BP is 'back to petroleum'

Tar sands in northern Alberta

A few years ago, BP spent about US$200 million to rebrand the company as beyond petroleum - to convince us that the company was going green, investing in renewable energy, and cared about climate change.

Statements by former Group CEO Lord John Browne called for research into the effects of his industry on climate change, and effectively got the company blackballed by the American Petroleum Institute.

But this rebranding did little for their green image; they are after all an oil company. And it looks like new Group CEO Tony Hayward is going back to petroleum. Company results for 2007 were released today and show that BP was responsible for 1.3 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions.

BP is also poised to dig up a large part of northern Alberta after purchasing half of the Sunrise field in Canada which ties the company into tar sands extraction until 2060.

If you've never heard of tar sands before it is for good reason. Alberta's tar sands lie under a heavy swathe of boreal forest and the bituminous deposits contain sand, water and heavy crude oil. In order to extract the crude oil the trees are cut down - all of them - the soil mixture is scooped up by gigantic machines and essentially cooked in a series of giant ovens to separate the crude oil from the sand.

This is basically the dirtiest possible way to get oil out of the ground; because it requires so much energy to separate the crude from the soil, the emissions involved in producing the fuel are many times that of conventional crude. And then there is the devastation to the local habitat.

This process is also very expensive. But with soaring oil prices, companies including BP are looking to cash in on Alberta's tar sands.

And in case there was any doubt about BP's commitment to go back to petroleum, in October the CEO announced the company would downgrade their alternative energy division. Significant investment planned for alternative energy will be moved to other divisions of the company. It will be interesting to see how much of this goes back into marketing.