What's it Like to Work at Exxon – and Then Quit?

How to Save a Planet

Gimlet

Science, News, Society & Culture

4.8 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 17 February 2022

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Back in 2003, Dar-Lon Chang took a job as an engineer at ExxonMobil — a job he thought would be focused on transitioning beyond fossil fuels. But over a 16-year career, he found it harder and harder to reconcile the threat of climate change with Exxon’s role as an oil and gas producer. We talk to Dar-Lon about what it was like to work inside the oil giant, what finally compelled him to leave, and what his story means for millions of oil and gas workers as the transition to a low-carbon economy picks up steam. Guests: Dar-Lon Chang Calls to Action Check out the Blue Green Alliance and the Just Transition Fund for ways to support a Just Transition in the US Read Dar-Lon’s profile in Inside Climate News Check out our Calls to Action archive for all of the actions we've recommended on the show. Send us your ideas or feedback with our Listener Mail Form. Sign up for our newsletter here. And follow us on Twitter and Instagram. This episode of How to Save a Planet was produced by Anna Ladd. The rest of our reporting and producing team includes Kendra Pierre-Louis, Rachel Waldholz, Hannah Chinn, and Daniel Ackerman. Our supervising producer is Katelyn Bogucki. Our editor is Caitlin Kenney. Our intern is Nicole Welch. Sound design and mixing by Peter Leonard and Lonnie Ro with original music from Peter Leonard and Emma Munger. Our fact checker for this episode was Claudia Geib. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to how to save a planet. I'm Alex Bloomberg. This is the show that what we need
0:06.5	to do to address climate change and how to make those things happen.
0:24.5	The 90s, a magical time.
0:33.7	We dialed up, we browsed the worldwide web, we asked Jeeps all our burning questions, and
0:39.6	we watched the Nasdaq Stock Exchange rise fivefold as new internet companies like Amazon
0:45.0	and eBay formed. But then in 2000, all that changed.
0:50.2	This described as nothing short of breathtaking a point drop never before seen on the US market.
0:59.0	The dot com bubble burst and the Nasdaq dropped almost 77%. This led to many things, the
1:05.9	instantly iconic collapse of pets.com, a recession, and to today's guest taking a job at
1:14.2	Amazon mobile. His name is Darlon Chang. And in 2003, he had just graduated from the University
1:20.5	of Illinois with his PhD in mechanical engineering with plans to work in the automotive industry.
1:27.0	But it didn't work out because of the dot com financial crash that affected the automotive
1:34.0	industry much more than the energy industry. And there weren't a lot of jobs for automotive
1:39.5	industry people. So it ended up that people that would have normally gone to Ford, or
1:45.6	normally gone to Michigan, they ended up going to Texas. Got you. And I ended up working
1:50.6	there my entire career from 2003 to 2019.
1:54.2	2019, when he quit working at Exxon, and that 16 year career is what we're talking to Darlon
2:02.7	Chang about on today's episode. Because during that 16 year career, he got to see inside
2:08.1	the workings of one of the largest and most prominent fossil fuel companies in the world
2:12.6	through the fracking boom and extreme weather events. And during those 16 years, more and
2:17.4	more people were waking up to the threat of climate change and to Exxon's role in escalating
2:22.3	it. One of those people was Darlon himself, who over time was finding it harder and harder
	...

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