With all the attention being paid to alternative fuels, it is not surprising that Big Oil should launch a PR counteroffensive. The American Petroleum Institute (API), advertising itself as "the People of America's Oil and Natural Gas Industry," is running a new TV ad, Delivering America's Energy Security, which can be viewed at their website at energytomorrow.com. Their contention is that there is still so much oil under America that we can achieve energy independence without getting off oil for a long time. According to API, there are "112 billion barrels of technically recoverable oil beneath U.S. federal lands and coastal waters. That's enough oil to fuel 60 million cars for 60 years." Unfortunately, we already seem to have about 250,000,000 passenger vehicles in the U.S. And perhaps we don't have 60 years to reverse the effects of 100 years of gasoline-powered internal combustion.

[Source: American Petroleum Institute]

Despite Big Oil's recent run of record profits, they're still very concerned with the diminishing state the industry's image. The Wall Street Journal ran this article (subscription required) which reports that the American Petroleum Institute (API) is engaging in a "full-fledged, open-ended [advertising] campaign" and has turned to Harris Interactive, the same company that is entrusted to keep America's milk consumption on the ups. API president Red Cavaney has said that they "will spend what's necessary to achieve the objective."

The API says the campaign is an effort to inform consumer and policy makers about how the energy industry works which can most likely be read as, "it's not our fault gas prices soared" and "please let us drill where we want." The article's author, Jeffrey Ball, says that we can expect the call for new drilling to be embedded in a "softer endorsement of steps to address the energy crunch, from efficiency to alternative fuels." He then quotes Harris Interactive senior vice president Jean Statler who's working on the campaign at an oil conference in Dallas as saying, "I know and you all know that you're in the oil and gas business... but the fact of the matter is there is just a driving, overwhelming desire for the industry to start diversifying."

This is more than likely a brilliant move for the oil industry as they'll soon be wading in a sea of Democrats who may very well seek increased taxes and limit drilling.

[Source: Wall Street Journal]