It’s unbelievable and worrisome to return from COP29, the climate conference, having been surrounded by nations and corporate lobbyists advocating for continued and even increasing fossil fuel use. It reminds me of decades ago when Big Tobacco used disinformation and lobbying to weaken health policy on smoking. But we can draw hope from public health winning that battle and creating strong regulations limiting the ability of tobacco companies to influence public policy. We now need to do the same with the fossil fuel industry.
The World Health Organization (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control was enacted in 2003 in response to decades of poor behaviour by the tobacco industry. That behaviour included downplaying the health effects of smoking, concerted lobbying to limit regulations on their products, and advertising to entice new users, including teenagers.
Finally, the harms were so clear and the behavior so egregious that countries were convinced to unite to counter their money and power, and the framework was born. Since then, the framework has saved millions of lives, and in turn, revolutionized how we address industries that harm people.
The rapidly worsening impacts of the climate crisis are increasingly apparent, with devastating wildfires, droughts, floods and hurricanes across the world. For a rational civilization, there would be clear incentives to be much bolder in countering this existential crisis. But, in large part, thanks to active disinformation, disruption and lobbying by the fossil fuel industry, the ambition seemed evidently weaker at COP29.
The cracks in the COP climate conference system are so gaping and obvious that there is now a cacophony of voices calling for changes. In particular, the “Club of Rome” suggests reforms that would substantially improve negotiations. The historical approach to the Big Tobacco lobby which includes banning advertising, eliminating lobbying and taxing products (or at least removing subsidies, in the case of fossil fuels) can transform our approach.
The fossil fuel industry's presence at climate talks is as inappropriate as tobacco companies at a lung cancer conference. There were 1,773 fossil fuel lobbyists identified there with at least 28 from Canada alone. Prominent fossil fuel lobby organizations had pavilions, including OPEC, the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) and Canada’s own Clean Resource Innovation Network (awkwardly named to avoid the words “Canada” and “oil and gas”.)
Meanwhile, authoritarian petrostates have hosted the conference three years in a row, further disrupting the negotiations.
We need regulations to protect against the fossil fuel industry's attempts to delay and dilute effective, life-saving climate legislation. Fossil fuel advertising and public relations campaigns continue to undermine efforts to implement effective measures to discourage fossil fuel use and protect people from pollution and climate change. To reduce the consumption of fossil fuels and stem disinformation that blocks effective climate action, a comprehensive ban on advertising, promotion and sponsorship of fossil fuel products and industries is needed.
The climate crisis is a health crisis. As a Canadian emergency physician, I see the fallout firsthand: the asthma exacerbated by wildfire smoke, the loss of primary care by internally displaced people from our annual wildfire events, and the PTSD and depression that follows climate disasters.
And scientists tell us things are going to get worse, possibly much more rapidly than expected. That money is better spent elsewhere — for example, on our teetering health care systems, or climate adaptation and mitigation.
So, I speak on behalf of my patients and my children, and entreat the world: We must do more, faster. Let’s not allow the fossil fuel industry to delay life-saving reforms, as Big Tobacco once did.
Ban fossil fuel advertising. Remove lobbyists from negotiations. End subsidies. The science is clear, and the stakes couldn’t be higher. It’s time to treat fossil fuels like Big Tobacco.
Dr. Joe Vipond is an emergency doctor and the past-president of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment.
Comments
The last paragraph says it all. Thank you for this article.
Climate activists should stop attending and stop legitimizing useless UN climate conferences. Save the airfare and emissions. Stop flying altogether.
The tobacco and fossil-fuel industry comparison is flawed.
In terms of revenues, the fossil-fuel industry is at least four times bigger.
Unlike the tobacco industry, the fossil-fuel industry has captured governments, political parties, regulators, academe, and the media.
The fossil-fuel industry's denial, disinformation, delay, and obstruction machine is far more powerful.
In Canada, the deep state starts with the Big Banks and Corporate Canada. The oil patch's financial backers — and the chief patrons and main constituency of both main federal parties. And O&G shareholders, who live mostly outside the country.
Political parties led by industry-captured politicians — left, right, and centre.
Industry-captured regulators.
CAPP and other industry lobby groups.
The courts, which uphold the rights of extractionist interests over indigenous communities and protestors.
RCMP/CSIS, which crack down on indigenous communities and protestors.
The legions of industry cheerleaders, apologists, and drum-beaters in the media, at the National Post, CBC, and even The Observer's star columnist.
A web of extractionist think tanks: Fraser Institute, Frontier Centre for Public Policy, Ethical Oil, Friends of Science, Canadian Taxpayers Federation, Macdonald-Laurier Institute, Int'l Climate Science Coalition, Canada Action, Resource Works, Canada's Energy Citizens, Canada Proud, Oil Sands Strong, Oil Sands Action, Oil Respect, Canadian Energy Centre, Canada Growth Council, Canada Powered By Women, etc.
Academe engaged in fossil fuel R&D.
Industry-funded scientists doing bad science to create confusion and obstruct action.
Academics who line up to endorse the "climate-sincere" Liberals and their plans to fail on climate before every election — but remain curiously silent while we choke on wildfire smoke.
Explicit climate denial outfits (e.g., Friends of Science).
Implicit climate denial outfits: Corporate pseudo-environmentalists/lobbyists, industry collaborators, and big ENGOs that sideline grassroots activists, support pipelines, carbon capture — and make bad deals on our behalf with industry. Looking at you, Pembina.
"Meet the green group that the oilpatch can work with" (Financial Post, 2016)
The suggestion that we can use the same playbook to rein in the fossil-fuel industry that we used with the tobacco industry is naïve.
The fossil-fuel industry is in power.
Obviously, Joe Vipond, front-line doctor and true stalwart during the pandemic, but more than that, also a serious environmentalist willing to openly identify the PURELY evil politics of current conservatism as entirely responsible for making a disaster SO much worse.
But what else would you expect from the "Ultimate Chaos Peddlers" and/or the "Convoy Party of Canada" or the "Christian Party of Canada," right? Nonetheless, here we are, on the cusp of apparently somehow voting for these same proud boy idiots DESPITE the Trump wrecking ball ALSO quietly ushering in the insane, bible-based Project 2025, the 900- page culmination of big and getting bigger oil and the religious right joining forces. (I suggest googling Tim Dunn, or start subscribing to DeSmog.)
No wonder the noble "pursuit of truth" for its own sake has disappeared. Only in America could that happen so overtly while democracy and theocracy compete covertly as if on a par; such is the degree of their exceptionalism at this point.
This insanity is proof that Joe Rogan's reach is truly legendary in social media and that Christian Nationalism is the dark horse common denominator between our two countries because we have our own home-grown psycho (literally, the guy has a doctorate degree in psychology from U of T) in Jordan Peterson whose latest book "Wrestling with God" is on two bestseller lists I see in the Globe and Mail on the weekend.
But back to Joe, who offers a recognizable "win" at a time when people are despairing, probably in an attempt to inject some hope, something your predictable litany of doom- scrolling seeks to instead squelch completely, laying waste indiscriminately by unfairly including the likes of Max Fawcett....
Do you think virtually everyone who subscribes to the National Observer doesn't KNOW that the fossil-fuel industry is still very much in power?
Personally, my hope comes from another older aspect of "da boys" which is "live by the market, die by the market" because it's the ultimate, neutral arbiter of ALL aspirations.
Max Fawcett supports new taxpayer-owned pipelines and taxpayer-funded carbon capture, both of which perpetuate fossil fuels.
"In the early days, as a supporter of the Trans Mountain pipeline, Fawcett disagreed with some of the ways CNO covered fossil fuels, one of the main drivers of climate change."
"How Canada's National Observer helped bring climate change into the mainstream" (18-Jan-23)
Fawcett's support for O&G export pipelines — premised on a bright future for fossil fuels — comes as no surprise. The former editor of Alberta Oil Magazine and Liberal Party cheerleader has argued for the Trans Mountain Expansion project and taxpayer-funded carbon capture:
-"Should the government kill the Trans Mountain pipeline project?" (National Observer, Feb 22 2022)
-"Steven Guilbeault leads Canada through the hard choices on the road to net-zero" (National Observer, April 18 2022)
-"Suncor goes back to the future with its new CEO. Are its net-zero ambitions next?" (National Observer, Feb 22 2023)
The former editor of Alberta Oil Magazine and Liberal Party cheerleader argued for the Trans Mountain Expansion project and taxpayer-funded carbon capture:
"Should the government kill the Trans Mountain pipeline project?" (2022)
"Killing TMX won't mean that oil doesn't get consumed, or the emissions from it won't be released into the atmosphere. It just means they'll get to market by different — and more expensive — modes of transportation."
Fawcett's talking points come straight from CAPP (Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers).
"Steven Guilbeault leads Canada through the hard choices on the road to net-zero" (National Observer, April 18, 2022)
Fawcett: "Yes, Canada could move to wind down oil and gas production more aggressively, but that would only create an opportunity for other producing nations — or OPEC, which has spent the last few years deliberately restricting its supply — to fill the resulting supply gap."
The same argument the Conservatives make. The same arguments Canada's asbestos industry used for years.
"If we don't sell it, someone else will." The drug dealer's defence. "Why should I stop selling crack? Someone else will just take my place."
---
Fawcett has bounced back and forth on the federal carbon levy.
1) "Conservatives tweet while Canada burns" (National Observer, Aug 22 2023)
2) "The carbon tax is dead. Climate policy doesn't have to be" (National Observer, March 20 2024)
3) "Justin Trudeau should say yes to a carbon tax showdown" (National Observer, April 11 2024)
---
Fawcett promotes the O&G industry's false climate solutions like carbon capture — rejected by all ENGOs.
In 2022, Fawcett spoke confidently of the oil industry's commitment to carbon capture, a fake climate solution at taxpayers' expense:
"But this year's budget, and the incentives it offers for carbon capture and storage, force Canada's oil industry to push more of its chips into the middle on decarbonization. In order to take full advantage of the credit, companies will have to make major investments in carbon capture projects quickly, since it gets cut in half by 2031.
"By the time fossil fuel producers have sunk that capital into emissions-reducing technology, they're not going to want to go backwards, no matter how much a new or different prime minister might want them to. That's especially true if the rest of the world continues to move more decisively towards net-zero in their own economies.
"By tying their hands with their own stated ambitions, which include reaching net-zero emissions by 2050, the federal budget locks Canada's biggest oil companies onto a path they won't easily be able to deviate from."
"Steven Guilbeault leads Canada through the hard choices on the road to net-zero" (National Observer, April 18th 2022)
Fawcett: "Getting anywhere close to that target will require the construction of multiple carbon capture and storage projects, but not a single one of those companies has made a final investment decision yet."
---
Fawcett nominates Alberta's Pipeline Queen to replace Jagmeet Singh as federal NDP leader:
"Rachel Notley is Alberta's real progressive conservative" (National Observer, May 4 2023)
"Rachel Notley is done with Alberta politics. Is Ottawa next?" (18-Jan-24)
Fawcett: "Notley's demonstrated ability to win over moderates and expand the appeal and reach of the Alberta NDP might be just what a listless federal party needs to get back in the game."
"Pull Rachel Notley out of retirement, if you have to."
"Jagmeet Singh just played himself" (05-Sep-24)
Imagine a world in which the lead columnists of Canada's leader in climate journalism do not support new pipelines.
Can you not conceive of the possibility that people evolve with circumstances and often CHANGE THEIR MINDS completely, especially over YEARS?!
I have pointed out before but will again that such a rigid, dogmatic stance is reminiscent of the conservatives.
@TP: Indeed. Max Fawcett has changed his mind more than once about the federal carbon price. He may change his mind yet again before the Liberals are done. In this reader's opinion, Fawcett's vacillations within a period of mere months diminish his authority and credibility.
Fawcett's recent articles cited above are all of recent vintage. Yes, it is possible that Mr. Fawcett will see the error of his ways — and change his mind.
In the meantime, as a self-appointed authority on these subjects, he and his fellow opinion makers do a good deal of harm. TMX is up and running. The Liberal government is misdirecting billions of dollars into O&G industry follies like pipelines and carbon capture that perpetuate fossil fuels.
As for Fawcett's suggestion that Rachel Notley should lead the federal NDP … Perhaps not the most absurd piece of advice ever offered, but it certainly ranks up there.
"Rigid, dogmatic stance"? So says our resident Liberal partisan. Don't make me laugh.
My views are based on the evidence. I freely criticize politicians of all stripes when they fail on climate. When self-serving politicians and parties fail to serve the public interest, I will call them out on it, whatever hat they wear. When have you ever criticized the Trudeau Liberals or AB NDP?
Not only do you not criticize the Liberals, you attack anyone who does.
You reflexively reject all criticism of the federal Liberals and AB NDP. Essentially writing them a blank cheque. You express unwavering, uncritical support of these parties regardless of what compromises they make. Essentially, they can do no wrong. You refuse to hold them to account, as is every citizen's duty in a democracy.
Why should your federal Liberals and provincial NDP be immune from criticism? If our political leaders and representatives fail to properly address the existential issue of our times, why are they in government? What good are they?
None of my comments suggest an affinity for or sympathy with right-wing views. Just because someone criticizes your beloved Liberals does not mean that they support the Conservatives.
When I criticize the Liberals and provincial NDP on climate, I stand in good company. At the back of a long line of progressive critics on the LEFT.
Logic fail.
Perspective matters.
As you sail along up there, righteous and beyond the fray, strafing at will, the reality is that this pitched battle we're in is like nothing any of us has seen before, with one saving grace--it's become totally binary. There's even the whiff of genuine fascism involved to provide clarity, which should also include political clarity. Unfortunately, our side has instead succumbed to its own version of stubborn hubris and the standard narcissism of small differences, stupidly allowing themselves to be divided and therefore more easily conquered. So I'm a bit of "a pox on all their houses" as well.
But the political reality remains, and the fact that there is no talk of uniting progressives anymore when there used to be before it mattered so desperately, and when it's the only reason these hideous reformed conservatives have even got anywhere, I also metaphorically throw my hands up.
So I vote progressive strategically, but when it comes to strategy, I still think the Liberals are the smartest, not to mention the fact that they are "in power" right now, so I lose patience with all the petty criticism of them when they're still our best chance to hold ONTO it. After all, that petty nastiness IS supposed to be the conservative's wheelhouse isn't it? Imitation is the most sincere form of flattery.
Then there's most people's seeming obliviousness to the algorithms and/or their own proven susceptibility to "subliminal advertising," not to mention the surprising apparent appeal of "mob mentality" in play that's skewing reality even further....
completely agree, its time to take BOLD action. COP needs to be hosted by Sweden, Norway or Finland. Countries that are actually courageous. Oil and Gas advertising needs to be banned!
According to the Norwegian Ministry of Energy, Norway is the fourth largest exporter of gas in the world behind USA, Russia and Qatar. Nearly all of oil (2% of the world oil production) and gas produced is exported. This makes oil and gas the most important export commodities (and government revenues) in the Norwegian economy. Equinor, the Norwegian state-owned company (67% of the shares), is primarily a petroleum company operating in 36 countries (including Canada).
Norway also became the first country in the world to move forward with commercial-scale deep-sea mining when it approves the plan last January. A week ago, after fierce critics from marine scientists and environmental organizations inside Norway and around the world, the move was blocked after the country's Socialist left said it would not support the government's budget unless it scrapped the first licensing round set for 2025. The Prime Minister responded saying that preparatory work on regulations and environmental impacts will continue.
So the question is: "Is Norway a suitable candidate for a future COP meeting?"
I totally agree that similar to the tobacco industry, ban on advertising should also apply to the oil and gas industry. Similar to campaigns aiming at helping people quit smoking, we should also have campaigns showing people the environmental and health benefits of buying smaller cars ( gas powered, hybrid or electric), using transit, bike or simply walk. Publicity for big SUVs and pickup trucks should be banned.