But it isn’t increasing demand for oil that is driving the recent price increase. In fact, demand is the lowest it’s been since April, 2007, according to the Oil Price Information Service (OPIS). Instead, OPIS points to speculators as the party responsible for driving up prices:

Strangely, the current run-up in prices comes despite sinking demand in the U.S. “Petrol demand is as low as it’s been since April 1997,” says Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst for the Oil Price Information Service. “People are properly puzzled by the fact that we’re using less gas than we have in years, yet we’re paying more.”

Kloza believes much of the increase is due to speculative money that’s flowed into gasoline futures contracts since the beginning of the year, mostly from hedge funds and large money managers. “We’ve seen about $11 billion of speculative money come in on the long side of gas futures,” he says. “Each of the last three weeks we’ve seen a record net long position being taken.”

A multitude of experts, from academics to government agencies, have pinned the 2008 gas price spike on oil speculators. Of course, a big increase in gas prices could doom the slow but steady economic recovery.

I am usually a big fan of Joe Nocera, whether he is skewering Wall Street crooks or exposing the high-handed behavior of the NCAA, but he is all wrong about the Keystone XL pipeline. He claims that Obama, in his “centrist heart of hearts,” also favors KXL. If so, the President is wrong, too.

The first problem is that Nocera, like other pipeline proponents, frames the decision on KXL in isolation. Doing so leads to the following seductive line of reasoning: The United States needs a lot of oil now and for the foreseeable future. If we don’t get the oil from Canada, we will get it from other sources, like Venezuelan oil sands or Nigeria’s polluted delta, that are just as dirty. Therefore, we might as well buy our oil from our friends to the North.

But who says we have to use so much oil? Other countries do not. The United States has the highest oil consumption of any one of the advanced economies that make up the OECD. Why? Primarily because we have the lowest energy taxes and the cheapest oil prices. Low oil prices feed into an endless list of decisions we make. How far from work will we live? Is it worth buying an electric car, even with subsidies, when gas is so cheap? If we build a high-speed rail line, will enough people ride it when it costs so little to drive?

In case you think prices don’t matter, take a look at this chart, courtesy of Todd Litman of the Victoria Transport Policy Institute. The United States is the little diamond in the extreme upper-left-hand corner: Lowest oil prices, highest oil consumption.

Once the question is reframed — not as “KXL yes or no,” but as “what kind of an energy policy should we have” — the pipeline starts to look a lot less attractive. If we get the country on a downward trajectory of energy use, we can start to pick and choose which fuels to take. We don’t have to use the dirtiest ones just because they are the closest to hand.

Nocera’s second problem is that he falls hook, line, and sinker for the phony “energy security” argument in favor of KXL. True, as long as we have an every-growing appetite for oil, we do have a real security problem. The problem stems from the political instability, and often open hostility, of many oil producers.

The problem, though, is that getting our oil from Canada doesn’t help much. The world oil market operates as a single pool. Any event that interrupts supply from any source sends prices spiking everywhere. The price spike caused by last year’s conflict in Libya, a relatively minor supplier, contributed to a pause in the U.S. economic recovery that we are just now getting over. A really big crisis, like a closure of the Straits of Hormuz, would derail the recovery altogether.

Those global price spikes, not the danger of a physical disruptions to oil transport routes, are the real security threat. Would a pipeline to Canada protect us in case of a crisis? Not a bit—not unless Canada, in a fit of North American solidarity, decided to sell its oil to us at a big discount from prevailing world prices. I have seen no such clause in the proposed KXL pipeline agreement.

There are much more effective ways than KXL to protect ourselves from the very real security threat of dependence on imported oil. One, which I wrote about at the time of the Libyan crisis, is a price-smoothing oil tax. It would bring us more security at a lower cost to the environment than shifting our dependence to Canadian oil sands.

Nocera closes his argument by telling us that “at least one country in North America understands where its national interests lie. Too bad it’s not us.” Really? It all depends on what you mean by national interest.

If you mean a narrow focus on short-term economic gain at the expense of others, then yes, developing oil sands and exporting them to anyone who will buy them is in Canada’s national interest. The profits stay in Canada, while the resulting pollution spreads around the whole world. In much the same way, I could say it would be in my self-interest to shoplift a few CDs next time I’m in a music store, and sell them on the street corner. The gain would be mine, and someone else would bear the cost.

A better view of national interest, though, is cooperating with others to reach mutual goals. One of those goals is slowing global climate change. No one country can do that alone, but if major energy producers and consumers were to work together, they could enjoy mutual benefits, in the form of a healthier planet, that would greatly outweigh the short-term costs of lost profits for Canadian oil sands developers and continued cheap fuel prices for U.S. drivers. As our President likes to put it, it can be done.

by Daniel J. Weiss, Jackie Weidman, Rebecca Leber

General economic theory holds that companies will produce more of a good if its price is higher, or if it receives subsidies. Funny that these rules didn’t seem to apply to Big Oil in 2011, when the highest oil price since 1864 and $2 billion in subsidies to the five largest oil companies—BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, and Royal Dutch Shell—yielded lower oil production than in 2010. But these five oil companies combined made a record-high $137 billion in profits in 2011—up 75 percent from 2010—and have made more than $1 trillion in profits from 2001 through 2011.[1] This exceeds the previous record of $136 billion in profits in 2008.

Here are some more highlights from the big five’s activities in 2011:

• They produced 4 percent less oil and “oil equivalent” in 2011 compared to 2010.
• They spent a total of $38 billion, or 28 percent, of their profits to repurchase their own stock.
• They are sitting on more than $58 billion in cash reserves as of the end of 2011.
• They spent $1.6 million on campaign contributions and $65.7 million on lobbying efforts.
• For every $1 spent on lobbying in Washington, the big five received $30 worth of tax breaks.

Let’s dig a little deeper into this mystery to see why these companies are making more money while Americans see less oil and pay more at the pump.

Where the money goes

In spite of these high profits and oil prices, oil-equivalent production fell from 2010 levels for four of the big five oil companies. Shell’s profit, for example, increased by 54 percent from 2010 to 2011 while its oil and natural gas production decreased by 3 percent during the same time period.

So if the big five companies are not using their additional earnings to increase production, what are they spending their money on? The answer: They’re buying shares of their own stocks and investing in politicians to maintain the policies that led to their enormous profits over the past decade.

Instead of heavily investing in job creation or production, the big five used $38 billion, or 28 percent of annual net income, to repurchase their own stocks. This practice enriches shareholders but it doesn’t add to oil supplies or investments in alternative fuels or other new technologies.

These companies also cling to tax breaks while maintaining $58 billion in cash reserves. This is nearly 30 times more than the estimated $2 billion in annual special tax breaks that these companies receive.

Tax breaks, but not more jobs

ExxonMobil, the most profitable of the big five, paid an effective tax rate of 17.6 percent (from 2008–2010 data), which is 3 percent less than what the average American family paid. But Exxon and other oil companies that receive these tax breaks do not pass benefits on to consumers. Instead, their board members, executives, and shareholders are the ones that profit.

These companies, along with the American Petroleum Institute—their political arm—fight relentlessly to keep their tax breaks intact by threatening economic and energy damage. API claims that eliminating tax loopholes for the oil and gas industry would “lose jobs … and energy production.” Yet higher oil prices and profits, combined with huge reserves and tax breaks, yielded lower, not higher, employment and oil production.

Last year, the Democrats on the House Natural Resources Committee released “Profits and Pink Slips: How Big Oil and Gas Companies are Not Creating U.S. Jobs or Paying Their Fair Share.” This report revealed:

Despite generating $546 billion in profits between 2005 and 2010, ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, and BP combined to reduce their U.S. workforce by 11,200 employees over that time.

Nor are many of these net revenues used for oil production. The report found that “among the Big 5 oil companies, less than 10 percent of profits are reinvested into exploration of new oil deposits.”

The report also concluded that:

The oil and gas industry is a mature and highly profitable sector that is no longer in need of generous tax breaks or royalty free drilling. The $43.6 billion in tax subsidies that the industry is set to receive over the next decade will not help consumers with rising energy costs.

One place where oil companies have no trouble spending money, however, is in Congress. Last year the big five spent $65.7 million on lobbying efforts, successfully persuading their congressional friends to retain tax breaks. Both the House and Senate had votes to scale back these tax breaks, and both proposals were defeated.[2]

And Big Oil’s lobbying expenditures were quite a bargain. For every $1 the big five spent on lobbying in D.C. last year, they effectively received $30 in subsidies disguised as tax breaks. This is equivalent to a 3,000 percent return on every dollar they invested in strong-arming Congress.

More than $1.6 million was spent on campaign contributions in 2011 from just four of the top five oil companies. And more than 90 percent of these campaign contributions were made to Republican candidates or committees. But that doesn’t even include their undisclosed contributions to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the American Petroleum Institute, or other organizations that also support tax breaks for Big Oil.

In the spirit of giving, three of the five Big Oil CEOs—Rex Tillerson of ExxonMobil, John Watson of Chevron, and Jim Mulva of ConocoPhillips—contributed an additional $75,000 to GOP candidates and committees.

Enough is enough

Two days after his State of the Union address last month, President Obama spoke in Aurora, Colorado, about American-made energy. He reiterated his call to eliminate tax breaks for Big Oil:

We subsidized oil for a very long time, long enough. It’s time to stop giving taxpayer giveaways to an industry that’s never been more profitable.

Seventy-four percent of Americans agree with the president’s desire to eliminate tax breaks for the oil and gas industry.

Instead of benefiting oil companies that reward senior executives, board members, and stockholders, these taxpayer funds should be invested in projects that benefit all Americans. A University of Massachusetts study found that investment in clean energy creates anywhere from two to four times more direct and indirect jobs compared to the same investment in oil and gas production.

But let’s put these tax breaks in context. Ending the $2 billion in annual tax breaks for the big five oil companies could pay for:

• The salaries of 36,000 high school teachers earning an average of $55,000 per year
• Pell Grants for more than 500,000 aspiring college students
• Sixty-seven thousand home solar energy systems costing an average of $15,000, which would reduce carbon dioxide pollution by 175,000 metric tons annually

Last September while addressing economic growth and deficit reduction, President Obama noted that as we cut federal program funding to reduce the budget deficit, “Either we gut education and medical research, or we’ve got to reform the tax code so that the most profitable corporations have to give up tax loopholes that other companies don’t get. We can’t afford to do both.”

After a year of near-record profits and a decade of more than $1 trillion in total profits, the least the five huge oil companies can do to help our nation is to relinquish their unnecessary and ineffective tax breaks.

Daniel J. Weiss is a Senior Fellow and the Director of Climate Strategy, Jackie Weidman is a Special Assistant, and Rebecca Leber is a Research Assistant at American Progress.

Special thanks to Gabe Manion and Linda Benesch, who are both interns with the Think Progress War Room.

Endnotes

[1] In 2010 BP suffered a net loss of $4 billion due to its huge expenditures related to the BP Deepwater Horizon oil disaster. If BP is excluded from profit calculations in 2010 and 2011, the four remaining companies had a 36 percent increase in profit.

[2] On March 1, 2011, the House voted 249-176 to defeat a “Motion to Recommit [that] would repeal oil and tax production tax breaks for major integrated oil companies.” On May 17 the Senate voted 52-48 on a motion to proceed to the Close Big Oil Tax Loopholes Act, S. 940. Sixty votes were required to end debate and proceed to the bill, so it failed.

BP earned $3 million every hour in 2011. Its fourth-quarter profits reached $7.69 billion, which is up 38 percent from 2010.

The company is sitting on another $14 billion in cash.

The company continues to scale back its production in the wake of the spill, producing 10 percent less than 2010 levels.

BP contributions to federal candidates totaled more than $98,000 in 2011, with more than half (65 percent) to Republican candidates.

BP spent $8 million lobbying Congress in 2011, down from the record $15 million the company lobbied in 2009 – one year before the oil disaster.

For every dollar the big five oil companies use in lobbying, they effectively receive $30 in subsidies. This could mean BP potentially gained up to $243 million in subsidies, although the exact amount for an individual company is undisclosed.

In the third quarter, BP’s Bob Dudley announced the company had reached a “definite turning point” of boosted profits. However, nearly two years following the Deepwater Horizon disaster, BP has still only paid $7.8 billion of the $20 billion fund they created to compensate individuals and businesses for losses incurred by the spill.

In order to pay the $40 billion cleanup costs and additional penalties, the company has committed to selling $38 billion worth of assets before 2014.

Despite being found “ultimately responsible” for the most devastating oil spill this nation has ever seen, BP has spent millions lobbying on bills that would speed offshore drilling and leases. This includes filing a total 24 reports on bills undermining safety regulation in the Gulf of Mexico, H.R. 1231 “Reversing President Obama’s Offshore Moratorium Act” and H.R. 1229 “Putting the Gulf of Mexico Back to Work Act.” At the time, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar accused House Republicans of having “amnesia” about the oil spill. No doubt the total $137 billion profits in 2011 for the five big oil companies had something to do with it.

The super PAC Restore Our Future has fundraised $30 million to Romney to the White House. The super PAC spent $800,000 on pro-Romney ads, but it has flooded his Republican opponents with attack ads totaling 17 million. Restore Our Future’s war chest comes from under 200 donors, 85 percent of whom had already donated the maximum amount to the Romney campaign.

Romney’s campaign has raised at least $500,000 from the oil and gas industry, according to Open Secrets. But his super PAC allows special interests another chance to exert their influence. While many of the super PAC’s donors come from the financial sector, coal, oil, and gas have also flocked to Restore Our Future:

Coal mining:
– Oxbow Carbon:$750,000

– Oxbow President Bill Koch: $250,000

– Consol Energy: $150,000

Oil and Gas:
– Ballard Exploration: $25,000

– Bassoe Offshore President Jonathan Fairbanks: $25,000

– Murphy Wade of Murphy Oil Corporation: $15,000

– Joseph Grigg of American Energy Operations: $5,000

– Total for oil, gas, and coal: $1,220,000

In total, coal, oil, and gas companies contributed at least $1.2 million to Restore Our Future’s $18 million haul in the last half of 2011. The coal company Oxbow Carbon, alone, contributed $1 million, including a $250,000 donation from billionaire Oxbow CEO Bill Koch — the brother of oil billionaires Charles and David of Koch Industries.

With Perry out of the race, Romney has received more money from mining and oil than any other presidential candidate. The pro-Perry super PAC “Make Us Great Again” took in an outstanding $1.3 million from oil companies and executives during the last six months of his run.

Although Restore Our Future has no “formal” ties to the candidate, the donations reflect Romney’s right pivot on energy and climate concerns. The Massachusetts governor that once supported regulations on coal pollution, has since questioned whether carbon is even dangerous. In addition to becoming a climate denier, he now blasts government support for cleaner energy — despite creating a state green fund as governor.

You can expect Romney to sound suspiciously like his rich polluting backers, as dirty money continues to flood Restore Our Future and Romney’s campaign stash.

Although Keystone XL advocates like to portray the flowing of tar sands crude to China as inevitable, the dangerous Northern Gateway pipeline is just as controversial.

A comparison of the oil spill response capability in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico. Click to enlarge.

In “Putting a Freeze on Arctic Ocean Drilling: America’s Inability to Respond to an Oil Spill in the Arctic,” the authors, Kiley Kroh, Michael Conathan, and Emma Huvos, investigate the prospect of drilling in some of the most extreme conditions on Earth, and find the preparations by the oil and gas industry, federal agencies, and Congress are inadequate, overstretched, and untested:

This report outlines the specific shortcomings in both Shell’s response plans and the private- and public-sector response capabilities to a devastating oil spill in the Arctic region of the United States. Failing to meet the targets laid out here will expose the residents and natural resources of one of the last unspoiled places on the planet to an unacceptable level of risk. Until the oil and gas industry and its federal partners can demonstrate with certainty that they can identify and respond to a true worst-case scenario incident, the Arctic should remain off-limits to exploration and drilling.

In one telling example of dangerous shortcuts in the rush to drilling, Shell’s spill response plan describes a “worst-case scenario” of a spill happening in the relatively warm month of August, although it submitted plans to drill into the drastically harsher month of October.

The report also contrasts the very limited infrastructure for oil spill response in Alaska to the robust infrastructure in the Gulf of Mexico (which was still unable to prevent serious harm from the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster).

In October, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrator Jane Lubchenco told ThinkProgress Green that the implications of accelerating climate change by drilling for oil and gas in the Arctic has “huge implications for the global system.” Although NOAA is the nation’s top oceanographic agency, its scientists play only a minor, advisory role in the government’s approval of offshore drilling, which is run by the Interior Department. NOAA plays a larger role in cleaning up after oil spills.

Below is the summary of CAP’s recommendations for what needs to happen before offshore Arctic drilling should proceed:

For Shell:
– Develop a credible worst-case scenario—have a well-designed and vetted emergency plan in place that includes proof of the ability to respond to a worst-case blowout/oil spill
– Demonstrate that a blowout can be contained, including the required installation of redundant emergency shut-off systems
– Ensure adequate response capabilities are in place before drilling operations commence

For the federal government:
– Require and oversee oil spill response drills in the Arctic that prove the assertions made in company drilling plans prior to plan approval
– Improve weather and ocean prediction and monitoring capabilities to ensure a safe and effective oil spill
– Engage other Arctic nations in developing an international oil spill response agreement that includes an Arctic Ocean drilling management plan

For Congress:
– Appropriate adequate funds for the Coast Guard to carry out its mission in the Arctic, including increasing our icebreaking capability
– Significantly increase the liability cap (currently $75 million) for oil companies in violation of drilling safety rules
– Appropriate additional funds for NOAA research and development to increase oil spill response capacity in the Arctic

Kiley Kroh is the Associate Director for Ocean Communications, Michael Conathan is the Director of Ocean Policy, and Emma Huvos is an intern at the Center for American Progress.

Download the “Putting a Freeze on Arctic Ocean Drilling” report.

Here are a few other facts about Shell:

• Shell made $31 billion in 2011 profit, or over $3.5 million every hour.

• Production of oil and natural gas both fell 3 percent, from 3.3 million barrels equivalent per day to 3.2 million.

• Shell, which is Europe’s biggest oil company, is the second biggest player in U.S. oil and gas lobbying, spending nearly $15 million last year.

• Shell repurchased 4 percent of its stocks in 2011, which benefits the largest shareholders.

• With just BP left to announce its fourth-quarter profits, the big five oil companies stand to pocket more than $130 billion in profits.

Related Post:

• ExxonMobil Makes $41 Billion, But Pays Estimated 17.6% Tax Rate, Lower Than Most Taxpayers (But Not Romney)

by Kiley Kroh

Today the House Natural Resources Committee will take up a trio of “drill, baby, drill” bills that would partially pay for the House surface transportation reauthorization bill, designed to fund our nation’s programs for trains and automobiles.

As it stands right now, the bill would last four years and cost $260 billion. Unfortunately, the House Republicans’ version of the transportation bill would throw open protected pristine places for dirty petroleum production.  One proposal opens Alaska’s pristine Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling. Another measure opens the Atlantic and Pacific coasts to be drilled and mandates more drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. The third proposal makes available millions of acres in the western U.S. to oil shale development.  Despite Boehner’s characterization of the measure as a “job creation package,” it seems to be little more than another Republican giveaway to Big Oil.

Transportation advocates have sought a long-term reauthorization of highway and transit programs, which currently expire on March 31. Traditionally, improvements to roads, bridges, and public transportation are funded by the federal gasoline tax, but GOP leaders in the House are taking the unprecedented step to tie funding to an unnecessary and ineffective increase in fossil fuel production.  As CAP’s Donna Cooper writes, “Congressional Republicans are making this push so they can block movement to create jobs and rebuild our infrastructure while sounding like they are in favor of policies that do both.” Here are the key reasons this package is no solution to repair our nation’s aging transportation infrastructure.

We’re already running more drill rigs than the rest of the world combined. As of last Friday, there were 2,008 drill rigs operating in the U.S. and 1,862 rigs operating in the rest of the world, according to industry statistics. In 2010, total U.S. production (onshore and offshore) was the highest it has been since 2003.  And the Obama administration’s latest five-year offshore leasing plan already makes more than 75% of recoverable offshore resources available for exploration and development.  Clearly, the number of acres available to be drilled is not the problem.

And despite decades of effort, oil shale has never been shown to be economically viable. In addition, it would consume huge amounts of western water in the Colorado River basin that is already facing predictions of severe and prolonged drought and which is relied upon by more than 25 million people in the southwest.

Oil companies are letting the vast majority of their leases sit idle. A Department of Interior report released last year found that more than 70 percent of the tens of millions of offshore acres under lease are inactive, neither producing nor currently subject to approved or pending exploration or development plans.  For onshore leases, 22 million out of a total of 38 million leased onshore acres sit idle.   Instead of opening more of our protected lands and oceans to be drilled, companies should be forced to use the leases they already have, or lose them.

Proposed drilling bills wouldn’t generate enough revenue to meet transportation needs: As Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA), ranking member of the House Natural Resources Committee, emphasizes, the current funding shortfall to just keep our bridges, roads, airports and other existing transportation elements running is $12 billion for the next two years, and more than $75 billion over the next six years – “even using the most optimistic projections, Republican drilling proposals would generate, at most, a little more than $5 billion over 10 years. This is well short of the revenue needed to just to maintain inadequate current investment levels.”

More importantly, the revenue from increased drilling isn’t even guaranteed.  At a hearing late last year, Ryan Alexander of the nonpartisan Taxpayers for Common Sense spoke strongly against relying on “speculative” future revenue, stating,

“Paying for a couple of years of transportation funding with expected revenues from an increase in oil and gas drilling that will likely take many years to get rolling is not a responsible budget approach … It’s like buying the Ferrari tomorrow because you are sure a raise is coming sometime in the future.”

Using expanded drilling to lure Republican support has drawn harsh criticism from conservatives, as well.  As Heritage Action for America CEO Michael Needham told Politico, “One of the problems you have in Washington, is you take really bad legislation, which the highway bill is, and you put a sweetener in it … That’s what’s going on here.”

An oil import fee is a real solution for raising revenue. As CAP’s Daniel J. Weiss outlines, “An oil import fee could raise revenue to reduce oil consumption by investing in oil demand reduction programs. Such funds could also reduce the budget deficit—a top priority of congressional Republicans.” A temporary, extremely modest $2.50 per barrel fee on imported oil could raise $8 billion annually.  This would only increase gasoline prices made from foreign oil by six and a half cents per gallon.

It’s clear the House GOP priority is not repairing our crumbling transportation infrastructure, or even creating jobs – it’s simply a way to justify a reckless expansion of fossil fuel production into our last wild places and precious beaches to benefit Big Oil.  In this scenario, they win and the American people lose.

Kiley Kroh is Associate Director of Oceans Communications at the Center for American Progress.

– Exxon’s $41.1 billion in 2011 profit translates into nearly $5 million in profit every hour, or more than $1,300 every second. The annual profit comes near the record revenues of $46.23 billion in 2008.

– Stock buybacks for Q4 were $5.4 billion, and $21.60 billion for the year, equivalent to 53 percent of total 2011 profit. This enriches executives, the board of directors, and largest shareholders.

– Exxon pays a lower tax rate than the average American. Between 2008-2010, Exxon Mobil registered an average 17.6 percent federal effective corporate tax rate, while the average American paid a higher rate of 20.4 percent.

– The company paid no taxes to the U.S. federal government in 2009, despite 45.2 billion record profits. It paid $15 billion in taxes, but none in federal income tax.

– The oil giant uses offshore subsidiaries in the Caribbean to avoid paying taxes in the United States.

– Exxon is sitting on $11 billion cash on hand as of September 30.

– Exxon spent nearly $13 million on lobbying expenditures in 2011. The company gave nearly another $900,000 in federal campaign contributions. 92 percent of contributions went to Republicans.

– Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson made $29 million in 2010 (according to the latest records): He made $2.2 million in salary, a $3.4 million bonus, and stock awards valued at $15.5 million.

– Exxon is drawing out a legal battle for damages on a spill from 22 years ago. Exxon hasn’t paid $92 million in cleanup for the devastating Valdez Alaskan oil spill. In its Sept. 30 court filing, Exxon argued the damages it agreed to pay only covers “restoration” and not additional “clean-up.”

– Far from a job creator, ExxonMobil — together with Chevron, Shell, and BP — reduced their U.S. workforce by 11,200 employees between 2005 and 2010.

• Exxon’s $41.1 billion in 2011 profit translates into nearly $5 million in profit every hour, or more than $1,300 every second. The annual profit comes near the record revenues of $46.23 billion in 2008.

• Stock buybacks for Q4 were $5.4 billion, and $ 21.60 billion for the year, equivalent to 53 percent of total 2011 profit. This enriches executives, the board of directors, and largest shareholders.

• Exxon pays a lower tax rate than the average American. Between 2008-2010, Exxon Mobil registered an average 17.6 percent federal effective corporate tax rate, while the average American paid a higher rate of 20.4 percent.  [In 2010, Mitt Romney paid an effective tax rate of 13.9%.]

• The company paid no taxes to the U.S. federal government in 2009, despite 45.2 billion record profits. It paid $15 billion in taxes, but none in federal income tax.

• The oil giant uses offshore subsidiaries in the Caribbean to avoid paying taxes in the United States.

• Exxon is sitting on $11 billion cash on hand as of September 30.

• Exxon spent nearly $13 million on lobbying expenditures in 2011. The company gave nearly another $900,000 in federal campaign contributions. 92 percent of contributions went to Republicans.

• Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson made $29 million in 2010 (according to the latest records): He made $2.2 million in salary, a $3.4 million bonus, and stock awards valued at $15.5 million.

• Exxon is drawing out a legal battle for damages on a spill from 22 years ago. Exxon hasn’t paid $92 million in cleanup for the devastating Valdez Alaskan oil spill. In its Sept. 30 court filing, Exxon argued the damages it agreed to pay only covers “restoration” and not additional “clean-up.”

• Far from a job creator, ExxonMobil — together with Chevron, Shell, and BP — reduced their U.S. workforce by 11,200 employees between 2005 and 2010.

Chevron Corp. announced fourth-quarter earnings today of $5.1 billion, falling from $5.3 billion a year earlier. However, the second-largest U.S. energy company had a record year-end profit of $26.9 billion, a 23.3 percent jump since 2010. Here are a few other useful facts about Chevron:

• Chevron has spent more than $9 million lobbying Congress in 2011.
• Chevron contributed $467,996 to federal campaigns in 2011, with 91% to Republican candidates.
• Chevron is the third-largest campaign contributor in the oil and gas industry.
• Chevron had $13 billion in cash on hand last year. The five oil companies collectively have cash resources of $59 billion.
• The company spent $1.25 billion on stock repurchases for Q4. They spent 16 percent — $4.35 billion — of annual profit to reinvest in their own stock. That enriches their shareholders, but it doesn’t add to oil supplies or investments in alternative fuels or other new technologies.

Earlier this week, ConocoPhillips reported record fourth-quarter profits of $3.4 billion — a 66 percent gain, with a 2011 profit totaling $12.4 billion. Exxon releases its fourth-quarter results this coming Tuesday.

– Chevron’s $26.9 billion profit translates to $3 million every hour or $51,000 every minute of 2011.

– Chevron has spent more than $9 million lobbying Congress in 2011.

– Chevron contributed $467,996 to federal campaigns in 2011, with 91 percent to Republican candidates. This does not include their undisclosed contributions to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the American Petroleum Institute, or other organizations.

– Chevron is the third-largest campaign contributor in the oil and gas industry.

– Chevron had $13 billion in cash on hand last year. The five oil companies collectively have cash resources of $59 billion.

– The company spent $1.25 billion on stock repurchases for Q4. They spent 16 percent — $4.35 billion — of annual profit to reinvest in their own stock. That enriches their shareholders, but it doesn’t add to oil supplies or investments in alternative fuels or other new technologies.

Earlier this week, ConocoPhillips reported record fourth-quarter profits of $3.4 billion — a 66 percent gain, with a 2011 profit totaling $12.4 billion. Exxon releases its fourth-quarter results this coming Tuesday.

This morning, ConocoPhillips announced its 2011 fourth-quarter earnings, reporting profits of $3.4 billion — a 66 percent gain– bringing total profits in 2011 to $12.4 billion. Below is a quick look at some other facts about ConocoPhillips:

• ConocoPhillips has spent over $16 million lobbying Congress in 2011, ranking in as the fifth largest spender last year – and number one in the oil and gas industry.
• ConocoPhillips has contributed over $200,000 to federal campaigns in 2011, with 90 percent of the contributions going to Republicans.
• ConocoPhillips used 88 percent of their 2011 profits – $11 billion – to buy back their own stock.  That enriches their shareholders, but it doesn’t add to oil supplies or investments in alternative fuels or other new technologies.
• The five biggest oil companies – BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, and Shell – are likely to make $130 billion in profits in 2011. Added together, the Big Five oil companies are sitting on cash resources of $59 billion and made nearly $1 trillion in profits over the past decade.

Chevron Corp. plans to release its quarterly figures on Friday, followed by Exxon Mobil Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell next week.

Activists "mic check" Big Oil.

The annual event included addresses by American Petroleum Institute, American Gas Association, and the National Mining Association. During API President Jack Gerard’s speech, the activists yelled “mic check” and fact-checked the oil lobby. “Big Oil’s lies are hurting Americans, our economy, and our environment,” the group shouted. “API spends hundreds of millions of dollars corrupting our democracy. … Big Oil is raking in record profits at the expense of the American people.”

One of the protesters described her experience:

We all stood up. Our voices combined were deafening in that small room. I could see Gerard fuming under his smug grin. We were hurried out by Suits with nervous demeanor, but not before we were able to get a few powerful last words in. This was Big Oil’s crown-jewel forum – they’d been advertising this forum on NPR and even their top PR officials were talking it up online. It was clear they were embarrassed and totally caught off guard.

But this will not be the last one Big Oil hears from us. Oh no. We’ll be visiting them again and again, speaking truth to the lies, corruption, and corporate greed of dirty energy, and replacing it with a vision of transparent democracy and a just, clean energy future.

Watch it:

While the protesters promise to return, API is deploying an election-year “Vote 4 Energy” campaign to promote “drill, baby, drill” and deliver on its threat that rejecting the Keystone XL pipeline has “huge political consequences” for the president.

And yet, youth activists have spread the 99 percent’s environmental message across the world, recently. Thousands of protesters fought successfully against the Keystone XL pipeline, and youth voices grabbed attention at the Durban climate conference last month. Now, the 99 percent are taking that message directly to the doorstep of the oil industry.