It seems not everyone thinks Twiggy and FFI are so...

It seems not everyone thinks Twiggy and FFI are so wonderful...this article is somewhat tongue in cheek.

As Twiggy Forrest’s hydrogen world tour continues, it appears the mining magnate is now thinking outside the old environmentalist’s adage of “think global, act local”, and towards something more akin to “think global, irritate local”.

With COP26 finally over, Twiggy’s biggest forum for self-promotion has also gone away.

But, fear not! When your internal PR team has a budget fuelled by this year’s record iron ore price, opportunities to promote your latest obsession can be had for the price of an ad booking.

Over the past month Fortescue Future Industries has plastered its logo and slogans across London taxis and buses as part of a global advertising blitz; however, its latest campaign is running a little closer to the homes of its corporate rivals. Inside the lifts of the towers that house BHP, Rio Tinto and South32, in fact.

is told FFI has booked the digital ad boards, seen by the staff of all three companies, to run its “Dear fossil fuel industry” ads, in what appears to be a naked recruitment campaign.

“Dear fossil fuel, your industry is in terminal decline. Luckily the new green hydrogen economy needs some tenacious go-getters just like you,” read one ad seen by this column.

That particular ad has caused more than a little bemusement among the Rio staff that see it every day, given Fortescue has been at pains to make sure its investors know it has flogged off all of its coal assets, and never owned any oil and gas projects of any note.

Fortescue Future Industries latest ads happen to be placed in the buildings of its major competitors.

But it’s all just a coincidence according to those in the know, said to be a “relatively small part of the global campaign” with “placements picked based on audience volume, targeting some of the busiest locations in each city”.

The fact that Fortescue Future Industries and Fossil Fuel Industry share an acronym hasn’t gone unnoticed either.

But just how is the billionaire’s push to save the world going down among his corporate rivals?

He is, perhaps, not coming across as quite the Messianic figure he might have hoped.

As one wag noted, popular culture has a completely different reference point for a multibillionaire who styles himself Dr, owns a mobile ocean-going research laboratory and talks about saving the world from itself.

All Forrest needs is an underground bunker built in an extinct volcano for his transition into a Bond villain to be complete.

He’s probably still better off than Elon Musk, mind you, whose SpaceX ambitions put him very firmly in Moonraker territory.