A Corpus-Assisted Ecolinguistic Analysis of CNPC’s Twitter Communication

Given the oil industry’s heightened sensitivity to social responsibility, corporations must actively fulfill and disclose their related performance. Understanding the role of discourse in shaping perceptions of energy practices is critical, as energy discourse reflects both material conditions and the values, interests, and identities of its actors. This study examines how corporate discourse influences public opinion by analyzing China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC)’s posts on X (formerly Twitter). Employing corpus-based ecological discourse analysis, we investigate CNPC’s ecological perspectives and their implications for trends in the Chinese oil industry, aiming to foster international dialogue on corporate social responsibility (CSR). The study addresses three key questions: (1) What are the lexical and thematic characteristics of CNPC’s ecological discourse? (2) How does the transitivity system construct CNPC’s ecological views? (3) What motivations underlie the emphasized themes, and what linguistic strategies are employed?Using a mixed-methods approach, we analyzed CNPC’s Twitter corpus (2020–2024) through frequency-based and qualitative techniques, integrating corpus linguistics, Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) topic modeling, and transitivity analysis. The findings reveal that: (1) Thematic analysis highlights CNPC’s focus on sustainable development and technological innovation; (2) Transitivity analysis demonstrates a prevalence of unmarked themes (“WE,” “CNPC”) in material processes, reflecting sustainability initiatives, while mental processes convey empathy toward ecological entities. Key nouns (e.g., “GAS,” “CARBON”) frequently function as Goals in material processes, emphasizing environmental action, whereas “STAFF” and “PEOPLE” as Actors underscore commitments to innovation and social welfare, projecting a vision of a shared ecological future; (3) CNPC strategically constructs its ecological discourse by aligning with global sustainability agendas, managing corporate image, employing ideological framing, balancing narratives, institutionalizing sustainability discourse, and advancing ecological governance.