Activists Zero In on Gas in Supermajor Court Attack
Activists are suing TotalEnergies for greenwashing. The supermajor's alleged crime: saying that natural gas is better for the environment than coal and oil. Normally, activists focus on oil when they attack the energy industry, but lately, they have shifted their attention to gas. The TotalEnergies case may be only the beginning of a new offensive.
Less than a decade ago, natural gas was broadly accepted as what many called 'a bridge fuel' from the hydrocarbon era to the post-hydrocarbon era of low-emission energy. Gas was going to be around longer than coal and oil as it came to replace them to drive CO2 emissions down. Yet some activists spotted an inconsistency with that strategy. While it emits much less carbon dioxide, natural gas is mostly methane—and methane is a greenhouse gas in its own right. Also, it's more greenhouse-y than CO2, which activists like to point out, although it gets degraded in the atmosphere much more quickly than CO2.
Perhaps the most notorious attack on natural gas was one study claiming that liquefied natural gas specifically was actually more harmful to the planet than coal. The study—although promptly debunked—led to the Biden administration imposing what it called a pause on new LNG export facility permits. President Trump removed the pause, but elsewhere, the offensive against natural gas continues.
'Total has deployed communication campaign on gas aimed at associating it with renewable energies, in an attempt to make it seem positive, clean, desirable energy and even a 'fantastic resource for decarbonisation'. This impression is, once again, seriously erroneous,' said Clementine Baldon, one of the attorneys representing a group of environmentalist outlets, including Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth, as quoted by the Financial Times this week.Baldon's clients accuse TotalEnergies of misleading consumers with an information campaign during its rebranding from Total to TotalEnergies in 2021. The misleading consisted of TotalEnergies saying that it planned to achieve 'carbon neutrality with society', which was inconsistent, per the environmentalists, with its core business, which involved an expansion in oil and gas production—especially gas.
The allegations rest on a collection of 44 pieces of corporate communication, including things like social media posts, corporate statements on TotalEnergies' websites, and advertising materials. TotalEnergies has countered the allegations frankly rather toothlessly, saying that 'It is false and artificial to accuse TotalEnergies of greenwashing . . . TotalEnergies has never said that [fossil fuels] are good for the climate.' The company also said a lot of the information referenced by the plaintiffs was not produced for the mass consumer, so consumer laws should not apply.
In the past couple of years, supermajors began to strike back against the activists. Even TotalEnergies itself filed a lawsuit against Greenpeace for misleading information contained in a report claiming that TotalEnergies deliberately underestimated its carbon footprint. The court dismissed the case, prompting celebrations at Greenpeace, but TotalEnergies' move to sue signaled a change in the industry with regard to activists and their attacks on it.
What this latest lawsuit shows is that these attacks are nowhere near done, which was only to be expected. Climate activists want all hydrocarbons to stay in the ground regardless of emission footprint. But because oil has been overused as a scarecrow, it is now the turn of natural gas, which is objectively cleaner, in terms of CO2 emissions and particulate material emissions, than coal and oil.
Demand for natural gas is rising globally, many countries are trying to switch from coal to gas precisely because it is cleaner in terms of actual physical pollution. From the activists' perspective, this cannot be allowed to happen because gas is as much a hydrocarbon as is oil and as is coal. Cue the lawfare.
In truth, if the activists win this case, the victory will be mostly symbolic. They could probably get the court to order TotalEnergies to add a tobacco-style warning to its promotional materials but they could not force it to stop its LNG developments around the world—because this world needs gas and the ones supplying this gas are the energy companies like TotalEnergies.
In further truth, there is already a shift underway to reduce methane leaks along the natural gas supply chain. There are even certification providers that guarantee certain gas cargos are low-emission ones, and buyers are willing to pay a premium for them. Reducing methane leaks is more gas for sale, after all.
The activists probably do not delude themselves into thinking a court order that can stop TotalEnergies advertising can also stop it from producing natural gas. They may think such an order would sap consumers' appetite for gas, but that would be asking for too much because there is a pretty simple reason why gas is and will continue to be in strong demand for decades to come. It is reliable, it is cheap, and it is abundant enough to remain both reliable and cheap for quite a long while. No amount of 'misleading commercial practices' lawsuits can change that.
By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com
More Top Reads From Oilprice.comRead this article on OilPrice.com
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
8 minutes ago
- Yahoo
'An outright lie': Fiery Bass delivers impassioned speech demanding ICE leave city
Standing alongside a hundred civic leaders as police sirens blared in the background, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass delivered her most impassioned critique of the federal response to anti-ICE protests to date Thursday. The mayor — flanked by faith leaders, business leaders, immigrant rights advocates and others — defended the city's ability to handle the sometimes chaotic protests that have swept across downtown L.A. for the last week, while accusing the Trump administration of deliberately misrepresenting the city as overwhelmed by violence. "To characterize what is going on in our city as a city of mayhem is just an outright lie," Bass said, responding to comments by Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem earlier in the day. "I'm not going to call it an untruth. I'm not going to sugarcoat it. I'm going to call it for what it is, which is a lie." "I served with the Secretary for probably about 10 years in Congress. And Madame Secretary, I do not recognize you. I do not know the Kristi Noem that I served with," she said. Noem told the media earlier Thursday that the Trump administration planned to 'liberate the city from the socialists and the burdensome leadership that the governor and the mayor have placed on this country.' Bass also denounced the brief detention of Sen. Alex Padilla, who showed up at Noem's press conference and was forcibly removed after he tried to ask questions. "They just shoved and cuffed a sitting U.S. senator. How could you say you did not know who he was?" Bass asked of Noem. The hastily-called press conference at City Hall was the clearest representation yet of the two-pronged battle the mayor is currently facing — on the one hand trying to end the Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids that have given rise to the protests across the city, while on the other attempting to quell the vandalism, theft and violence that have roiled the Civic Center and surrounding parts of downtown. At the press conference, Bass once again called for the president to remove the National Guard and the U.S. Marines from the city and to stop the ICE raids. She also extended the 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. downtown Los Angeles curfew that she first announced Tuesday as the LAPD and other law enforcement agencies worked to clear out protesters. The event came nearly a week after ICE agents began fanning across the region, showing up at workplaces, schools and courthouses, and triggering an array of protests across Southern California. Angelica Salas, executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles, said the Trump administration had brought cruelty, chaos and violations of human, civil and constitutional rights to L.A. "What has been brought to our city has been racial profiling in a way that I have never experienced it in my career," she said. "The pain that we are witnessing, when we talk to the family members, is unbearable, of children being left behind," said Salas, as she stood next to Bass. "And I want this president to know that this city is tough, it is organized, it is disciplined and will not tolerate what is happening at this moment." Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
The Hill
9 minutes ago
- The Hill
Padilla denies claims he lunged at Noem during LA press conference
Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) denied the Trump administration's claims that he lunged at Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem during a Thursday presser in Los Angeles. 'I wasn't lunging at her or anybody, and yes, I identified myself,' Padilla told CNN's Erin Burnett Thursday night after being forcibly removed from the presser and placed in handcuffs. The lawmaker said he attended the press briefing to ask why the National Guard was deployed by the president to address local protests sparked by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids last week. 'I'm just trying to do my job as a senator when we ask questions in committee and don't get answers,' he added. Padilla said he used the press conference to try a different approach with the Trump administration to gain information on immigration operations after officials failed to respond to letters from lawmakers. 'I had a potential audience with the secretary, and I took it. Sadly, still not forthcoming with any sort of data or details,' the senator said, before describing his brief meeting with Noem following the incident. 'You would think, you would hope that that's how the meeting would have started, but no apology, no acknowledgment whatsoever. But it's the Trump administration, so I'm not holding my breath for decency, decorum or manners,' he told CNN. 'One of the big points I was trying to make with her is I get if the Trump administration was doing what Trump said on the campaign trail, let's focus on dangerous, violent criminals for detention and deportation. There's no disagreement there. There's no debate there. But that's not what's happening on the streets of Los Angeles and throughout the country,' he added. Padilla said instead lawful residents are being wrongfully removed and detained. 'Where is this going? It's going to keep getting worse. This is how authoritarianism happens, unless and until the people speak up and push back. So that's why you've seen so many protesters, vast majority peaceful protesters, not just in and around Los Angeles this last week, but increasingly in other cities,' he told CNN. 'So, we have to continue to exercise our First Amendment rights, keep it peaceful. Violence is not tolerated. Violence is not condoned. That will have its consequences. But people need to continue to speak up because this is not normal,' he added. Some Republican lawmakers have called for Padilla to be federally prosecuted over the outburst with Noem while Democrats defended his actions. The incident with Padilla follows the federal indictment of Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.) for allegedly impeding and interfering with law enforcement officers at an immigration detention center and the arrest of Newark Mayor Ras Baraka (D-N.J.) for trespassing at the same site.
CNN
15 minutes ago
- CNN
Judge rules Trump illegally used California's National Guard in Los Angeles protests; DOJ appeals the decision
President Donald Trump unlawfully federalized thousands of members of California's National Guard and must return control of the troops to the state, a federal judge ruled Thursday. The ruling from senior US District Judge Charles Breyer is a significant win for Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who sued Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth earlier this week after the president called the troops into federal service in the wake of protests in the Los Angeles area over Trump's hardline immigration policies. 'His actions were illegal – both exceeding the scope of his statutory authority and violating the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. He must therefore return control of the California National Guard to the Governor of the State of California forthwith,' the judge wrote in his 36-page ruling. Breyer is pausing his temporary restraining order until noon Friday. The Justice Department appealed the ruling minutes after it was issued. Breyer, of the federal district court in San Francisco, said Trump had not satisfied any of the requirements that must be met in order to call up members of a state's National Guard and that the president had not complied with a procedural aspect of federal law that requires presidents to issue an order 'through the governor' when they want to federalize state troops. 'Regardless of whether Defendants gave Governor Newsom an opportunity to consult with them or consent to the federalization of California's National Guard, they did not issue their orders through him, and thus failed to comply with' federal law, he wrote. In federalizing the guardsmen, Trump pointed to a provision of federal law that says he can call up a state's troops to suppress a 'rebellion.' But Breyer said in his ruling that 'the protests in Los Angeles fall far short of 'rebellion.'' 'Violence is necessary for a rebellion, but it is not sufficient,' Breyer wrote. 'Even accepting the questionable premise that people armed with fireworks, rocks, mangoes, concrete, chairs, or bottles of liquid are 'armed' in a 1903 sense – the Court is aware of no evidence in the record of actual firearms – there is little evidence of whether the violent protesters' actions were 'open or avowed.'' The judge added: 'Nor is there evidence that any of the violent protesters were attempting to overthrow the government as a whole; the evidence is overwhelming that protesters gathered to protest a single issue – the immigration raids.' And he was extremely critical of arguments pushed by DOJ that the protests in and around Los Angeles against Trump's immigration policies constituted a rebellion. '(T)he Court is troubled by the implication inherent in Defendants' argument that protest against the federal government, a core civil liberty protected by the First Amendment, can justify a finding of rebellion,' he wrote. 'In short, individuals' right to protest the government is one of the fundamental rights protected by the First Amendment, and just because some stray bad actors go too far does not wipe out that right for everyone,' Breyer said. 'The idea that protesters can so quickly cross the line between protected conduct and 'rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States' is untenable and dangerous.' The judge also said Trump had violated California's rights under the 10th Amendment, writing that 'it is not the federal government's place in our constitutional system to take over a state's police power whenever it is dissatisfied with how vigorously or quickly the state is enforcing its own laws.' 'The federalization of 4,000 members of California's National Guard necessarily prevents Governor Newsom, as the commander-in-chief of his state's National Guard, from deploying them as needed,' Breyer wrote. Breyer also suggested that having too much firepower on the ground may be making things worse. 'Federal agents and property may actually well be served by de-militarization and a concurring de-escalation of the situation,' the judge wrote. 'Regardless, Plaintiffs and the citizens of Los Angeles face a greater harm from the continued unlawful militarization of their city, which not only inflames tensions with protesters, threatening increased hostilities and loss of life, but deprives the state for two months of its own use of thousands of National Guard members to fight fires, combat the fentanyl trade, and perform other critical functions,' he added. Attorneys from DOJ had argued during a hearing earlier Thursday that Trump's actions were lawful, pushing back on claims by the state that the president had violated federal law because he didn't involve Newsom in the process of federalizing the troops. Importantly, Breyer on Thursday did temporarily bar Trump from using Marines for law enforcement activities in California, as the state had requested. He noted that there was dispute between each side over whether both the federalized guardsmen and several hundred Marines deployed to LA would be engaged in such activities. 'The Court does not at this point reach any conclusion on this issue,' he wrote. Breyer set a hearing for next Friday to hear arguments over whether his temporary order should not be converted into an indefinite ruling in the state's favor. This story is breaking and will be updated.
