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Environmental group Greenpeace has launched a competition challenging creative protestors to update oil giant BP's 'green' flower logo to reflect the alleged darker side of its activities - sourcing oil from tar sands, deepwater drilling and the company's perceived inactivity and irresponsibility in the wake of the latest oil spill crisis off the Gulf of Mexico.

Greenpeace argues: 'BP's slick green logo doesn't suit a company that wants to invest in tar sands, the dirtiest oil there currently is. We're inviting you to design them a new logo that's more suitable for their dirty business.' The design brief states that the image must communicate three points - the toxicity of the oil spill, the death of wildlife and the company's incompetence.

The Greenpeace competition is one of a string of campaigns harnessing public anger to develop more damning depictions of companies' environmental activity. As food manufacturer Nestlé underwent a roasting earlier this year for buying palm oil from suppliers who were expanding their plantations into rainforest land, campaigners proposed a revamp of the KitKat logo to 'Killer' whilst the old slogan 'Have a break' was given a new spin with the tag-line; 'Give me a break'.

Crowdsourcing protest logos and posters has gained currency in recent months. The satirical MyDavidCameron site which urged the electorate to spoof Conservative campaign posters during the last election generated over 74,000 submissions. The posters became so ubiquitous that the Tories tried to hijack the campaign with a blog entitled MyLabourPosters. Fearing the site could become a victim of its own success and its anti-Tory message could be 'blunted', Clifford Singer, the creator of the original campaign, chose to call it a day.

John Sauven, executive director of Greenpeace UK, said of the BP campaign: 'BP's famous green logo is there to distract us from what this company really stands for. This company has chosen to extract the last drops of oil from deep sea wells and the tar sands of Canada, instead of developing the clean technologies that can actually help beat climate change.

'That's why we're calling in the experts. We're hoping that the design community and the public will help us come up with a logo that will actually reflect BP's obsession with dirty oil.

'This is a competition with a difference, because we're planning to use the winning entry all over Britain in a high profile Greenpeace campaign that the company will find impossible to spin.'

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