American Petroleum Institute: Please stop selling us snake oil

(Source: Rice University)

by Leigh Pomeroy, Vox Verax

Recently a new ad showed up in the Google ad space in the right column of this blog: Vote4Energy.org. Sounds harmless enough, right?

Wrong.

It comes from the American Petroleum Institute (API).

Now, I don't mind the API promoting itself. Every industry has that right. But absolutely NOTHING on the Vote4Energy.org homepage indicates it's sponsored by the API.

If you go deeper into the site and click on a link or two, you'll learn that yes, Vote4Energy.org is a project of the API. But why does a viewer have to search to find this out? Is there some reason why the API is hiding its identity? Does it do this because it knows it's deliberately trying to mislead viewers into thinking that petroleum is the best answer for America's future?

Seems to me that if petroleum was, in fact, the answer to America's energy challenges, the API would proudly announce this on the Vote4Energy.org homepage.

But no.

Yes, we all use petroleum and will continue to do so for a while in the future. But obviously we need to lessen our reliance on petroleum if we are going to limit man-made climate change and reduce the odds of triggering a runaway climate-induced disaster.

So go on, API, continue to do your thing and keep trying to cut down on those greenhouse gas emissions as you say you're doing.

But don't try to buffalo us with feel-good ads about why we should "vote for energy." Admit who you are. Be proud of it. Be proud of your history. And go ahead and keep selling us oil until we collectively find a suitable replacement for our energy.

But, please … Don't treat us like we're dumb. And please stop selling us snake oil.

(NOTE: The API opposes the Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan.)