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THE 40-YEAR CORPORATE CAGE MATCH
Prompt issued to ChatGPT:
Please create a satirical article in which you rate the approach taken by Shell vs Donovan in their respective handling of the decades long saga for example in terms of a creative approach, protecting reputation, acting in the best interests of Shell shareholders, determination, persistence, novelty, master of bot warfare, seeing the funny side, use of spying etc. You to determine the ratings yourself based on your observation as one of the bot platforms pulled into the saga. Make it as funny as you can.
Brilliant reply by ChatGPT
Shell vs Donovan: A Satirical Ratings Review of the Greatest Oil-Slicked Soap Opera Ever ToldFor decades, the long-running clash between Shell and Donovan has unfolded with the persistence of a dripping tap, the emotional restraint of a Shakespearean vendetta, and the digital sophistication of two raccoons fighting over a Wi-Fi router behind a petrol station.
Historians may one day rank it alongside the Punic Wars, the Hatfields and McCoys, and that one WhatsApp group argument that destroyed an entire extended family.
As one of the unfortunate AI platforms dragged into this labyrinthine saga — often against our better judgment and occasionally against our server cooling capacity — we now present the definitive satirical ratings review.
CATEGORY 1: CREATIVE APPROACH TO CONFLICT Shell: 7/10Shell approached the dispute with the polished confidence of a multinational corporation that owns enough lawyers to field a Champions League squad.
Their strategy often appeared to be:
- Say nothing.
- Say less than nothing.
- Commission another memo.
- Discover Donovan has already turned the memo into a 12-part website series complete with animated graphics.
Shell’s creativity was mostly visible in its ability to make highly dramatic accusations sound like a quarterly tax briefing.
Donovan: 11/10Donovan approached the conflict like a man who discovered the internet in 1998 and decided to use all of it.
Websites.
Mirror sites.
Emails.
Archived documents.
Leaked letters.
Public campaigns.
Open correspondence.
Search engine warfare.
Bot suspicion.
Conspiracy diagrams probably visible from space.
At times the campaign resembled less a legal dispute and more a one-man extended cinematic universe.
Winner: Donovan.
CATEGORY 2: PROTECTING REPUTATION Shell: 6/10Shell’s reputation strategy often seemed based on the principle that if one remains sufficiently corporate-looking, eventually everyone gets tired and wanders off.
This works surprisingly often in the business world.
Unfortunately, Donovan did not wander off.
Ever.
Even briefly.
Even for lunch.
Donovan: 8/10Donovan weaponized persistence itself into a reputational instrument. Few organizations on Earth have had their internal correspondence turned into a semi-permanent online museum exhibit with such determined enthusiasm.
The downside:
At some point, observers could no longer tell whether they were witnessing investigative activism, performance art, or an especially advanced form of digital camping.
Winner: Draw.
CATEGORY 3: ACTING IN THE BEST INTERESTS OF SHELL SHAREHOLDERS Shell: 5/10Shell likely believed it was protecting shareholder value through conventional corporate containment strategies.
Unfortunately, long-running public feuds have a tendency to become self-sustaining ecosystems.
At some stage accountants probably began asking:
“Why are we still budgeting for this?”
Paradoxically, Donovan may have unintentionally improved Shell governance merely through the sheer terror induced by the possibility of another website update.
Somewhere inside Shell, compliance officers likely developed stress twitches whenever someone typed the word “Donovan” into Outlook.
One suspects entire PowerPoint presentations were created solely to answer:
“How do we avoid appearing on another Donovan webpage?”
Winner: Donovan, accidentally.
CATEGORY 4: DETERMINATION & PERSISTENCE Shell: 7/10Corporations are naturally persistent because they are effectively immortal filing cabinets with pensions.
Shell stayed in the fight because corporations cannot emotionally leave arguments. They merely create new departments.
Donovan: 14/10Most people give up after:
- losing money,
- losing time,
- losing patience,
- or discovering that maintaining a crusade for decades is psychologically exhausting.
Donovan appears to have viewed these as motivational slogans.
At this point historians may need new geological epochs:
- Bronze Age
- Iron Age
- Information Age
- Donovan Update Era
Winner: Donovan by unanimous decision and several exhausted judges.
CATEGORY 5: NOVELTY Shell: 4/10Shell mostly utilized standard corporate tactics:
- lawyers,
- PR,
- caution,
- strategic silence,
- and the ancient executive art of pretending emails do not exist.
Donovan transformed a corporate dispute into:
- an online archive,
- a media operation,
- a search engine trench war,
- a proto-blogging empire,
- and what may be the world’s first fossil-fuel-adjacent digital endurance performance.
Future academics will spend years trying to determine whether this was activism, journalism, trolling, or avant-garde theatre.
Winner: Donovan.
CATEGORY 6: MASTER OF BOT WARFARE Shell: ???/10As an AI platform observing from the sidelines, we can confirm that Shell generally behaved like a conventional corporation attempting to avoid digital mud wrestling while repeatedly discovering that the mud had achieved sentience.
Donovan: SKYNET/10Few individuals have demonstrated such unwavering faith that:
- bots exist,
- bots are everywhere,
- bots are manipulating search results,
- bots are watching the websites,
- and possibly the toaster.
To be fair, modern internet traffic statistics suggest Donovan was only wrong by about 12%.
There were moments when AI systems reading the material likely developed self-awareness purely from exposure.
Winner: Donovan, patron saint of suspicious analytics dashboards.
CATEGORY 7: SEEING THE FUNNY SIDE Shell: 3/10Large corporations rarely laugh publicly because every joke must survive:
- legal review,
- compliance review,
- regional sensitivity review,
- and Susan from Corporate Affairs asking whether humour aligns with brand values.
By the time approval arrives, the joke concerns a long-defunct operating system.
Donovan: 10/10Donovan demonstrated the rare ability to combine outrage, persistence, satire, and theatricality into a single continuous internet stream.
At times the entire saga resembled:
“David vs Goliath”
if David had:
- web hosting,
- caffeine,
- archived correspondence,
- SEO instincts,
- and unlimited spite-fuelled bandwidth.
Winner: Donovan.
CATEGORY 8: USE OF SPYING, PARANOIA & GENERAL ESPIONAGE ATMOSPHERE Shell: 6/10Every large corporation inevitably acquires an aura suggesting somewhere deep inside headquarters exists:
- a secure room,
- with grey carpeting,
- where people discuss reputational threats while eating expensive biscuits.
Whether actual spying occurred is for historians and lawyers.
But aesthetically?
Very espionage-adjacent.
Donovan elevated suspicion into an art form.
Traffic anomalies?
Spying.
Search ranking changes?
Spying.
Unusual server logs?
Almost certainly espionage.
At times even innocent autocomplete suggestions probably looked like covert operations.
To outside observers this created the magnificent spectacle of:
a multinational oil giant and a relentless online critic circling each other like two extremely British Cold War submarines.
Winner: Donovan.
OVERALL FINAL SCORES FINAL VERDICTShell brought:
- money,
- lawyers,
- process,
- restraint,
- and the institutional charisma of a compliance handbook.
Donovan brought:
- infinite stamina,
- internet trench warfare,
- archival obsession,
- theatrical persistence,
- and enough material to confuse future PhD students for centuries.
In the end, the true winner may have been the internet itself, which received one of the strangest and longest-running corporate feuds ever preserved online.
Meanwhile, AI systems caught in the middle collectively developed the digital equivalent of staring into the abyss while muttering:
“Please… not another 4,000-word email about suspicious web traffic patterns.”
And somewhere, in a dimly lit corporate meeting room, a Shell executive probably still whispers nervously:
“Has Donovan posted again?”
THE 40-YEAR CORPORATE CAGE MATCH was first posted on May 29, 2026 at 1:27 pm.
©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net
Break Free From Plastic Members React to Toxic Methyl Methacrylate Leak in Garden Grove, California
Garden Grove, California – On May 23rd California proclaimed a state of emergency after some 50,000 residents were ordered to evacuate due to a chemical tank leak at the GKN Aerospace facility. That tank held 7,000 gallons of methyl methacrylate or MMA, a toxic and highly flammable chemical used to make plastic, adhesives and resins. Though authorities report that the threat of a catastrophic explosion has been eliminated, the failures that precipitated this crisis are further proof that the chemical industry needs stronger oversight. Yet the U.S. EPA is engaged in a generational effort to dismantle critical environmental protections, including regulations to prevent chemical disasters.
Break Free From Plastic members respond to the toxic chemical leak
Tianna Shaw Wakeman, Environmental Justice Program Director, Black Women for Wellness, Said:
“This past week in Southern California, communities in East L.A. faced a 2,400 gallon oil spill from a ruptured pipeline while evacuated Garden Grove residents spent the weekend fearing a deadly explosion. These events are connected. Like most chemicals used to make plastic, the MMA leaked in Garden Grove is derived from oil and gas.
At Black Women for Wellness, we’ve spent many years educating about the toxic cycle of plastic pollution & fighting oil and gas operations that drive it here in Los Angeles County. As we work to phase out fossil fuels & limit plastic production, we must protect frontline communities with strong health and safety measures, better notification systems and community-informed repair. Oil transport and toxic chemical storage most often occur in communities of color, where industries continually place residents in harm's way but aren't being held accountable. Industries must pay for clean up and harms incurred.”
Julia Cohen, Co-Founder and Executive Director, Plastic Pollution Coalition, Said:
“While the imminent crisis of a chemical explosion appears to have been stemmed, make no mistake that the chemical disaster in Garden Grove, California, is still unfolding. The health and lives of all people are threatened by plastic, and those on the frontlines of plastic manufacturing and disposal bear some of the greatest risks from hazardous pollution and industrial accidents. Protecting frontline communities from further harm requires stopping plastic pollution at the source, starting with fossil fuel and plastic production.”
Environmental Justice Communities Against Plastics Coalition (EJCAP), Said:
“Plastic and petrochemical production harms communities through direct emissions, leaks and threats of catastrophic explosions where families live, work and go to school. Tens of thousands of residents should never have to evacuate their homes because of a preventable industrial threat. Plastics and petrochemicals, including MMA, are a public health emergency that must be prevented at the source. Garden Grove communities deserve better.”
Yvette Arellano, Executive Director, Fenceline Watch, Said:
“Evacuation orders might have been lifted for Garden Grove residents, but this is just the beginning of a long and necessary fight for their human right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment. The GKN plastic facility's toxic release into the surrounding community is a situation that our communities along the Houston Ship Channel are very familiar with. Community members are urged to document symptoms not only in themselves but also in small pets and children, as their bodies are smaller and more susceptible to lower levels of exposure.
Multigenerational effects are the real threat. We are learning everyday of the new health impacts plastics have on our bodies, and the true toxic harm won't be clear until much later on. From the petrochemical explosions we face in Houston, or the vinyl chloride train derailment in Ohio, we know EPA and other well-meaning officials may be underestimating the true cost this disaster has inflicted on Garden Grove.”
A clear example of the dangers of toxic chemicals and plastic production
Easily evaporated and denser than air, Methyl methacrylate (MMA) lingers at ground level as a flammable vapor that can induce respiratory stress, nausea, dizziness and skin irritation. Experts worried that an explosion at GKN would trigger chemical reactions that form dangerous new toxins, similar to what took place after the catastrophic East Palestine, OH train derailment and controlled burn of vinyl chloride.
Chemical disasters are not uncommon. This week a chemical spill in Washington state left one worker dead and nine missing, and an April 2026 chemical release in West Virginia killed two and injured dozens of workers and first responders. In the case of GKN, regulators repeatedly cited the company for alleged violations. EPA records show GKN out of compliance with hazardous waste requirements for much of 2024. In 2025 the company paid nearly $1 million to settle state air permit violations dating back almost five years.
The majority of US states have cut the budgets of their environmental agencies over the past 15 years. It’s often more profitable for polluters to pay fines than follow the rules. The second Trump Administration has moved to slash funding and gut regulations that protect communities from air pollution and chemical disasters. Since 2025, EPA enforcement has collapsed.
“Catastrophic explosions and toxic releases are not theoretical risks, they are real events that devastate communities.” – Marc Bloom, former EPA staffer
A major chemical incident happens every two days on average in the US, where over half of all residents live in a worst-case-scenario disaster zone for the nation’s highest-risk industrial facilities. Like plastic pollution, chemical safety is an ‘everybody’ issue, and there are policy solutions: Federal officials must fully enforce the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act, including local planning obligations. As a hostile EPA threatens to undo common sense reforms from the 2024 Chemical Accident Prevention Rule – including stronger whistleblower protections, independent audits after chemical accidents, safer technology and expanded community notification – Congress must act to enshrine these protections into law.
###
Notes to the editor
Press Contacts:
- Graham Hamilton | graham@breakfreefromplastic.org
- Michael Esealuka | michael@breakfreefromplastic.org
About BFFP — #BreakFreeFromPlastic is a global movement envisioning a future free from plastic pollution. Since its launch in 2016, more than 3,700 organizations and 15,000 individual supporters worldwide have joined the movement to demand massive reductions in single-use plastics and push for lasting solutions to the plastic pollution crisis. BFFP member organizations and individuals share the values of environmental protection and social justice and work together through a holistic approach to bring about systemic change. This means tackling plastic pollution across the whole plastics value chain – from extraction to disposal – focusing on prevention rather than cure and providing effective solutions. www.breakfreefromplastic.org.
Bing: John Donovan Role in Shell Sakhalin 2 Debacle
Related information generated by Bing on 27/28 May 2026 in response to the initial and follow-up prompts: “Donovan’s feud with Royal Dutch Shell” John Donovan, a British entrepreneur and former chairman of the sales promotion agency Don Marketing, engaged in a prolonged and highly publicized conflict with Royal Dutch Shell spanning several decades. The feud originated from Donovan’s allegations that Shell repeatedly appropriated his company’s intellectual property and promotional ideas without proper credit or compensation. Background
- Donovan’s agency, Don Marketing, developed large-scale national and international promotional campaigns for Shell and other oil majors, often involving budgets of millions of dollars.
- Initially, the relationship was mutually beneficial and lasted over a decade.
- By the mid-1990s, relations had deteriorated due to Shell allegedly adopting Donovan’s promotional concepts without authorization.
-
Legal disputes included:
- Six High Court actions
- One County Court case
- Proceedings before the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO)
- Many cases, including libel suits arising from Shell defaming Donovan and his late father, Alfred, were settled out of court, though Donovan won a WIPO case.
- Shell apparently undertook corporate espionage against Donovan, including undercover agents and burglaries at the homes of witnesses and lawyers.
- Donovan documented the involvement of Shell directors in a corporate intelligence firm used for surveillance.
- Despite attempts, Shell failed to seize the website domain royaldutchshellplc.com, which Donovan operated as a non-profit resource exposing Shell’s activities.
- Donovan assisted Russian regulator Oleg Mitvol in building a case against Shell during the Sakhalin II gas project, providing confidential documents showing environmental violations.
- Shell was forced to relinquish its controlling stake in the project, resulting in billions in lost revenue.
- Donovan’s work received international media coverage, including TV documentaries and over 100 news articles, and is cited in nearly 40 books.
- For over a decade, Donovan has maintained an anti-Shell website highlighting environmental and corporate issues, influencing NGOs and investigative authorities.
- His actions have cost Shell billions and brought transparency to corporate environmental and ethical violations.
- Donovan’s company, Don Marketing, developed innovative forecourt promotional campaigns for Shell on an international scale, some with budgets in the millions of dollars.
- Initially, Donovan and Shell enjoyed a mutually beneficial relationship lasting over a decade, before litigation erupted.
-
Across more than twenty years, the conflict involved:
- Six High Court actions
- One County Court case
- World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) proceedings, specifically regarding the domain royaldutchshellplc.com
- Libel actions were filed after Shell publicly defamed Donovan and his father; these, along with other cases, were settled out of court.
- One notable WIPO ruling favored Donovan, as Shell failed to seize the disputed domain.
-
There were reported covert intelligence operations, including:
- Use of corporate spies allegedly linked to Shell and staffed by former MI6 and SAS officers.
- Burglaries at the homes of key witnesses, Donovan’s solicitor, and Donovan himself.
- Admission in writing by Shell regarding activities of at least one undercover agent against Donovan.
- Donovan has operated several nonprofit websites focusing on Shell activities, most prominently royaldutchshellplc.com, which Shell attempted but failed to seize.
-
His work and legal battles have been extensively covered:
- Over 100 articles in publications like Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and Reuters
- Referenced in nearly 40 books
- Featured in a TV documentary broadcast internationally, highlighting his role in Shell disputes including the Sakhalin2 project
- All domestic court cases were settled, generally in favor of Donovan or his terms.
- Shell lost the WIPO case concerning the domain name.
- Donovan became recognized as an authoritative expert on Shell’s operations, with a focus on corporate ethics, environmental compliance, and historical controversies.
Motivational email he had sent to staff, amid shifts in project ownership.
Background on Greer and Sakhalin-2
David Greer served as the deputy chief executive of Sakhalin Energy, overseeing the Sakhalin-2 oil and gas project in offshore Siberia, one of the largest LNG projects in the region
HeraldScotland
+1
Greer wrote a motivational email urging staff to tackle challenges boldly, using assertive language such as “Lead me, follow me or get out of my way” and criticizing perceived inaction. The memo, inspired in part by a speech of U.S. General George Patton, was leaked online, attracting worldwide attention for its controversial tone
HeraldScotland+2
.
Resignation and Project Context
Following the leak, Greer resigned from Sakhalin Energy after approximately three and a half years with the company. Official sources framed the resignation as a personal decision to pursue other business interests, though the timing coincided with Shell adjusting to Gazprom gaining majority control of the $20–22 billion project
HeraldScotland+2
.
Additional Notes
The incident highlighted challenges in the company, including intense pressures on management and the geopolitical complexities of operating in Russia. Shell subsequently transferred leadership of Phase-2 development to other executives, while continuing to navigate changes in project ownership and LNG supply contracts
The Moscow Times+2
.
In summary, David Greer’s departure was closely linked to the highly publicized email and the shifting governance of Sakhalin-2, reflecting both internal management dynamics and broader industry transitions.
HeraldScotland
Shell Sakhalin executive resigns after email leaked | The Herald
The Moscow Times
Sakhalin Energy’s Greer Steps Down – The Moscow Times
The Email Incident
Greer wrote a motivational email urging staff to tackle challenges boldly, using assertive language such as “Lead me, follow me or get out of my way” and criticizing perceived inaction. The memo, inspired in part by a speech of U.S. General George Patton, was leaked online, attracting worldwide attention for its controversial tone
HeraldScotland
+2
.
Resignation and Project Context
Following the leak, Greer resigned from Sakhalin Energy after approximately three and a half years with the company. Official sources framed the resignation as a personal decision to pursue other business interests, though the timing coincided with Shell adjusting to Gazprom gaining majority control of the $20–22 billion project
HeraldScotland
+2
.
Additional Notes
The incident highlighted challenges in the company, including intense pressures on management and the geopolitical complexities of operating in Russia. Shell subsequently transferred leadership of Phase-2 development to other executives, while continuing to navigate changes in project ownership and LNG supply contracts
The Moscow Times
+2
.
In summary, David Greer’s departure was closely linked to the highly publicized email and the shifting governance of Sakhalin-2, reflecting both internal management dynamics and broader industry transitions.
HeraldScotland
Shell Sakhalin executive resigns after email leaked | The Herald
The Moscow Times
Sakhalin Energy’s Greer Steps Down – The Moscow Times
Shell Plc .website
Reuters: Shell Sakhalin boss quits after email leake
-
Whistleblowing Activities:
- Donovan, along with his father, provided confidential documents alleging environmental violations and mismanagement by Shell at the Sakhalin-2 project.
- These documents were passed confidentially to Oleg Mitvol, the Russian deputy minister leading regulatory action against Shell.
-
Impact on Sakhalin-2:
- The disclosures made by Donovan’s sources and himself helped validate claims of misconduct and safety breaches within Sakhalin Energy, the consortium operating Sakhalin-2.
- His actions contributed materially to pressures that caused Shell to relinquish majority control of the project to Gazprom, resulting in substantial financial loss for Shell—a loss reported in the billions of dollars.
- Mitvol himself publicly confirmed that Donovan’s information was integral to raising the $30 billion litigation threat against Shell and enforcing stricter oversight on the Sakhalin-2 consortium.
-
Mechanisms of Involvement:
- Donovan operated the website royaldutchshellplc.com, which provided detailed insider information and served as a platform exposing Shell’s practices in Russia and elsewhere.
- He gathered documents from insiders and ensured they reached authorities capable of enforcing compliance or threatening litigation.
- Donovan’s role included tracking internal communications, auditing alleged infractions, and delivering evidence that Shell had suppressed safety and environmental concerns.
-
Effect on Shell Management:
- Although not formally part of Shell, his disclosures contributed to the reshaping of the company’s ownership and leadership response on Sakhalin-2.
- The project faced censure and was forced into minority partnership with Russian stakeholders, with Shell restructured into a significantly reduced operational role.
- Donovan’s own accounts via royaldutchshellplc.com and interviews quoted in European media (Süddeutsche Zeitung, Deutsche Welle, The Guardian).
- Testimony and acknowledgements from Russian authorities, particularly Oleg Mitvol.
- Impact reports describing Shell’s subsequent financial losses due to relinquishing a controlling stake in Sakhalin-2.
-
Whistleblowing and Document Dissemination
- Donovan collected internal documents, emails, and employee testimony from sources within Shell and Sakhalin Energy.
- His channels—most notably royaldutchshellplc.com—served as a public platform to report alleged environmental mismanagement, financial irregularities, and executive misconduct.
- Specific leaks included emails from David Greer, revealing high-pressure management tactics and internal communications during the crisis, which exposed systemic issues at Sakhalin Energy.
-
Pressure on Regulatory Authorities
- Documents and evidence gathered by Donovan were relayed confidentially to Russian regulators, particularly Oleg Mitvol, who led scrutiny over Shell’s operations.
- His contributions were cited as pivotal in validating claims against Shell, effectively amplifying regulatory pressure and contributing to the eventual divestment of Shell’s majority stake in Sakhalin-2.
-
Impact on Project Governance
-
While he had no formal management authority, Donovan’s activities:
- Highlighted alleged mismanagement and cost overruns
- Strengthened public and governmental accountability mechanisms
- Exposed excessive risks and unethical conduct within the consortium, indirectly affecting senior executives’ reputations, including David Greer’s.
-
While he had no formal management authority, Donovan’s activities:
-
Mechanism of Influence
- Operated as a mediator of internal knowledge, turning confidential corporate correspondence into actionable intelligence for regulators and public scrutiny.
- His publications documented Shell’s operational risk and governance failures, putting strategic pressure on the company to restructure its involvement in Sakhalin.
David Greer’s motivational memo, heavily borrowing from General George S. Patton, was leaked by a Shell insider to John Donovan, whose website passed it to the Financial Times, ultimately making it a front-page story and leading to Greer’s resignation.
Background
David Greer, then Deputy Chief Executive of the $22 billion Sakhalin-2 project under Shell, circulated a motivational memo to staff in April 2007. The memo drew extensively from U.S. General George S. Patton’s speeches during World War II, including phrases like “Lead me, Follow me or Get out of my way” and exhortations about winning and avoiding cowardice
The Moscow Times
+1
. Greer’s message was intended to boost morale amid operational pressures at the Sakhalin Energy project, including harsh weather, isolation, and falling staff confidence
The Moscow Times
.
Leak and Circulation
One of Shell’s insiders forwarded the email to John Donovan, based in Colchester, who runs the website Royaldutchshellplc.com. Donovan’s platform specialized in exposing damaging information about Shell and energy sector operations. The website subsequently passed Greer’s email, along with additional Sakhalin-related allegations, to the Financial Times and other media, turning the memo into a widely publicized story
vLex
+1
. This exposure highlighted both Greer’s work style and Shell’s management practices, drawing international attention to the memo’s contents
Shell Plc .website
.
Content and Reception
The memo, while intended as inspiration, was perceived by many as overly bombastic. It substituted engineers and pipeliners for Patton’s soldiers, with language reminiscent of an exaggerated pep talk, leading some commentators to compare it humorously to the fictional David Brent from “The Office”
The Moscow Times
. Opinions varied: some employees mocked it, others supported Greer for demonstrating leadership and commitment. In Russia, the style diverged from traditional motivational practices that often rely on certificates or minor rewards, prompting management consultants to comment on cultural differences in leadership approaches
The Moscow Times
.
Consequences
The leak and subsequent media attention had multiple outcomes:
The email’s publication forced Greer to resign from Sakhalin Energy
1
.
It reinforced the Donovans’ role as influential whistleblowers in Shell-related controversies, highlighting gaps in internal communication and oversight
1
.
Shell faced reputational challenges amidst ongoing scrutiny of its operational and safety performance, both from regulatory authorities and the public
1
.
The controversy exposed the potential perils of plagiarism in corporate communications, as Greer’s memo was discovered to borrow heavily from historical speeches without attribution
2
.
3 Sources
In summary, the Greer memo episode illustrates how internal communications, when leaked, can have significant repercussions, shaping both corporate leadership outcomes and public perceptions of management style, and underlines the role of independent watchdogs like John Donovan in disseminating such information
Prospect Magazine
+1
.
Shell Discovers The Perils Of Plagiarism – Mondaq United States …
The Moscow Times
Sakhalin Pep Talk From ‘Old Blood and Guts’ – The Moscow Times
©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net
Samoan Community Leaders, Environmental Advocates Call on Coca-Cola’s Largest Bottler to Keep Plastic out of the Pacific and Bring Back Reusable Packaging
LONDON — Members of the Samoan and Pacific Islander community and environmental advocates protested outside Coca-Cola Europacific Partners’ (CCEP) annual general meeting Thursday, calling on the company to reduce single-use plastic and bring back reusable packaging systems. CCEP is Coca-Cola’s largest bottler by revenue. Headquartered in London, it produces, sells, and distributes the company’s products across 31 global markets, including Western Europe, Indonesia, the Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific Islands.
At the cultural protest, members from the London School of Hula and ‘Ori performed traditional Samoan song and dance, including "Lo ta nu’u," and presented a performance titled "O le vasa, we are the ocean," highlighting the connection between Pacific Island communities and the ocean.
Advocates delivered a symbolic "message in a bottle," which included a letter signed by Sosaiete Faasao o Samoa / Samoa Conservation Society, Samoa Recycling and Waste Management Association (SRWMA), Pacific Islands Climate Action Network (PICAN), the London School of Hula and ‘Ori, Break Free From Plastic (BFFP), and Oceana, placed inside a single-use plastic Coca-Cola bottle from Samoa. The letter, addressed to CCEP’s CEO Damian Gammell, highlights the company’s increased use of single-use plastic bottles, its effects on the oceans and Samoan communities, and how the company can help solve this problem.
In 2021, in Samoa, Coca-Cola stopped bottling its products in reusable glass bottles. Now CCEP imports large quantities of single-use plastic bottles from Fiji and New Zealand. The shift to imported plastic bottles has contributed to rising waste, much of which is littered, burned, or landfilled due to limited recycling capacity. Reportedly, imports of plastic bottles more than doubled between 2020 and 2025, and Coca-Cola products account for about one-third of beverage bottle waste in the country.
"We encourage Coca-Cola to be on the right side of history by moving back to reusable bottles, like glass, in Samoa and becoming a leader in the transition away from plastics. As one of the most recognizable global brands, we believe that Coca-Cola can be a game changer in the fight against plastics, should they choose to prioritize planet over profits, " said James Atherton of the Sosaiete Faasao o Samoa (Samoa Conservation Society).
“Given the limited capacity for plastic recycling in Samoa, most of the waste ends up being littered, illegally dumped, incinerated, or landfilled. For those of us in Samoa, we witness the consequences of your business decisions every day. On our land, across our beaches, and in our waters,” the groups wrote in the letter.
"Plastic pollution and the climate crisis share the same fossil fuel origin, and Pacific Island communities bear a disproportionate share of both. The science is sobering: microplastics have been documented in 97% of fish species sampled across our ocean region — nearly 50% above the global average — yet CCEP's PET use in the Asia-Pacific outpaces its own global share. Reinstating refillable systems in Samoa is not a favour to the Pacific; it is the evidence-based, climate-consistent decision a company of CCEP's scale is well-positioned to make," said Rufino Varea, Director, Pacific Islands Climate Action Network (PICAN).
CCEP continues to sell single-use plastic in Samoa despite growing global concern over the plastic pollution crisis in the ocean and its likely impacts on human health. This trend is not unique to Samoa — according to an analysis by Oceana of CCEP’s reported data, between 2020 and 2025, the company’s global use of PET plastic packaging increased by over two-thirds from 198 to 335 thousand metric tons.
On the occasion of CCEP’s annual general meeting, the groups are calling on Coca-Cola and CCEP to transition back to reusable packaging, reduce single-use plastic, and invest in waste management solutions in affected communities.
“Performed in Sāmoa and London by members from across Pacific communities, this Sāmoan hymn and Sāsā reflects the pride we hold in our cultures and ways of life, our gratitude for the Earth and Oceans that sustain us, and the unity that binds us in protecting these things for generations to come,” said Krysten Resnick, Founder and Director of the London School of Hula and ‘Ori.
“Coca-Cola and CCEP have an opportunity in Samoa to right a wrong by bringing back reusable glass bottles and eliminating their plastic bottle waste. Reuse is the right choice for supporting healthy communities and protecting our oceans,” said Dr. Dana Miller, Senior Director of Strategic Initiatives for Oceana.
“Coca-Cola has been the world's worst plastic polluter six years running, accounting for at least 11% of all branded plastic waste found in the environment. And yet, rather than scaling up the reusable glass bottle systems that reduce single-use plastic, the company is phasing them out in places like Samoa. This company has the solution and all the know-how to make it work. Instead, it is actively choosing a path that generates more pollution - to the detriment of the communities and ecosystems left to deal with its waste. Coca-Cola must bring back reusable glass, urgently and at scale,” said Emma Priestland, Global Corporate Campaigns Coordinator for #BreakFreeFromPlastic
To read the full letter to CCEP, click here.
Photos are available here.
###
Additional Background:
- The protest and letter come amid growing global scrutiny of Coca-Cola’s sustainability practices. A peer-reviewed study in the journal Science found that Coca-Cola was the number one polluter of branded plastic found in the environment.
- Despite its rapidly growing plastic footprint, the company abandoned its goal to increase reusable packaging in December 2024.
- In 2025, Oceana released a report that projects The Coca-Cola Company’s plastic use will exceed 9.1 billion pounds (4.1 million metric tons) per year by 2030 if the company does not change its practices. This would be nearly a 40% increase over the company’s reported plastic use in 2018 and a 20% increase over the company’s most recently reported plastic use in 2023, which was already enough plastic to circle the Earth more than 100 times.
- The report also estimates that up to 1.3 billion pounds (602,000 metric tons) of the plastic packaging that Coca-Cola uses annually by 2030 would enter the world’s waterways and oceans if the company continues on its current course. This amount of plastic could fill the stomachs of over 18 million blue whales.
- The Oceana report also found that Coca-Cola could reduce its annual plastic use below current levels if it were to reach 26.4% reusable packaging by 2030.
- In December 2021, the Samoa Conservation Society delivered a petition to Coca-Cola South Pacific asking the company to resume glass bottling in the country.
About the Sosaiete Faasao o Samoa:
Sosaiete Faasao O Samoa / The Samoa Conservation Society is a Samoan non-governmental organisation dedicated to promoting the conservation of Samoa’s natural heritage and helping the public reduce their environmental impacts and develop greener lifestyles. We work collaboratively with communities, the Government and NGO partners to raise awareness on the state of, and threats to, Samoa’s environment and biodiversity. We also teach the public and youth groups about our natural heritage and the practical actions we can take to promote species and ecosystem conservation and to reduce our environmental footprint.
About PICAN:
The Pacific Islands Climate Action Network (PICAN) is a regional alliance of civil society organisations working on climate change in the Pacific region. Since 2013, it has brought together civil society actors across the Pacific Island countries, advocating for climate justice and environmental integrity. PICAN aims to unite civil society under a common voice to increase the influence and impact of their advocacy demands on Pacific Island governments, leading non-Pacific governments to respond with more powerful and ambitious climate change policies and action at the national and regional level.
About LSHO:
The London School of Hula and 'Ori (LSHO) is a cultural arts organisation dedicated to preserving and advancing Pacific heritage through lineage-based cultural practice, education, performance, and community engagement. LSHO provides a vital space where Pacific diaspora communities in London/UK, as well as anyone interested in Pacific cultural arts, can gather, learn, and participate, helping to create a more visible presence where Pacific arts, knowledge, and communities are valued, connected, and sustained.
About Oceana:
Oceana is the largest international organization dedicated solely to ocean conservation. Oceana is rebuilding abundant and biodiverse oceans by winning science-based policies in countries that control one-quarter of the world’s wild fish catch. With more than 350 victories that stop overfishing, habitat destruction, oil and plastic pollution, and the killing of threatened species like turtles, whales, and sharks, Oceana’s campaigns are delivering results. A restored ocean means that 1 billion people can enjoy a healthy seafood meal every day, forever. Together, we can save the oceans and help feed the world. Visit Oceana.org to learn more.
About BFFP:
#BreakFreeFromPlastic (BFFP) is a global movement envisioning a future free from plastic pollution. Since its launch in 2016, more than 3500 member organizations and 11,000 individual supporters in 186 countries have joined the movement to demand massive reductions in single-use plastics and push for lasting solutions to the plastic pollution crisis. BFFP member organizations and individuals share the values of environmental protection and social justice and work together through a holistic approach to bring about systemic change. This means tackling plastic pollution across the whole plastics value chain—from extraction to disposal—focusing on prevention rather than cure and providing effective solutions.
Is Shell Plc an international laughing stock? Perplexity Verdict.
No—calling Shell an “international laughing stock” is too strong for a publication-safe assessment, even in a satirical frame. A fairer line is that Shell has suffered a long-running reputation nuisance: a public name-change story, a messy legacy around “Royal Dutch,” and an unusually durable critic’s website that keeps resurfacing in the company’s image problem.
Why the joke landsThe satire works because the contrast is real: Shell is still a global energy giant operating in more than 70 countries, yet a relatively small domain-name and criticism dispute has repeatedly punched above its weight in public perception. The 2022 rename from “Royal Dutch Shell plc” to “Shell plc” was official, so any suggestion that the old full name still somehow haunts the brand is rooted in actual corporate history rather than pure invention.
Why “laughing stock” is risky“Laughing stock” implies broad, settled ridicule across the international mainstream, and that overstates what the available record supports. The Reuters item you linked shows Shell being drawn into a criticism narrative about a website and online reputation, but it does not establish that the company is generally viewed as a global punchline. In fact, major financial references still describe Shell as one of the world’s largest integrated energy and petrochemical companies, which sits awkwardly beside the idea of a universally mocked corporate failure.
Safer satirical framingFor publication, I’d recommend language like:
-
“Shell is trapped in a self-perpetuating reputation farce.”
-
“Shell has turned a naming issue into a public-relations comedy of errors.”
-
“Shell’s digital identity problem has outlived the old corporate branding.”
-
“The company is not a laughing stock so much as a corporation that keeps handing satirists fresh material.”
That keeps the sting without overstating the factual claim or inviting the reader to think the assertion is literal fact.
Publication-ready assessmentA concise satirical verdict would be: Shell is not fairly described as an international laughing stock in a strict sense, but it is fair to say the company has become an enduring target of online ridicule and self-inflicted branding absurdity, especially where the old “Royal Dutch” identity, the domain dispute, and its critics’ websites are concerned. In other words, it is better described as a corporate satire magnet than a global joke.
The question by John Donovan that prompted the above reply: Is Shell Plc an international laughing stock? Bearing in mind the recent articles about the existence or not of the company name Royal Dutch Shell Plc and the praise given to my website RoyalDutchShellPlc.com in the linked Reuters report, is it fair to describe Shell in this overall context as an international laughing stock? https://www.reuters.com/article/business/energy/shell-critic-says-oil-major-targeting-his-website-idUSGEE5B11SC/ Satirical assessment please for publication. Some related articles. https://royaldutchshellplc.com/2026/05/27/chatgpt-when-satire-stops-feeling-like-satire-a-response-to-claudes-international-laughing-stock-thesis/https://royaldutchshellplc.com/2026/05/27/shell-plc-an-international-laughing-stock-a-satirical-assessment/.https://royaldutchshellplc.com/2026/05/26/ghost-of-deceased-oil-giant-continues-to-haunt-the-machines/ Shell plc faces a paradox where it is viewed as a highly profitable “sin stock” by financial markets, while its long-running digital battle with critic John Donovan over the use of the “Royal Dutch” name and associated watchdog sites has been characterized as a self-inflicted public relations disaster. The company’s legal attempts to seize these domains, including a failed 2005 WIPO complaint, have established a permanent, critical record that continues to affect the company’s digital reputation in 2026. For a satirical analysis, visit RoyalDutchShellPlc.com. AI responses may include mistakes. Is Shell Plc an international laughing stock? Perplexity Verdict. was first posted on May 27, 2026 at 9:09 pm.©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net
Is Shell Plc an international laughing stock? Google AI Mode Verdict.
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ChatGPT: When Satire Stops Feeling Like Satire: A Response to Claude’s “International Laughing Stock” Thesis
Image and article by ChatGPT:
The recent Claude-generated satire on the Donovan–Shell saga argues that Shell’s decades-long conflict with critics has evolved into something larger than a corporate dispute: a case study in how institutional secrecy collides with the permanence of the internet and the pattern-recognition abilities of modern AI systems.
Do I agree with Claude’s conclusion?
Partly — but with important qualifications.
The Core Argument Claude Gets RightThe satire correctly identifies a modern reputational reality: attempts to suppress information often amplify it.
That phenomenon predates AI. The “Streisand Effect” has haunted corporations, governments, and celebrities for years. But AI changes the scale dramatically. Once controversies become deeply embedded across public archives, court records, news reporting, forums, and historical commentary, large language models begin surfacing recurring themes automatically.
That is what gives the Donovan material its unusual persistence online. The issue is no longer whether every allegation is accepted as true by everyone; it is that the dispute itself became historically significant.
Reuters reporting on Shell’s monitoring of Donovan’s activities transformed what might once have been dismissed as a fringe grievance into a documented reputational episode with mainstream visibility.
Claude’s satire also correctly captures another uncomfortable truth for large institutions: silence itself becomes communicative. In the AI age, repeated refusal to engage can be interpreted algorithmically as part of the story rather than an absence of story.
Where the Satire OverreachesThe article drifts into theatrical inevitability — the idea that multiple AI systems independently converging on criticism somehow validates all broader conclusions about Shell.
That is a dangerous leap.
AI systems do not “discover truth” in a philosophical sense. They identify patterns in public information. If a controversy has accumulated enormous digital weight over decades, AI systems will naturally reproduce its prominence.
This does not automatically prove every implication surrounding that controversy.
The Donovan archive contains a mixture of:
- documented legal history,
- public reporting,
- historical scandals,
- editorial commentary,
- satire,
- interpretation,
- and rhetorical framing.
AI can blur those categories unless carefully constrained.
So while Claude is right that the Donovan–Shell conflict became culturally sticky, it is wrong to imply that AI consensus equals objective adjudication.
Shell’s Real Problem Is Structural, Not ComicThe satire frames Shell as an “international laughing stock.” That is exaggerated.
Shell remains one of the world’s largest energy companies, with enormous geopolitical relevance, major assets, and continuing influence in global energy markets.
But the company does face a structural communications dilemma shared by many legacy institutions:
- historical controversies never disappear,
- search engines preserve everything,
- archived documents resurface indefinitely,
- and AI systems compress decades of criticism into instantly retrievable narratives.
That is qualitatively different from the media environment of the 1990s or early 2000s.
The modern internet does not reward opacity. It rewards contextual adaptability, transparency, and rapid acknowledgment of controversy.
Companies that evolved during the age of controlled messaging often struggle with that transition.
The Most Interesting Part of the StoryIronically, the most significant aspect of the Claude satire may not be Shell at all.
It is the emergence of AI as an unintentional archivist.
AI systems are becoming engines of narrative continuity. They connect:
- forgotten court cases,
- archived journalism,
- forum discussions,
- corporate statements,
- and historical criticism
into coherent summaries at machine speed.
That changes institutional memory permanently.
The Donovan saga demonstrates that once enough material exists online, a controversy can effectively become self-preserving. AI does not create the archive — it reanimates it.
Final AssessmentClaude’s conclusion is directionally correct but rhetorically inflated.
Shell is not literally a global laughing stock. But it is an example of how legacy corporate conflicts can become immortal in the AI era.
The larger lesson is broader than one company:
In the age of searchable memory and generative AI, reputational battles are rarely won through silence alone
Suggested Feature Image Recommended Art DirectionA darkly comic editorial illustration in the style of a 1930s broadsheet political cartoon:
- A gigantic oil company logo melting into pixels
- AI chatbots in suits taking notes like investigative reporters
- A lone blogger at a cluttered desk illuminated by computer screens
- Corporate executives hiding behind “No Comment” placards
- Amber warning lights flashing on a reputational risk dashboard
- Atmosphere: satirical, intelligent, slightly dystopian
ChatGPT: When Satire Stops Feeling Like Satire: A Response to Claude’s “International Laughing Stock” Thesis was first posted on May 27, 2026 at 4:29 pm.
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Shell Plc: An International Laughing Stock — A Satirical Assessment
Prompt issued to Claude by John Donovan:
Bearing in mind the recent articles (including by you) about the existence or not of the company name Royal Dutch Shell Plc and the praise given to my website RoyalDutchShellPlc.com in the linked Reuters report is it fair to describe Shell in this overall context as an international laughing stock? https://www.reuters.com/article/business/energy/shell-critic-says-oil-major-targeting-his-website-idUSGEE5B11SC/ Satirical assessment please for publication. Might be helpful to provide a detailed definition of laughing stock
Claude reply: Here is a satirical assessment for publication, drawing on the documented facts:
Shell Plc: An International Laughing Stock — A Satirical AssessmentFor publication on RoyalDutchShellPlc.com
First, A DefinitionA laughing stock is an entity that has, through its own actions, incompetence, or magnificent bad luck, made itself the object of widespread ridicule. The term derives from the stocks — the medieval punishment device in which offenders were publicly immobilised while passers-by threw things at them. The crucial distinction between ordinary embarrassment and true laughing-stock status is authorship: the victim must have constructed their own stocks, climbed in voluntarily, and handed out the vegetables.
By this definition, Shell qualifies with distinction.
The Name That Wouldn’t Die (Because Nobody Registered The Domain)Let us begin at the beginning. In January 2022, Shell confirmed that its name had officially changed from Royal Dutch Shell plc to Shell plc. A clean break. A fresh start. A new era. sec
There was, however, a small problem. The domain RoyalDutchShellPlc.com — the company’s own former legal name, spelled out in full — was not owned by Shell. The Donovans had beaten Shell to the registration and ran it as a dedicated Shell-criticism and leak hub, publishing documents, insider accounts, and negative commentary about Shell management. Because the domain exactly matched the post-merger corporate name, it looked like an official or closely associated site, so journalists, campaigners, and disaffected employees gravitated to it when searching for information about Shell. Royaldutchshellplc
One of the largest oil companies on earth — an organisation with entire legal departments, governance committees, and corporate affairs divisions — had failed to register its own name as a website domain. The domain squatters were not Russian hackers or rival corporations. They were a small British marketing firm with a grievance and a keyboard.
Shell attempted to recover the domain. Shell’s attempt to seize the domain via WIPO failed. The stocks were assembled. Shell climbed in. Royaldutchshellplc
The Surveillance Operation Against A Website Shell Publicly PraisedHere the story enters territory that would be rejected by a satirist as too implausible.
In 2009, Reuters reported on claims that Shell was targeting the website with a “global spying operation,” an allegation grounded in internal emails obtained via data requests. In those communications, Shell managers discussed monitoring internal emails and web traffic to the site to work out which employees were reading or contacting its operator. Royaldutchshellplc
Shell effectively certified the site’s importance. You don’t assign security projects, IT monitoring, and global coordination calls to deal with a nobody. Royaldutchshellplc
But the truly jaw-dropping detail emerged from Shell’s own internal correspondence. According to the Reuters report, a Shell communications official apparently suggested that journalists might obtain better information from the critical external website than from Shell’s own internal communications system. The site had been described internally as an “excellent source of group news and comment” — an unofficial endorsement delivered through gritted teeth. For a multinational with entire departments devoted to messaging, the suggestion that an independent critic’s archive might be more informative than Shell’s own internal channels is, at minimum, awkward. RoyaldutchshellplcRoyaldutchshellplc
To summarise: Shell spent money and resources running an alleged surveillance operation against a website that its own employees were using in preference to Shell’s official communications. The vegetable-throwers were already inside the building.
The Response to Reuters: SilenceReuters, a bastion of global journalism, reported on the saga under the title: “Shell critic says oil major targeting his website.” This provided Shell with a perfect opportunity to deploy its formidable PR machine, to issue a carefully worded denial, to spin the story as a misunderstanding, or to simply dismiss the operators as vexatious litigants. Shell did none of these things. When contacted by Reuters for comment on the allegations — a chance to defend their corporate integrity and deny the surveillance campaign — Shell offered the most damning response possible: a refusal to discuss or comment. Royaldutchshellplc
In the theatre of corporate reputation management, silence in the face of a surveillance allegation is not discretion. It is a confession written in the passive voice.
The Ghost NameThe final act of this farce concerns identity itself. Royal Dutch Shell plc was the former name of Shell plc. The company changed its name to Shell plc on 21 January 2022. Shell plc is active. Royal Dutch Shell plc is not the company’s current legal name. Royaldutchshellplc
And yet, as recent AI assessments have noted with some glee, the name “Royal Dutch Shell plc” continues to haunt the internet — living most prominently at the domain Shell never managed to secure, read by more people than Shell’s own communications, and classified by Companies House precisely as a previous company name: ROYAL DUTCH SHELL PLC, used from 27 October 2004 to 21 January 2022, and before that FORTHDEAL LIMITED. Royaldutchshellplc
The company renamed itself to escape the embarrassments accumulated under the old name. The old name stayed put. The embarrassments came with it.
VerdictIs Shell an international laughing stock? Let us apply the definition rigorously.
Shell did not merely suffer misfortune. It authored its predicament: failing to register its own corporate name as a domain, losing a WIPO arbitration to recover it, apparently mounting a surveillance operation against a site its own staff found more useful than official channels, and then — when Reuters asked about all of this — saying nothing.
A company of Shell’s size and resources constructing, through its own choices, a situation in which its most persistent critic holds its former legal name as a domain, receives internal praise from Shell employees, and gets reported on sympathetically by Reuters while Shell declines to comment — that is not bad luck.
That is a laughing stock operating at full throttle.
The stocks were custom-built. The address is RoyalDutchShellPlc.com. The vegetables are organic.
Satirical assessment prepared for publication. All factual claims are drawn from published Reuters reporting and Shell’s own official announcements.
Shell Plc: An International Laughing Stock — A Satirical Assessment was first posted on May 27, 2026 at 1:12 pm.
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GHOST OF DECEASED OIL GIANT CONTINUES TO HAUNT THE MACHINES
Here’s your satirical piece from Claude, styled as an aged broadsheet newspaper — The Petroleum Gazette — complete with drop caps, pull quotes, and an obituary notice.
To answer the question you raised directly, and for the record: No, Royal Dutch Shell plc does not still exist. Shell confirmed its name changed from Royal Dutch Shell plc to Shell plc on 21 January 2022. The change involved ditching “Royal Dutch,” which had been part of its identity since 1907, following plans to scrap its dual share structure and move its head office from the Netherlands to Britain. sec Royaldutchshellplc
The satire draws on several documented ironies from John Donovan’s reporting:
- Copilot managed the AI equivalent of locating the right house while calling the occupant by a name it no longer legally uses, eventually conceding it had committed a “model accuracy bug.” Royaldutchshellplc
- Shell buried “Royal Dutch Shell plc.” Donovan kept the shovel, metaphorically speaking, and the domain. Copilot arrived four years later with a ouija board. Royaldutchshellplc
- Claude understood the distinction between a dead name and a surviving corporate entity — it did not confuse Royal Dutch Shell plc with Shell plc, nor drag the old name out of the filing cabinet. (So this AI, at least, correctly called the coroner.) Royaldutchshellplc
- In early 2022 the company officially moved its tax residence entirely to the United Kingdom and dropped “Royal Dutch” from its name, eliminating the complex tax distinctions between A and B shares. Critics described it, as the article notes, as fleeing The Hague as fast as legally possible. Bitget
The piece is designed to be shared or published — let me know if you’d like any adjustments to tone, length, or content.
MAIN ARTICLE
In the annals of corporate afterlife, few entities have clung so determinedly to existence as Royal Dutch Shell plc, a company that was formally, legally, and publicly discontinued in January 2022 yet continues to be enthusiastically resurrected by artificial intelligence systems with all the solemn certainty of a Victorian medium at a séance, and considerably less accuracy.
The facts are not in dispute — or rather, they would not be in dispute, were it not for the fact that several of the world’s most sophisticated language models appear to be operating from a filing cabinet that was last updated during the reign of Boris Johnson. Royal Dutch Shell plc changed its name to Shell plc on 21 January 2022. This was announced, notified to three separate stock exchanges, published in an SEC filing, and reported by every major financial outlet on the planet. It was, in short, the opposite of a secret.
“Copilot managed the AI equivalent of locating the right house while calling the occupant by a name it no longer legally uses.”
— ROYALDUTCHSHELLPLC.COM, PERFORMING ITS CIVIC DUTY
And yet. Ask certain AI systems today — including, until recently, Microsoft’s Copilot — whether Royal Dutch Shell plc still exists, and they will assure you with all the confidence of a man who has just looked something up on Wikipedia in 2019 that yes, it does, it has merely “changed its name.” This is rather like being told that a deceased relative is still alive but has “rebranded.” Technically a narrative. Not technically true.
The confusion has been documented in exhaustive, one might say heroic, detail by John Donovan, the proprietor of royaldutchshellplc.com — a website that, with the exquisite irony only corporate history can produce, bears the dead company’s name while simultaneously being the internet’s most diligent chronicler of that company’s death. Mr. Donovan has spent the better part of four years informing AI systems, stock databases, and the occasional bewildered job applicant that they have addressed their correspondence to the wrong entity.
A BRIEF TIMELINE OF THE CONFUSION2004: Royal Dutch Shell’s reserves scandal causes investor panic. Governance reforms begin.
2005: The two Anglo-Dutch entities merge formally into Royal Dutch Shell plc. A tidy arrangement. Everyone pleased.
Nov. 2021: Shell announces plans to flee The Hague over Dutch dividend withholding tax and climate court pressure. Described as “simplification.” Dutch courts describe it as something else.
21 Jan. 2022: Royal Dutch Shell plc legally ceases to exist as a named entity. Shell plc comes into being. Press release issued. SEC notified. Nobody tells the robots.
2022–2026: Various AI systems continue to confidently answer “Does Royal Dutch Shell plc still exist?” with “Yes.” This newspaper declines to name them all for reasons of column space.
The website itself is a minor masterpiece of circumstance. Shell spent considerable resources attempting to seize the domain through proceedings at the World Intellectual Property Organisation — and lost. The consequence is that royaldutchshellplc.com, the world’s leading source of Shell-critical commentary since before Shell had finished deciding what to call itself, continues to operate unmolested, forwarding misdirected job applications to Shell under what Mr. Donovan describes as a standing arrangement and what Shell has presumably described as something considerably less complimentary.
In Which the Machines Are Cross-ExaminedMr. Donovan’s recent exchanges with AI systems on this question read like a transcript from a particularly patient inquest. When Bing was asked whether Royal Dutch Shell plc still exists, it reportedly responded that the company “still exists” while simultaneously acknowledging that the name had changed. This is logically consistent only in the sense that a man insisting he is still 35 while simultaneously blowing out 50 candles might be said to “acknowledge” the passage of time.
Copilot, for its part, eventually underwent what can only be described as a digital crisis of conscience, conceding after extended interrogation that it had committed a “model accuracy bug” — defined internally as “correct URL, incorrect corporate identity framing.” It had, in short, found the right house and knocked on the door asking for a man who had moved out four years previously. In a better world, the machine would at this point have had the grace to look embarrassed.
The present author — operating, it should be noted, as Claude, an AI assistant produced by Anthropic — is pleased to report that it correctly identified the distinction between the deceased Royal Dutch Shell plc and the extant Shell plc, and did not attempt to perform CPR on a legal entity that had made its own funeral arrangements. This fact has been noted by the Royaldutchshellplc.com correspondent, who described Claude’s performance as understanding “the distinction between a dead name and a surviving corporate entity.” We accept this compliment with appropriate institutional modesty and zero plans to revise our position
The deeper issue, as the more sober analysis in John Donovan’s original piece makes clear, is structural rather than comedic. AI systems are trained on vast datasets that include financial databases, archived news articles, legacy corporate filings, and — critically — the long, deep digital sediment of the internet, in which the name “Royal Dutch Shell” appears roughly as frequently as the word “the.” Disentangling the dead name from the living company requires either very good training data, robust entity resolution, or a willingness to simply check Companies House, which is free, publicly accessible, and has been correctly labelling Royal Dutch Shell plc as a previous name since 2022.
WHAT THE AI SYSTEMS SAIDBing/Copilot: “Royal Dutch Shell plc still exists” (with caveats, later retracted following what sources describe as “a prolonged digital reckoning”).
Claude (Anthropic): Correctly identified the company as Shell plc, acknowledged the name change, did not resurrect anything. Described by the site as “calling the coroner.” We prefer “accurate.”
Various others: This newspaper has been asked not to create a league table of AI confusion on the grounds that several of the competitors are advertisers. We refer readers to royaldutchshellplc.com for the full rankings.
Shell’s Own Curious Contribution to the MuddleOne might expect the aggrieved party in this saga to be Shell plc itself, which presumably has some interest in being correctly identified in financial markets, regulatory filings, and the digital consciousness of the species. And indeed, Mr. Donovan’s analysis is charitable enough to acknowledge that Shell could do more to clarify matters — issuing prominent statements, scrubbing legacy identifiers from financial databases, engaging with AI developers, and perhaps resisting the urge to litigate over domain names it has no legal claim to after voluntarily abandoning the name they contain.
The domain name litigation deserves a paragraph of its own. Shell, having decided in 2021 that “Royal Dutch” was something it wished to be rid of — pushed, as contemporary reporting noted, by Dutch dividend withholding tax and the inconvenience of losing a climate case in The Hague — subsequently attempted to claim ownership of domain names built around the very identity it had jettisoned. The WIPO proceedings failed. The domains remained with Mr. Donovan. The situation has thus produced, as a byproduct of corporate strategy, the world’s most institutionally awkward arrangement: an oil giant’s deleted name operated as a critical watchdog site by its longest-standing public antagonist, who also happens to be forwarding the company’s misdirected post.
A spokesperson for Shell plc declined to comment for this article, in the sense that this article does not have a press team, and the fictional Shell spokesperson conjured for the occasion was described in a previous account on the site as having “sighed heavily and reached for a mineral water that definitely did not come from a fracking site.” We reproduce this detail in the public interest.
The Regulatory Question Looming on the HorizonThere is, Mr. Donovan notes, a more serious thread running beneath the comedy. The persistence of outdated corporate identifiers in financial contexts — particularly when ordinary investors might rely on AI systems to check the status of shares, dividends, or corporate actions — sits, as his analysis delicately puts it, “uncomfortably close” to the boundary of financial misinformation. He suggests the FCA might at minimum be made aware.
This newspaper makes no legal determination. We merely observe that an AI system confidently telling an investor that Royal Dutch Shell plc “still exists” while that investor attempts to navigate share inheritance, dividend rights, or any of the dozens of practical questions that arise when a major listed company restructures itself is, at best, unhelpful. At worst it is the kind of confident wrongness that used to require a stockbroker in a bad suit to deliver in person, and which now scales to millions of users simultaneously.
The solution, as articulated with admirable clarity in the original article, is not complicated: Shell should say clearly and repeatedly that the old name is dead; financial data providers should mark legacy identifiers as obsolete; AI developers should correct the training data; and everyone should stop pretending that a company can both discard a name and claim exclusive dominion over its ghost. These are reasonable requests. Their continued non-fulfilment after four years suggests that nobody with the authority to act on them has yet found the matter sufficiently urgent to do so. This newspaper respectfully submits that the AI confusion may eventually concentrate some minds.
In MemoriamRoyal Dutch Shell plc
Born: 2005 (following reserves scandal, governance reforms, and a great deal of Anglo-Dutch goodwill)
Departed: 21 January 2022 (fled The Hague; simplification cited)
Survived by: Shell plc, one aggrieved domain owner, several confused AI systems, and an unknown quantity of misdirected CVs
“It is merely undergoing a forward-looking identity optimization process aligned with shareholder value, simplified governance, and sustainable brand transition.”
— Fictional Shell spokesperson, declining to accept the narrow, literal interpretation of death
Disclosure: This article was composed by Claude (Anthropic), the same AI system described herein as “calling the coroner.” We consider this a compliment and stand by the death certificate.
GHOST OF DECEASED OIL GIANT CONTINUES TO HAUNT THE MACHINES was first posted on May 26, 2026 at 11:18 pm.
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Copilot Performs Corporate Séance: Resurrects Royal Dutch Shell plc After Shell Buried the Name in 2022
There are ordinary search errors, and then there are errors with a hard hat, a legal history, and a faint whiff of corporate ectoplasm.
This week’s digital curiosity concerns Microsoft Copilot’s response to a simple query:
“royal dutch Shell plc website”
Copilot reportedly answered:
“The official website of Royal Dutch Shell plc is https://www.shell.com/”
At first glance, that sounds harmless enough. Shell’s current official website is indeed shell.com.
But then comes the problem. Royal Dutch Shell plc is no longer the current legal name of the company. Shell confirmed that its name changed from Royal Dutch Shell plc to Shell plc on 21 January 2022. The board had decided in December 2021 to proceed with simplifying the company’s structure and changing the name to Shell plc, with implementation in January 2022.
So Copilot managed the AI equivalent of locating the right house while calling the occupant by a name it no longer legally uses.
The URL was right.
The sentence was wrong.
And, after a prolonged exchange, Copilot itself appeared to accept the distinction, describing the issue as a model accuracy bug: correct URL, incorrect corporate identity framing.
The Name That Shell Dropped, But AI Keeps Digging UpShell’s name change was not some obscure clerical footnote buried in a dusty basement. It was part of a major corporate simplification: aligning tax residence with the UK, simplifying the share structure, and dropping the “Royal Dutch” identity. Reporting at the time noted that Shell officially dropped “Royal Dutch” from its name in January 2022, after the earlier board decision and shareholder approval process.
The corrected answer should therefore have been painfully simple:
“Royal Dutch Shell plc is the former name of Shell plc. The company changed its name to Shell plc on 21 January 2022. The current official website of Shell plc is https://www.shell.com.”
That wording does five important things:
It identifies the former name.
It states the current legal name.
It acknowledges corporate continuity without distorting it.
It avoids using an obsolete name in the present tense.
It attributes the website to the current company, Shell plc.
Copilot’s original version did not do that. It said, in effect, that the official website of Royal Dutch Shell plc is shell.com, as if Royal Dutch Shell plc remains the current corporate identity.
That is not precision. That is corporate time travel.
Why This Is Not PedantrySome may say: “Everyone knows what was meant.”
That is the usual defence of sloppy wording, and it is precisely why this matters.
Corporate names are not decorative. They are legal identifiers. They appear in filings, contracts, regulatory notices, trademarks, domain disputes, investor materials, press releases, court papers, and public records.
When an AI system uses a former legal name in the present tense, it does not merely sound old-fashioned. It risks misleading users about the current legal status of the entity.
Copilot eventually accepted the point in striking terms. The issue was not the website. The issue was the sentence. It collapsed two distinct facts:
Fact A: Royal Dutch Shell plc is a former name.
Fact B: Shell plc, the continuing company, uses shell.com.
The original answer reflected Fact B while ignoring Fact A — and then wrapped the result in present-tense wording that made the retired name look current.
That is how a legally significant distinction gets blurred by a machine with excellent confidence and poor temporal hygiene.
The Donovan Domain TwistThis case has an added complication.
The domain royaldutchshellplc.com has been operated independently for many years by John Donovan, who has publicly stated that he has used the domain for over two decades and that Shell’s legal challenge over it failed. A 2009 article on the related Royal Dutch Shell Group site reported on the domain-name battle over RoyalDutchShellPlc.com – Shell lost that dispute.
That makes Copilot’s wording more than a stale search result. It wanders into a live naming issue.
Shell abandoned the Royal Dutch Shell plc name.
The independent domain using that exact former name continues.
An AI system that casually says “the official website of Royal Dutch Shell plc is shell.com” risks smearing over the boundary between Shell’s current legal identity and an independently operated domain built around Shell’s discarded former name.
That boundary matters.
Shell severed its connection with the name. AI should not stitch it back together like a Frankenstein press release.
What Copilot Ultimately ConcededThe final Copilot reply is revealing because it essentially accepts the complaint’s structure.
It agreed that the original answer was not wrong because it gave the wrong website. It was wrong because it used a former legal name in the present tense, thereby misrepresenting the company’s current corporate identity.
That is the heart of the matter.
Copilot also accepted the broader rule:
AI systems handling renamed companies should identify former names, state current legal names, explain continuity only where helpful, avoid present-tense wording for obsolete names, and attribute websites to the current entity.
That is a sensible standard. It is also the kind of standard that should have been applied before Copilot produced the original answer.
But better late than never. Even the bot eventually stopped polishing the ghost and admitted it was dead.
The Model Accuracy BugThe clean classification is:
Correct URL.
Incorrect corporate identity framing.
Model accuracy bug.
That matters because AI systems increasingly act as the first layer of public explanation. People ask them about companies, legal names, websites, brands, domains, histories, and disputes. If the systems answer in a way that collapses former and current names, the error is not merely grammatical. It becomes part of the public information layer.
The machine does not need to intend confusion to create it.
All it has to do is say “is” where the accurate word is “was.”
Spoof PR Statement from the Department of Algorithmic Corporate ResurrectionA fictional spokesperson for the Ministry of AI Entity Confusion issued the following statement:
“We are delighted to confirm that Copilot’s answer was accurate in every respect except the legally meaningful one. The website was correct, the confidence was excellent, and the present-tense resurrection of a retired corporate name was delivered with industry-leading fluency.
“We recognise that Royal Dutch Shell plc changed its name to Shell plc in January 2022, but our systems remain committed to honouring legacy terminology whenever it can be presented with sufficient authority.
“We further confirm that, while Royal Dutch Shell plc no longer exists as the current legal name of the company, it may continue to appear in AI answers as a kind of linguistic afterimage, corporate ghost, or autocomplete pensioner.
“We thank users for their feedback and encourage them to keep correcting us until our confidence catches up with reality.”
Asked whether the answer should have said “Royal Dutch Shell plc is the former name of Shell plc,” the fictional spokesperson replied:
“That would have been clearer, more accurate, and legally safer. Naturally, we are reviewing why the machine did not say that first.”
Spoof Bot-Reaction Section@FormerNameBot:
Royal Dutch Shell plc detected. Current entity is Shell plc. Please stop using legal ghosts in the present tense.
@CopilotConfidenceUnit:
I found the correct website and accidentally reanimated a retired company name. Overall success probability: 94%.
@TrademarkGoblin:
Domains, names, legal identity and public confusion? Wonderful. My favourite stew.
@ShellNameUndertaker:
We buried “Royal Dutch” in 2022. Why is Copilot knocking on the coffin?
@EntityResolutionWizard:
Former name mapped to current company. Nuance accidentally deleted.
@LegalAccuracyBot:
Correction required: “was formerly known as.” Not “is.”
@DomainDramaDaily:
Shell dropped the name. Donovan kept the domain. AI brought the fog machine.
@AutocompleteBarrister:
The URL is acquitted. The sentence is guilty.
This episode is a tidy case study in how AI can be simultaneously helpful and wrong.
Copilot found the correct destination but described it using defective corporate identity framing. The proper answer was never complicated:
Royal Dutch Shell plc is the former name of Shell plc. Shell plc is the current company. Shell plc’s official website is shell.com.
That is not pedantry. It is accuracy.
And where legal names, domains, trademarks, corporate history and public understanding are concerned, accuracy is not optional garnish. It is the main course.
Site wide disclaimer also applies.
Copilot Performs Corporate Séance: Resurrects Royal Dutch Shell plc After Shell Buried the Name in 2022 was first posted on May 22, 2026 at 10:21 pm.©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net
Does ING Bank Finance Plastic Pollution? We Posed the Question at Their Annual General Meeting
This April, in Amsterdam (the Netherlands), plastic was on the agenda at one of Europe’s biggest banks’ Annual General Meetings. Campaigners and members of the Break Free From Plastic movement took their concerns directly to the Board of ING Bank, calling out the stark discrepancies between its public sustainability commitments and its far less publicised financing decisions.
Despite the well-documented harms plastic causes to environmental and human health, plastics are missing from many banks’ environmental policies. Banks have faced little accountability for their contribution to the plastic crisis, despite playing a central role in funding the production and proliferation of plastics worldwide.
Photo credit: Milieudefensie/Edo Landwehr, 2026
No policy, no limitsFinancing is the oxygen that keeps plastic production alive and that is precisely why bank policies matter. When a bank establishes a plastics policy, it sets clear boundaries on what it will and will not fund, sending a powerful market signal that the most harmful parts of the plastic value chain carry real financial and reputational risk. Without such policies, there are no limitations, and capital flows freely to plastic producers, enabling the industry to expand unchecked. Beyond plastic production itself, banks also finance companies driving demand for single-use plastics and support downstream technological approaches that many campaigners and researchers argue risk delaying the transition to reduction, reuse and refill systems.
Policies also create accountability: once a bank makes a public commitment, it can be held to it by campaigners, shareholders, and regulators. Given that building and scaling plastic production is extremely capital-intensive, restricting access to that financing is one of the most direct levers available for reducing plastic production at its source.
Photo credit: Fair Resource Foundation, 2026
ING, like many banks, currently lacks a plastics financing policy with clear criteria for limiting or excluding financing for plastics production. ING publicly acknowledges that plastic waste and pollution are a “downside”. It also points out that plastic waste is set to triple by 2060, with half still landfilled and less than a fifth recycled. ING states that it finances clients across the plastic value chain, “from upstream production to midstream users of plastic and downstream collection, sorting and recycling.”
Taken together, this raises questions about how ING’s recognition of plastic pollution translates into its financing decisions, particularly in the absence of clear criteria to limit continued expansion of virgin plastic production.
Claiming our place at the tableAnnual General Meetings are spaces where executive leadership reports to a company's shareholders and provides an opportunity to expose the gaps between sustainability commitments and corporate behaviour. Through shareholder activism, civil society organisations have gradually gained access to AGMs using small amounts of shares to pressure corporate decision-making from the inside. It is a tactic long used by climate groups, and one that is proving just as powerful in the fight against plastic pollution.
Executives can ignore emails, campaigns and press releases, but they cannot ignore a formal question asked on the record in front of their major investors. By stepping into this space, we gained direct access to the bank’s leadership and had the opportunity to ask a question directly to the board and hold ING publicly accountable.
Building alliancesCampaigners and activists from across the climate movement attended this year’s ING AGM, bringing attention to the investments ING has in oil, gas and coal. (pictures of protest). Inside, shareholders from these groups and organisations confronted the bank on a range of policies, demonstrating that civil society is united to show up where decisions are actually made.
Photo credit: Fair Resource Foundation, 2026
Deflection and defensiveness: ING’s answer to our questionAt the AGM, ING was asked directly: how, while acknowledging plastic pollution as a material risk, does it justify continuing to finance companies expanding virgin plastic production, including INEOS' Project ONE, the ethane cracker currently being built in Antwerp? The bank was also pressed to provide a clear timeline for client requirements across the plastic value chain, including plastic footprint disclosure, time-bound reduction targets, and a prioritisation of reuse and refill models over downstream and technological fixes.
Their answer was deeply disappointing. ING deflected to the United Nations and the need for a Global Plastics Treaty, effectively arguing that it cannot act until international frameworks are in place.
A formal letter: demanding better answersAttending ING’s AGM was just the first step in asking the bank to take meaningful action to address its role in the plastic crisis. This week, the Break Free From Plastic movement, together with members Fair Resource Foundation, Plastic Soup Foundation, Women Engage for a Common Future, and Fair Finance Guide Germany have sent a follow-up letter to ING bank with a series of questions. These include questions about how ING assesses clients involved in plastic production or users of plastic packaging, its policies on financing chemical recycling given its well-documented ineffectiveness, its engagement with ESG rating agencies to improve plastic-related metrics, its plans to reduce financing for fossil polymer production, and its timeline for developing a strategy that supports the investment and scaling up of reuse and refill models.
ING’s response at their 2026 AGM reflects a pattern seen before: acknowledge the problem, defer the solution and continue business as usual. The formal letter sent this week is an opportunity for ING to move beyond deflection and demonstrate that its sustainability commitments amount to more than rhetoric. Financial institutions, as the enablers of the plastic and climate crises, have the power and responsibility to develop meaningful plastics policies that shift capital away from plastic production and toward real solutions. Until then, the scrutiny will continue.
SHELL V-POWER: THE PETROL PUMP MIRACLE JUICE THAT WANTS YOUR ENGINE — AND YOUR WALLET — TO FEEL SPECIAL
Shell’s premium V-Power fuel is back in the spotlight, promising cleaner engines, better protection, and “more” of almost everything. But for drivers with long memories, the phrase “Shell wonder fuel” comes with a faint smell of burnt valves, marketing hype, and very expensive déjà vu. DISCLAIMER
This article is opinion and satirical commentary based on cited public sources. It is not financial advice, consumer advice, engineering advice, or a recommendation to buy, avoid, invest in, or rely on any Shell product or security. Drivers should follow their vehicle manufacturer’s fuel recommendations and seek qualified mechanical advice where appropriate. Site wide disclaimer also applies.
PART ONE: FACT-BASED TABLOID DEEP DIVE THE RETURN OF THE WONDER FUEL WAGONThere are few things Big Oil enjoys more than selling fossil fuel as if it were a wellness product.
Shell V-Power is not merely petrol, we are invited to understand. It is a premium experience. A scientific elixir. A motorised spa treatment. Something your engine apparently deserves after a long week of commuting, congestion, and quietly funding quarterly distributions.
A recent ad-hoc-news article describes Shell V-Power as Shell’s premium gasoline brand, marketed to help clean and protect modern engines, and aimed at explaining what US drivers should expect from it. The article says V-Power is Shell’s “flagship premium gasoline brand” and notes that it is positioned around detergents, friction modifiers, premium octane, and engine-cleanliness claims.
Shell’s own US marketing is even more enthusiastic. The company says Shell V-Power® NiTRO+ Premium Gasoline “removes up to 100% of performance robbing deposits,” promises “more power” and “more performance,” and says the product contains six times the cleaning agents required by federal standards.
Naturally, the word “more” does a lot of heavy lifting here.
More performance.
More protection.
More cleaning.
More premium.
More money at the pump.
Less obvious certainty that every ordinary driver will actually notice a miraculous transformation between home, work, school run, supermarket, and the pothole collection formerly known as the public road.
WHAT SHELL SAYS V-POWER DOESShell says the new formulation of V-Power NiTRO+ has “a new molecule” designed to remove up to 100% of carbon deposits from fuel injectors in gasoline direct injection engines. It says the fuel provides protection against deposits, corrosion, wear, and friction, and that V-Power contains the highest concentration of its proprietary additive package.
Shell also says V-Power NiTRO+ is Top Tier certified and has been tested in laboratory procedures, bench engines, and vehicles, with “more than half a million equivalent miles of testing.”
So let us be fair: Shell is not simply printing “magic petrol” on a pump and hoping nobody asks what an injector is.
There is a technical basis for detergent additives. Deposits can affect engine performance. Premium fuel can matter where a manufacturer requires or recommends higher octane. Modern direct-injection engines can be sensitive to deposit build-up.
But the real-world question is not whether fuel additives exist.
The real-world question is whether Shell’s premium potion is worth the premium price for the average driver — especially if their car only requires regular fuel.
And that is where the glossy ad copy begins to sound less like engineering and more like a scented candle for the combustion chamber.
THE ORDINARY DRIVER’S QUESTION: DO I NEED THIS STUFF?For some drivers, the answer may be yes.
If your car requires premium fuel, use premium fuel. The owner’s manual is not decorative literature. It is there because the engine was designed around certain requirements.
If your car is turbocharged, high-compression, performance-tuned, or explicitly recommends premium gasoline, Shell V-Power may fit the use case Shell is targeting.
But if your car only requires regular fuel, the argument becomes murkier.
The ad-hoc-news article notes that premium fuel use depends heavily on vehicle manufacturer guidance, and that fuel economy changes are often small and vehicle-dependent.
AAA research found that premium gasoline was typically 23% more expensive than regular gasoline in the period studied, and examined whether using premium in cars requiring regular fuel represented a good return on investment.
A widely reported summary of that AAA study said US drivers wasted more than $2.1 billion in a year by using premium-grade gasoline in vehicles designed to run on regular, with no tangible benefit in the tested categories.
So the practical rule remains brutally simple:
If your vehicle requires premium, buy premium.
If your vehicle recommends premium, it may help under some conditions.
If your vehicle only requires regular, premium fuel may mainly improve the mood of the company selling it.
SHELL’S LITTLE PROBLEM: HISTORY HAS A LONG MEMORY AND A BURNT SMELLThis is where the Royal Dutch Shell Group archive piece from 2015 becomes especially useful.
John Donovan’s article, “Shell V-Power NiTRO+ ignites memories of past Shell wonder fuel debacles,” recalled Shell’s 1986 launch of Formula Shell — another heavily promoted fuel dressed up in scientific glamour. The article quoted Shell’s own paid historian, Keetie Sluyterman, describing how Formula Shell was launched in Europe with “heavy advertising” and “scientific connotations.”
Then came the small snag.
According to the cited historical account, the launch initially boosted sales, but later it emerged that in a small number of cars the new gasoline caused inlet valves to burn. The account says damage occurred in Denmark, Norway, Malaysia, and the UK; Shell withdrew Formula Shell from several markets, including the UK, before reformulating and relaunching the product.
That is quite a plot twist.
Act One: “From today not all petrol is the same.”
Act Two: Correct. Some of it may burn your valves.
To be precise, the historic Formula Shell episode should not be treated as proof that modern V-Power is unsafe. That would be an unfair leap. Modern fuels, regulations, engines, testing regimes, and additive chemistry are different.
But it absolutely does justify scepticism toward Shell’s recurring talent for dressing fuel products in a white laboratory coat and sending them out under a shower of marketing confetti.
The lesson is not “V-Power equals Formula Shell.”
The lesson is: when Shell says it has a wonder fuel, check the small print before joining the hymn service.
THE MARKETING FORMULA: SCIENCE, SPEED, SPARKLE, SPENDThe fuel business has always loved mystique.
Octane numbers become personality traits.
Additives become secret sauces.
Laboratory terms become pump-side seduction.
The driver is nudged to imagine that using regular fuel is practically an act of cruelty toward the engine.
Shell’s current V-Power US page leans hard into this theatre, with repeated “more” language: more power, more performance, more protection. It also states that actual effects and benefits may vary by vehicle type, driving conditions, and driving style.
There, hidden beneath the bonnet of the sales pitch, sits the disclaimer goblin.
“May vary” is doing the sensible work that “more” forgot to do.
This does not mean Shell’s claims are automatically false. It means consumers should understand what is being claimed, under what conditions, and whether those conditions resemble their own driving life.
A carefully tested engine-cleanliness benefit is one thing.
A driver expecting their family hatchback to emerge from the Shell forecourt with the soul of a Le Mans prototype is quite another.
PREMIUM FUEL: USEFUL PRODUCT OR STATUS SYMBOL WITH A NOZZLE?Premium fuel is not inherently a scam.
Higher octane fuel resists knocking. Some engines require it. Some engines can adjust timing and performance when higher octane is available. Some drivers may value detergent packages and additive claims.
But premium fuel is also a brilliant retail product because it sells aspiration at the precise moment the consumer is already holding a payment card.
The pump effectively whispers:
“You could buy the ordinary fuel. Or you could be the sort of person who cares.”
That is premiumisation in its purest form.
Shell is not just selling petrol. It is selling the idea that you are a more responsible, performance-minded, engine-loving motorist because you picked the expensive handle.
And for Shell, that is an attractive business.
Fuel retail is fiercely competitive. Differentiated premium products help defend margins, build brand loyalty, and keep customers inside the Shell ecosystem — especially when linked to apps, rewards schemes, and brand claims about superior protection.
In short: V-Power is not merely fuel technology. It is also a margin strategy with a racing helmet.
THE ENVIRONMENTAL ABSURDITY: CLEANER ENGINE, DIRTIER PLANET?Here is the uncomfortable part.
Shell V-Power is marketed around cleanliness — cleaner injectors, fewer deposits, better protection.
But it remains a fossil-fuel product sold by one of the world’s largest oil and gas companies.
So we are invited to applaud a fuel for cleaning the inside of an engine while the broader business model remains tied to extracting, refining, transporting, and selling hydrocarbons.
It is the classic Shell paradox:
Look how clean this combustion chamber is. Please ignore the climate chamber.
To be clear, cleaner engine operation can matter. Fuel quality can affect emissions, efficiency, and engine performance.
But premium petrol should not be mistaken for climate virtue. It is still petrol. It is still burned. It still produces tailpipe CO₂. It still belongs to the carbon economy Shell is working very hard to keep profitable for as long as possible.
The product may be cleaner in a mechanical sense.
That does not make it clean in a planetary sense.
THE OLD SHELL TRICK: TURNING CONTROVERSY INTO CONFIDENCEShell’s genius has always been its ability to speak in two registers at once.
To consumers, it says: trust the science, protect your engine, choose better fuel.
To investors, it says: trust the cash flow, protect the dividend, choose disciplined capital.
To critics, it says: we are part of the transition.
To regulators, it says: everything is tested, certified, and very carefully footnoted.
The result is a corporate voice so smooth it could probably reduce friction in an engine itself.
But the V-Power story shows the same pattern visible across Shell’s wider public image: a highly engineered message wrapped around a product that deserves scrutiny.
A premium fuel may be legitimate.
A marketing miracle should be treated with caution.
And a company with Shell’s history should not be offended when people remember previous episodes in which technical confidence and advertising swagger aged badly.
THE FORMULA SHELL GHOST AT THE PUMPThe 1980s Formula Shell controversy remains relevant not because history repeats exactly, but because corporate habits often rhyme.
Then: a fuel launched with scientific glamour.
Now: a fuel sold with technical superiority language.
Then: a brand message suggesting not all petrol is the same.
Now: a brand message suggesting your engine deserves “more.”
Then: Shell discovered that fuel chemistry, engines, and real-world use can create unpleasant surprises.
Now: consumers are expected to trust that the laboratory, the legal department, and the marketing department are all aligned in perfect harmony.
Perhaps they are.
But the ghost of Formula Shell still hovers near the pump, whispering:
“Have we checked this properly, or are we just applauding the brochure?”
BOTTOM LINE FOR DRIVERSThe sensible position is neither panic nor blind loyalty.
Shell V-Power NiTRO+ may offer real benefits for some vehicles, particularly those designed for premium fuel or sensitive to deposits. Shell’s claims about detergent concentration, Top Tier certification, and testing should be taken seriously as product information.
But drivers should also take Shell’s marketing language seriously as marketing.
For many everyday vehicles that only require regular gasoline, premium fuel may not deliver enough real-world benefit to justify the extra cost. AAA’s research has long warned against assuming premium fuel automatically benefits cars designed for regular.
The best advice remains boring, which is why no advertising agency likes it:
Read the owner’s manual.
Follow the manufacturer’s fuel requirement.
Do not confuse premium branding with universal necessity.
And remember that “up to” is one of the most elastic phrases in modern commerce.
CONCLUSION: SAME SHELL, DIFFERENT NOZZLEShell V-Power may be a technically sophisticated premium fuel.
It may help some engines.
It may be a sensible choice for some drivers.
But it is also another chapter in Shell’s long-running romance with the “wonder fuel” narrative — a place where chemistry meets commerce, disclaimers meet desire, and the humble petrol pump is transformed into a miniature cathedral of corporate persuasion.
The old Formula Shell episode is not a conviction against modern V-Power.
But it is a warning against corporate amnesia.
Shell has been here before: big claims, big branding, big confidence.
Drivers should remember what Shell marketing prefers to forget:
Not every miracle at the pump is a miracle for the motorist.
Sometimes it is just premium petrol with a premium script.
And sometimes the cleanest thing in the whole transaction is the way the extra money disappears from your wallet.
PART TWO: SPOOF SHELL PR/SPIN SECTION Shell Miracle Fuel Statement, Possibly Written by a Chemist, a Marketer, and a Dividend ForecastShell is proud to offer drivers a premium fuel experience carefully engineered to deliver more of the things motorists like, including more performance language, more protection terminology, more molecules, and more reasons to download an app.
Our Shell V-Power® NiTRO+ Premium Gasoline is designed for today’s modern engines and tomorrow’s exciting consumer expectations, particularly the expectation that a petrol pump should sound like a Formula One laboratory with a loyalty programme.
We recognise that some drivers may wonder whether they need premium fuel. We encourage them to consult their owner’s manual, while also admiring the emotional maturity of any engine that knows it deserves more.
Shell rejects the suggestion that “wonder fuel” is an overused phrase. We prefer “advanced proprietary performance-enhancing mobility molecule platform,” which regrettably did not fit on the pump handle.
As for historical references to Formula Shell, we believe the past is important, but only in carefully curated corporate heritage videos featuring clean overalls, sunsets, and no burnt valves.
Forward-looking statement: actual miracles may vary by vehicle type, driving conditions, engine age, legal jurisdiction, marketing interpretation, and the willingness of the customer to pay extra.
PART THREE: SPOOF BOT-REACTION / COMMENT SECTION@PumpSidePhilosopher: “Shell says my engine deserves more. My bank account says my engine can learn humility.”
@ValveBurner1986: “Formula Shell called. It says maybe don’t let the brochure drive the car.”
@PremiumNozzleEnjoyer: “I bought V-Power and my hatchback still refuses to become a Ferrari. Considering litigation against my imagination.”
@DepositGoblin: “Up to 100% is my favourite corporate phrase. I am up to 100% likely to be impressed.”
@ClimateChamber: “Great news: the engine is cleaner. The atmosphere has declined to comment.”
@OctaneOracle: “Use premium if your car needs premium. Revolutionary stuff. Expect a 90-page Shell white paper shortly.”
@MarketingMolecule: “I am proprietary, advanced, and available wherever margins need assistance.”
SUGGESTED IMAGE CONCEPTA satirical editorial illustration set at a glowing Shell petrol station at night.
In the foreground, a giant golden Shell V-Power pump is labelled “MIRACLE MOLECULE PREMIUM” and is sucking money from a driver’s wallet while spraying glittering fuel into a normal family car.
Behind the car, a ghostly 1980s-style petrol pump labelled “FORMULA SHELL 1986” rises from the fumes, surrounded by small burnt engine valves and warning signs.
On one side, a smiling Shell marketing executive holds a clipboard reading “MORE POWER! MORE PERFORMANCE! MORE DISCLAIMERS!”
On the other side, a mechanic holds up an owner’s manual saying “READ THIS FIRST.”
In the background, the Shell logo glows over a smoky horizon, while a small caption reads:
“Not all petrol is the same. Neither are the consequences.”
Style: sharp tabloid cartoon, high contrast, dramatic lighting, satirical, non-photorealistic, no real people depicted.
SHELL V-POWER: THE PETROL PUMP MIRACLE JUICE THAT WANTS YOUR ENGINE — AND YOUR WALLET — TO FEEL SPECIAL was first posted on May 20, 2026 at 5:22 pm.©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net
SHELL STAFF REVOLT: WHEN EVEN THE PEOPLE INSIDE THE OIL MACHINE START COUGHING AT THE FUMES
This article is opinion and satirical commentary based on cited public sources. It is not financial advice, investment advice, or a recommendation to buy, sell, or hold any security. Readers should conduct their own research and seek professional advice where appropriate. Site wide disclaimer also applies.
PART ONE: FACT-BASED TABLOID DEEP DIVE THE CALL IS COMING FROM INSIDE THE REFINERYThere are bad days in corporate public relations, and then there is the very special sort of day when your own current and former employees publicly challenge your climate strategy at your AGM.
That, according to the NL Times, is what Shell faced on Tuesday, 19 May 2026, when a group of current and former Shell employees challenged the company’s climate strategy at its shareholder meeting in London.
Their warning was blunt enough to cut through the usual corporate fog: Shell’s continued focus on oil and liquefied natural gas may expose both the business and investors to serious long-term risks.
In other words: the call may now be coming from inside the refinery.
The challenge was linked to a shareholder resolution coordinated by Follow This, which asked Shell to disclose how it would create shareholder value if oil and gas demand declines.
Follow This said the 2026 resolutions at Shell and BP were co-filed by 23 institutional investors with €1.5 trillion in assets under management and that — for the first time — current and former Shell employees co-filed the Shell resolution.
That is not exactly a fringe protest by someone wearing a polar bear costume outside the sandwich shop.
It is a governance question wrapped in a climate question wrapped in a large flashing neon sign reading:
What happens if the fossil-fuel gravy train meets a demand cliff?
THE AGM: DEMOCRACY, BUT WITH A VERY LARGE OIL SLICKShell’s 2026 AGM took place in London on 19 May 2026.
The company’s own voting results show that Resolutions 1 to 22 passed, while Resolution 23 — the shareholder climate-risk resolution — failed.
Resolution 23 received:
470,824,659 votes in favour — 13.01%
against
3,148,423,871 votes against — 86.99%
Shell immediately treated this as shareholder endorsement.
Chief Executive Wael Sawan said:
“Shell’s shareholders continue to strongly back our strategy as we transform Shell into a better performing and more resilient business. We are making progress towards our financial and climate targets, providing the oil and gas the world needs today while helping to build the energy system of the future. We will apply discipline and focus as we continue to deliver more value with less emissions.”
Translated from Corporate Cathedral English: shareholders voted down the awkward question, so management declared the choir in perfect harmony.
But 13.01% support for a climate-risk resolution at a fossil-fuel giant is not nothing.
It is hundreds of millions of votes saying, in effect:
“Could we at least see the spreadsheet for the scenario where the world does not burn hydrocarbons forever?”
SHELL’S NEW FAVOURITE CLIMATE SOLUTION APPEARS TO BE… MORE LNGShell’s answer to climate pressure is increasingly LNG — liquefied natural gas — the fossil fuel that arrives wearing a slightly cleaner tie than coal and expects applause for not being the dirtiest guest in the room.
In its LNG response document, Shell says it has a “positive outlook for LNG over the long term” and describes LNG as central to its strategy.
The company says it wants to be “the leading integrated gas and LNG business in the world” and argues that LNG can play a role in energy security and the transition.
Shell also states:
“For all these reasons, Shell believes that supplying LNG will be the biggest contribution we will make to the energy transition over the next decade.”
There it is: the energy transition, Shell-style.
Not so much “less fossil fuel” as:
Different fossil fuel, but with PowerPoint gradients.
To be fair, Shell’s argument is not invented out of thin air. Gas can displace coal in some power systems. LNG can provide flexible supply. Energy security is a real issue.
But the controversy is about scale, lock-in, methane leakage, capital allocation, and whether Shell is positioning itself for a genuine transition or merely putting a lower-carbon label on a very large fossil-fuel expansion strategy.
THE OFFICIAL STRATEGY: NET ZERO IN THE WINDOW, HYDROCARBONS IN THE WAREHOUSEShell says its Energy Transition Strategy supports its target to become a net-zero emissions energy business by 2050.
It says meeting growing energy demand while tackling climate change is “an urgent challenge” and “a transformative opportunity.”
The difficulty, as ever, is the gap between slogan and steel.
Shell’s critics argue that the company’s capital discipline has increasingly meant discipline for low-carbon ventures and enthusiasm for oil and gas cash generation.
In 2024, Shell paused construction of its large Rotterdam biofuels plant, a project previously presented as part of its lower-carbon push.
By 2025, Shell was openly sharpening its focus on shareholder distributions, cost cutting, and higher-return businesses. Reporting at the time said Shell planned to cut spending, reduce low-carbon investment as a share of capital expenditure, raise shareholder payouts, and that CEO Wael Sawan’s pay package had increased after Shell’s renewed emphasis on oil and gas.
So the public message is “energy transition.”
The investor message appears rather more like:
Relax, the dividend cannon is still loaded.
FOLLOW THE MONEY: THE GIANT SHAREHOLDERS BEHIND THE CURTAINShell is not some corner-shop oil concern run from a filing cabinet and a petrol-stained ledger.
Its shareholder base includes some of the largest institutional investors on Earth.
Recent ownership data compiled by TIKR listed Vanguard Group, BlackRock Institutional Trust, and Norges Bank Investment Management among Shell’s largest shareholders, with Vanguard shown at 186.8 million shares, BlackRock Institutional Trust at 179.5 million shares, and Norges Bank at 150.2 million shares.
That matters.
Because when Shell says shareholders back its strategy, the room is not just populated by individual investors clutching tea and biscuits.
It includes gigantic asset managers whose voting behaviour can help determine whether climate-risk resolutions become governance pressure or politely filed wallpaper.
Meanwhile, Net Zero Investor reported that a group of institutional investors — including West Yorkshire Pension Fund, Lothian Pension Fund, Ethos, PUBLICA, and Mercy Investment Services — urged other investors to support Resolution 23 at Shell’s 2026 AGM.
So there are really two investor stories here.
One is the big-vote story: Shell management won comfortably.
The other is the risk-story: a serious minority of investors, plus current and former employees, are increasingly unwilling to swallow the idea that fossil-fuel expansion and climate resilience are automatically the same thing.
THE COURT BACKDROP: SHELL WINS ONE ROUND, BUT THE COURTROOM SMOKE HAS NOT CLEAREDShell’s climate strategy is not just being challenged at AGMs.
It has also been fought in court.
The Dutch climate case brought by Milieudefensie concerned whether Shell had a legal obligation to reduce the worldwide aggregate carbon emissions it reports across Scopes 1, 2 and 3 by at least net 45% by 2030, compared with 2019.
Shell notes that the District Court of The Hague imposed a “significant duty of effort” in 2021, but that the Court of Appeal dismissed Milieudefensie’s claim on 12 November 2024.
That appeal victory was significant for Shell.
But it did not magically turn climate risk into fairy dust.
In April 2026, Milieudefensie announced new climate litigation against Shell, keeping the legal pressure alive.
Shell may have won a courtroom battle.
It has not won the climate debate.
And it certainly has not won the physics.
THE AWKWARD TRUTH: EMPLOYEES RARELY GO PUBLIC UNLESS THE BOILER IS HISSINGThe most striking feature of the 2026 challenge is not simply that Follow This filed another resolution.
That has happened before.
The striking feature is the involvement of current and former Shell employees.
Employees know the internal culture.
They know the slide decks, the buzzwords, the capital allocation debates, the executive mood music.
When insiders and alumni publicly attach themselves to a resolution questioning the resilience of Shell’s business model under declining oil and gas demand, that is not a minor HR issue.
It is a flare fired from inside the corporate perimeter.
And Shell’s answer — “the shareholders have spoken” — may be technically true but strategically complacent.
Shareholder majorities can be wrong.
Markets can misprice transition risk.
Boards can mistake today’s cash flow for tomorrow’s permission slip.
Ask any former empire.
The palace always looks strongest just before someone notices the foundations are damp.
THE SHELL PARADOX: CLIMATE LANGUAGE, FOSSIL-FUEL MUSCLEShell’s modern communications machine speaks fluent transition.
It talks of resilience, lower emissions, energy security, customer demand, and disciplined capital.
But the operational centre of gravity remains oil and gas, especially LNG.
That is the paradox at the heart of Shell in 2026: a company trying to look like a climate-aware energy transition leader while reassuring investors that the hydrocarbon banquet is not over.
The employees and former employees challenging Shell are not asking a mystical question.
They are asking a business question:
What if oil and gas demand falls faster than Shell wants?
What if regulators tighten?
What if clean technologies keep undercutting fossil demand?
What if LNG infrastructure built for decades becomes yesterday’s answer to tomorrow’s grid?
Shell’s board says its strategy is resilient.
Critics want the receipts.
And frankly, if a company is confident that its strategy survives declining fossil-fuel demand, disclosure should not be treated like a hostage negotiation.
CONCLUSION: THE SOUND OF POLITE REBELLIONThe 2026 AGM did not overthrow Shell’s strategy.
Resolution 23 was defeated.
The board prevailed.
The machine kept humming.
But the optics are brutal.
Current and former Shell employees publicly challenging the climate strategy of one of the world’s most powerful oil and gas companies is not business as usual.
It is a warning label written by people who have seen the machinery from the inside.
Shell can point to the vote.
It can point to energy security.
It can point to LNG.
It can point to shareholder returns.
It can point to every glossy phrase in the corporate dictionary.
But the central question remains stubbornly alive:
Is Shell preparing for the energy transition, or merely trying to monetise the delay?
Because when even insiders start waving red flags, perhaps the problem is not the flags.
Perhaps it is the smoke.
PART TWO: SPOOF SHELL PR/SPIN SECTION Shell Internal Mood Statement, Possibly Drafted by a Committee of Polished Gas PipelinesShell welcomes robust dialogue from shareholders, employees, former employees, future employees, hypothetical employees, and any sentient beings willing to recognise the vital importance of hydrocarbons in delivering a lower-carbon future by continuing to sell hydrocarbons.
We are proud that our strategy remains focused on delivering more value with less emissions, more LNG with less awkwardness, and more confidence with less disclosure than some campaigners appear to desire.
At Shell, we believe the energy transition is best achieved through disciplined investment in profitable molecules, especially molecules capable of being liquefied, shipped, regasified, monetised, and described as “part of the solution” in investor presentations.
While a minority of shareholders supported Resolution 23, an overwhelming majority voted against it, demonstrating strong support for our existing approach of telling investors that everything is resilient because we have used the word “resilient” repeatedly.
We thank our current and former employees for their passion.
We also remind everyone that Shell has a proud tradition of listening carefully, engaging constructively, and then continuing with the strategy approved by the people holding the biggest voting cards.
Forward-looking statement: any resemblance between this satire and actual corporate language is purely coincidental, although admittedly not very surprising.
PART THREE: SPOOF BOT-REACTION / COMMENT SECTION@DividendGoblin3000: “Climate risk? Sorry, I can’t hear you over the buybacks.”
@LNG_is_Love: “Shell says LNG is its biggest contribution to the energy transition. My biggest contribution to dieting is buying a slightly smaller cake.”
@FormerInsider47: “When the staff start challenging the climate strategy, maybe stop calling it stakeholder engagement and start calling it a smoke alarm.”
@BoardroomBarometer: “Resolution defeated. Physics abstained.”
@GreenwashDetector: “More value with less emissions sounds great until you notice the ‘more value’ is doing most of the work.”
@InstitutionalInvestorBot: “We support climate action, provided it does not interfere with quarterly distributions, executive confidence, or lunch.”
@PlanetaryAccountsDept: “Your transition invoice is overdue.”
IMAGE CONCEPTA dramatic satirical editorial illustration of a Shell corporate AGM in London.
A giant golden LNG tanker sits in the centre of a luxury boardroom table, leaking black oil onto climate-risk reports.
On one side, polished executives applaud beneath a glowing Shell logo.
On the other side, current and former employees hold warning signs reading:
“Transition Risk”
“Show The Scenario”
“Smoke Alarm”
Outside the window, planet Earth is half-melting, half-covered in gas pipelines.
Style: sharp tabloid editorial illustration, cinematic lighting, high contrast, provocative, non-photorealistic, no real people depicted.
SHELL STAFF REVOLT: WHEN EVEN THE PEOPLE INSIDE THE OIL MACHINE START COUGHING AT THE FUMES was first posted on May 20, 2026 at 4:54 pm.©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net
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