy.ca 1 points 8 months ago

Electric bikes and busses then. Same story.

[–] whoelectroplateuntil@sh.itjust.works 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

It's taking too long because the fossil fuel industry is heavily subsidized creating the appearance of a stronger cost advantage for fossil fuels than actually exists, which is the kind of bullshit Exxon-Mobil CEO is responsible for.

[–] 31337@sh.itjust.works 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

This kinda lines up with propaganda I've been seeing the past couple years (from the likes of Peter Theil and Alex Epstein). They argue that we should be extracting and using fossil fuels as fast as possible. The (stupid, fucked up, wishful thinking) idea is that cheap energy drives human development and technological solutions to climate change.

[–] thanks_shakey_snake@lemmy.ca 1 points 8 months ago

Yeah... And I mean, that's correct in a sense-- Cheap energy is good. It's just not the only factor.

Like cheap food is great too, but you might end up in a bad place if your nutrition strategy is just "spend as little as possible."

[–] mcvikingqueef@lemm.ee 3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

"So we’ve got to find a way to get the cost down to grow the utility of the solution"

As if they don't have a significant sum of all the worlds money. If its too expensive they should be eating all the cost, since they are the ones that put us in this mess, knowingly. They shouldn't be complaining that it costs too much. Maybe instead of wasting all that money lobbying against climate science, they could have put all that money into decarb and renewables. We are lightyears behind where we could be and why? Because they lied about what they knew and had to keep lying about it and maintaining the narrative that there is no problem. Can't get anybody to believe that anymore so now they say they need more time and money and its just too hard guys. No excuses for these vampires.