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CALGARY — It’s become the mantra of the oil patch and its top executives: What this country needs is an adult, fact-based conversation about energy. According to a newly unearthed document with TransCanada Corp.’s logo on it, it could also do with a heaping helping of manipulation.
And there, encapsulated in a neat package, is precisely what’s wrong with public discourse about energy development and building pipelines.
Rather than actually sticking to a policy of engaging in open dialogue, promoting economic benefits and addressing concerns with real explanations from experts – all things the industry has pledged to do time and again – there are factions preferring communications black ops, phony grassroots campaigns, squadrons of dutiful Twitter trolls and search-and-destroy missions on opponents.
The document, prepared by Edelman, the global PR firm, for TransCanada and its $12-billion Energy East pipeline proposal, was obtained by Greenpeace and released on Monday.
Some parts include obvious strategies like sticking to a positive message and framing a communication to try to gain trust. Other parts urge the kind of mean-spiritedness the company will want to avoid as it promotes a project that would change the face of the energy industry by moving oil sands crude across six provinces.
To be fair, TransCanada said it won’t implement all of the Edelman plan, subtitled Promote, Respond, Pressure (which is decidedly different from Eat Pray Love).
Spokesman James Millar told The Globe and Mail that TransCanada needs to get intelligence on its naysayers to counteract “misinformation” but that it’s opted against pursuing some of the more controversial ideas, such as quietly providing support to dubious pro-pipeline citizens’ groups.
That’s good. After all, what skilled PR pro would not think through to the implications for a company’s reputation when pulling such a stunt came to light?
I understand TransCanada’s need to get public and media campaigns in place as one part of a much larger strategy for Energy East that involves consulting stakeholders along the route, and also compiling environmental and economic data.
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