Climatic Change (2015) 132:157–171 163 could not resolve the problem. But that does not mean we should do nothing. …We have a responsibility to act [and] BP accepts that responsibility…^ (Browne 1997) Browne’s speech was a major departure from the prevailing industry pattern. The Los Angeles Times concluded it was akin to the Liggett Group’s acknowledgment earlier that year that smoking caused cancer and heart disease, the first major tobacco company to do so (Gerstenzang 1997). It was met with public praise and anticipation of action. The Financial Times reported that BBP’s stance sets a higher standard against which to judge other companies’ readiness to cooperate with governments to fight climate change^ (Allen and Bach 2011). Following the speech, BP and several other companies took steps in the direction that Browne envisaged (Kolk and Levy 2001). In 1997, BP became the first company to leave the Global Climate Coalition; Shell Oil (U.S.) left the following year. In 1998, BP established an internal cap-and-trade system reducing internal emissions by ten percent over the next 4 years, and began to invest in solar energy, forming BP Solar in 1999. These measures were touted in a major advertising campaign launched in 2000 to rebrand BP as BBeyond Petroleum.^ Shell and Chevron also made targeted investments in renewable energy, totaling as much as 2.5 % of each company’s annual expenditures during the past decade (Juhasz 2013). In 2007, BP, ConocoPhillips, and Shell became charter members of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership (USCAP), a coalition of business and environmental groups seeking to shape U.S. federal legislation to reduce greenhouse gases. In short, alternative paths were possible, and some leading companies took initial steps along them. Responsible climate action by these companies would have extended these initial steps to broader policies to become diversified energy corporations. This would have included unambiguous acceptance of the available scientific evidence demonstrating the role of fossil fuel production in driving dangerous climate change, encouraging public and corporate support for policies to avoid dangerous climate change; vigorous and sustained investments in low carbon energy technologies in anticipation of such policies; education and training for company employees to understand the reasons for the changes in their business model; and forthright communication with shareholders, banks and insurers, and the general public to explain their shift in company strategy. Responsible action by the fossil energy companies would also have included vigorous investments to assess the feasibility of carbon capture and storage technologies. The oil industry had the capability to assess and develop CCS based on their experience since the 1970s in CO2 injection as part of enhanced oil recovery (EOR), and the coal industry had a strong incentive to develop carbon capture and storage technology, perhaps in cooperation with coal-burning utilities—at or near sites of coal-fired power plants. By 1988, recognizing the need to reduce the risks of their products, these industries could have invested in adapting EOR technologies for the purpose of long-term carbon storage. But they did not. 5 What did the industrial carbon producers do instead? The major investor-owned fossil fuel companies did not follow this path. On the contrary, they took essentially the opposite path, denying the reality of the problem of climate change, working to ensure that fossil fuels would remain central to global energy production and that