I never thought I would support Exxon...

It looks like Exxon has a realistic view of energy and Kyoto.

Oil giants such as BP PLC and Royal Dutch/Shell Group are trumpeting a better-safe-than-sorry approach to global warming. They accept a growing scientific consensus that fossil fuels are a main contributor to the problem and endorse the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which caps emissions from developed nations that have ratified it. BP and Shell also have begun to invest in alternatives to fossil fuels.

Not Exxon. Openly and unapologetically, the world's No. 1 oil company disputes the notion that fossil fuels are the main cause of global warming. Along with the Bush administration, Exxon opposes the Kyoto accord and the very idea of capping global-warming emissions. Congress is debating an energy bill that may be amended to include a cap, but the administration and Exxon say the costs would be huge and the benefits uncertain. Exxon also contributes money to think tanks and other groups that agree with its stance.

Exxon publicly predicts that solar and wind energy will continue to provide less than 1 percent of the world's energy supply in 2025, a subject that others shy away from. Even if fossil fuels are the chief global-warming culprit, Exxon argues, the sensible response is to figure out how to burn them more efficiently.

"We're not playing the issue. I'm not sure I can say that about others," Lee Raymond, Exxon's chairman and chief executive, said in a recent interview at Exxon headquarters in Irving, Texas. "I get this question a lot of times: 'Why don't you just go spend $50 million on solar cells? Charge it off to the public-affairs budget and just say it's like another dry hole?' The answer is: That's not the way we do things."

The 66-year-old Mr. Raymond has emerged as the tallest lightning rod in the debate over global warming. At a London oil-industry dinner in February where he was the guest of honor, Greenpeace protesters poured red wine onto tables and called Mr. Raymond the "No. 1 climate criminal." Mr. Raymond, speaking on the same day the Kyoto treaty took effect, stuck by his prepared speech and called for a "reality check" on the treaty.

Exxon's approach to global warming typifies the bottom-line focus of its entire business. It is slogging away to improve the energy efficiency of its refineries -- primarily to cut costs, although this is also shaving global-warming emissions. But it says the business case for making more sweeping changes is still weak. It's a conservative, hard-nosed approach that has helped make Exxon the most profitable oil company in the world, with 2004 net income of $25 billion.

Read the whole thing....Exxon just might be right.