Clean Creatives’ 2026 F-list takes on global fossil fuel contracts and AI-generated oil ads

Clean Creatives, a collective of PR agencies and professionals who have pledged to not work with fossil fuel companies, is known for exposing the agencies that do in their annual F-list.

This year is the list’s sixth, and it counted 1,321 contracts—a nearly 9% increase from last year’s list and the highest number the group has found since its initial research in 2021. All seven major advertising holding companies have “significant contracts” with large fossil fuel companies—Omnicom-owned agencies had the most, at 118, and WPP-owned agencies had the second-highest number, 88. Publicis, Dentsu, Havas, Stagwell, and DJE Holdings were also on the list, but their agencies had far fewer contracts overall, according to Clean Creatives.

That said, independent agencies made up more than three-quarters of the contracts, according to the analysis.

Because the group has built up year-over-year data, Clean Creatives can now analyze a fuller picture of the trends in worldwide petroleum marketing—one that includes changing ad narratives, contracts in the Global South, and agency sustainability reports.

“The fossil fuel industry sees that we don’t need it for our future. It sees that the end of the road is coming for its industry,” Clean Creative’s Head of Research Nayantara Dutta told Morning Brew. “So we are seeing very advanced manipulation tactics in campaign messaging these days.”

Those tactics include coupling AI and its progress with the need for fossil fuels, she said. Oil company campaigns position AI “as a reason for fossil fuels to continue to remain relevant,” and “insert fossil fuels” into the larger narrative surrounding AI.

“The combination of all of these themes is really leading to this messaging we are seeing around AI as being intrinsic to nationalism, energy security, and future technologies,” Dutta said. “They’re really justifying continued investment in fossil fuels as a technological innovation through AI, rather than the over-extraction that it actually is.”

A 2025 ad from oil corporation Chevron illustrates Dutta’s point. In it, videos of American landmarks and the rocket launches play behind a voiceover that says “AI is here, the next big leap. And Chevron is working to power it.”

Petroleum marketing varies by country and focuses on different rhetorical motifs. In recent years, the F-List has widened its geographical scope and found campaigns and contracts between oil companies and communications companies in the Global South.

This year’s list contained a Central Asian contract for the first time, and Dutta said that “we’ve really tried to get as many as we could in Africa specifically.”

In the Global South, Dutta said she’s found that fossil fuel companies’ campaigns “tie oil and gas to cultural and religious celebrations,” exemplified in an AI-generated Ramadan ad from ADNOC Distribution, an oil distributor in Abu Dhabi. While fossil fuel producers may be attempting to tie their fortunes to AI, ads generated with the technology remain “in the early stages.”

“Creative agencies, despite the proliferation of AI, still have a very important place in this,” she said. “AI is more of a platform and a conversation they’re using to leverage the discussion around fossil fuel proliferation and dominance, rather than something that we’re actively seeing impact the creative output at the moment.”