Cigarettes & Tailpipes: Tales of Two Industries

Lowell Bergman, Investigative Journalist
Stanton Glantz, Director, Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education, University of California San Francisco
Kenneth Kimmell, President, Union of Concerned Scientists
Bill Reilly, Former Administrator, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency; Senior Advisor, TPG Capital

Oil companies have long used a page from tobacco companies' playbook by vigorously denying evidence that using their product as directed causes societal harm. Now the tobacco and oil narratives are getting closer following news that ExxonMobil executives for decades suppressed internal reports about the negative impacts of burning fossil fuels.

A former U.S. Department of Justice lawyer who won a huge racketeering case against tobacco companies says the federal government should investigate whether oil companies colluded to bury evidence of human-caused climate disruption. It’s easy to blame energy suppliers and that may be the right thing to do. But don’t individuals also share responsibility for driving and flying around knowing that we are emitting climate-killing gases? Aren’t we also culpable? A conversation on how oil might be the new tobacco.

A conversation on how oil might be the new tobacco.