Also by christian

Tate and Oil

Posted by christian - 30 June 2010 at 2:53pm - Comments

BP's pet reporter doesn't notice the oil slick

Posted by christian - 28 June 2010 at 3:12pm - Comments

Via the Dot Earth blog comes this particular exercise in car-crash PR. Maybe you've managed to miss the section of the BP website which contains the work of the 'BP Reporters' - corporate lackeys who are paid to produce puff pieces about Louisiana and how the company is responding to the oil spill.

There have been some absolute shockers - Ballet at sea is a wince-inducing 'favourite' in the office - but a new post where their reporter Tom Seslar flies over the gulf in a helicopter, without once sighting the oil spill - or at least, without referring to it.

We challenge BP to end the oil age

Posted by christian - 22 June 2010 at 11:47am - Comments

When we heard that Tony Hayward was scheduled to speak to the World National Oil Companies Congress – a collection of the greats and good of the oil industry – we knew it was too good an opportunity to pass up.

We wanted to challenge him to live up to BP’s slick branding and actually take the company 'beyond petroleum' in practice, rather than just talking it up. Whether it’s a business model that causes disasters like the oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico, or that drives BP's investment into the Canadian tar sands, the dirtiest oil available, or that assumes that six degrees of climate change is an acceptable price to pay for doing business, it’s clear that BP needs to change.

British polluters

Posted by christian - 14 June 2010 at 4:06pm - Comments

BP rebranding turns out to be surprisingly popular

Posted by christian - 3 June 2010 at 4:10pm - Comments

The first weekly winner from our logo competition, by Ken Cool.

Man, if I'd know our competition to redesign BP was going to be this successful, I'd definitely have chained a couple of volunteers to computers in the basement to deal with all the entries. (Want to volunteer with us, by the way?) As it is, I've spent a solid two weeks staring at a laptop screen downloading, saving, converting to JPEGs, typing into spreadsheets... I want my life back, as Tony Hayward might say.

Nah, only kidding. It's been great, and the reason it's been such an amazing couple of weeks is that the quality of the entries is so staggeringly, mesmerisingly, awesomely high. I think it's fair to say that every entry, from the sublime, to the ridiculous, has something about it which is great. Maybe it's the idea, or an amazing level of design skill. Maybe it's the dark humour that many of the logos show - or maybe it's the heartfelt plea for a different way of doing things. A picture, as they say, is worth a thousand words.

The early entries in our 'redesign BP' competition - have you got ideas of your own?

Posted by christian - 25 May 2010 at 1:22pm - Comments

We've already had loads of really amazing entries to our competition to redesign BP. Got ideas of your own? You can enter here.

We rebrand BP - can you do better?

Posted by christian - 20 May 2010 at 8:56am - Comments

BP has a really nice logo, but it doesn't really suit their dirty business. To me, a shiny green logo doesn't really suit a company that is responsible for the oil currently gushing into the Gulf of Mexico and onto the beaches of Louisiana, or the company that's sanctioning environmental disaster by being poised to invest in the Canadian Tar Sands.

We think the BP logo could do with a makeover, and we'd like you to design a new one to really show what lies behind the logo.

But hey, environmental disaster is the name of the game when you're committed to exploiting unconventional oil. As the wells get deeper and the oil sources get ever-more marginal, the risk to the planet increases.

But still, it might grate a little that a company that is actually considering investing in the Canadian tar sands, which is basically the dirtiest way to produce oil going, describes itself as ‘beyond petroleum', and has a green flower as their brand identity. Could you design them a logo that's more suitable?

Renewable energy solutions profiles wind power

Posted by christian - 11 May 2010 at 10:25am - Comments

If you're not already taking advantage of Peter Sinclair's youtube videos, you probably should be. Each week he examines a particular controversy in the field of climate science, explains it, and picks apart the often-dubious arguments of the climate deniers.

It's a valuable contribution, but if you're after something a bit more uplifting, Peter is now taking occasional breaks from being 'science geek with video skills' to concentrate on showcasing the technologies that we hope are driving the inevitability of a low-carbon future.

This month, it's wind power, and Peter does a great job of expressing clearly all that stuff you kind-of-already know about wind power, but never had the pithy facts at the front of your mind to call on about.

New Greenpeace investigation reveals tar sands oil being used in Europe

Posted by christian - 10 May 2010 at 3:15pm - Comments

The tar sands - biggest industrial development in the world.

There's a massive environmental disaster unfolding in one of the most delicate ecosystems in the world, and BP are responsible.

Sound familiar? You'd be forgiven for thinking of the oil slick gushing into the Gulf of Mexico. But actually, out of the glare of the media spotlight, BP is working on producing another environmental disaster zone. It's just that this time, as far as the company is concerned, nothing's gone wrong. It's just business as usual.

Dial N for Néstle

Posted by christian - 24 March 2010 at 1:30pm - Comments

A week on from launching our Nestlé Palm Oil campaign, it's time to take it to the next level. Nestlé's response has been weak - they're trying to greenwash their way out of trouble. We need to put them on the spot.

Unfortunately, they've also been busy trying to prevent as much criticism as possible reaching their HQ. They've deleted Facebook pages, deleted people's comments, got our video pulled off Youtube for a couple of days, and finally blocked your emails to their CEO Paul Bulcke, telling him to sort it out.

So it's time to be a little more direct. We'd like you to call up the company's customer service line, and tell them that using unsustainable palm oil from areas of destroyed rainforest is simply unacceptable, that they need to cut all ties to the company Sinar Mas - including through intermediaries like Cargill - and that they need to do it now.

Want to give them a call? We've written up some talking points here to help you.

Here's our campaigner Ian calling Nestle earlier today to show just how easy it is:

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