ExxonMobil hired scientists to spread confusion, doubt after learning about climate change

Jun 28, 2020 News

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Washington DC lawsuit reveals…

By Kiana Wilburg

More than five decades ago, ExxonMobil and three other major oil companies- Chevron, Shell and British Petroleum (BP)- were told by their in-house scientists that climate change is an indisputable fact. Importantly, they were told that their products would play a key role in heightening the catastrophic consequences of this phenomenon. But revealing to its consumers the environmental dangers associated with its products meant sacrificing billions of dollars in profits. So what did these fossil fuel polluters do next? They invested in a lean, mean confusion machine.

According to the details of a lawsuit that was brought last week Wednesday against the fossil fuel polluters by the Attorney General of Washington D.C, it was noted that these oil giants funded and controlled a special group of scientists whose purpose were to create doubt and sow seeds of confusion about the science of climate change.
The class action, that is 101 pages long, exposed that those scientists who were part of the oil companies’ campaign of deception, obtained part or their entire research budget directly or indirectly from companies like the American Petroleum Institute (API) which defended the interests of the defendants for decades.
The lawsuit stated that in the 1990s for example, both Exxon and API funded and promoted the work of two physicists, Fred Seitz and Fred Singer, as well as Singer’s Science and Environmental Policy Project (“SEPP”).
The Office of the Attorney General (OAG) contended that neither Seitz nor Singer was trained in climate science. This

publication understands that both had previously been hired by tobacco companies to create doubt in the public mind by questioning mainstream scientific conclusions.
Further to this, the OAG noted that in 1998, Seitz helped to organize and distribute a sham petition “refuting” global warming. The petition was formatted to look like it was sanctioned by the National Academy of Sciences and sent to thousands of American scientists. This newspaper understands that the petition claimed to find “no convincing scientific evidence that human release of . . . greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.” Although supposedly signed by 17,000 “scientists,” the list of signatories was filled with fictitious names, deceased persons, and celebrities.
The OAG said that the petition was so misleading that the National Academy of Sciences issued a news release stating that: “The petition project was a deliberate attempt to mislead scientists and to rally them in an attempt to undermine support for the Kyoto Protocol. The petition was not based on a review of the science of global climate change, nor was its signed experts in the field of climate science.”
The Office of the Attorney General stated that the defendants’ disinformation campaign regarding the existence and dangers of climate change was not only successful but created a false sense of disagreement among the scientific community despite the clear consensus previously acknowledged by its own scientists, experts, and managers.
HOW MUCH DID THEY KNOW?
According to the lawsuit, scientists who were working for the oil companies or their industry trade associations predicted with precision when global temperature rises would occur and by how much.
In this regard, the Attorney General’s Office pointed to a 1968 report that was paid for by the American Petroleum Institute — the leading industry trade group at the time was funded and controlled by the defendants.
The report projected that atmospheric carbon dioxide (“CO2”) concentrations would rise from 280 to 370 parts per million (“ppm”) by 2000. Years later, this was proven to be true with actual concentrations in 2000 at 369 ppm. It was further noted that by 1982, Exxon’s scientists in particular, predicted that atmospheric carbon dioxide would reach nearly 415 ppm by 2019. This also proved true for on May 11, 2019, atmospheric CO2 surpassed 415 ppm. This was Earth’s highest level in three million years.
The OAG categorically stated that ExxonMobil and the other oil companies were and are fully aware that the effects of a warming planet from massive fossil fuel combustion include, but are not limited to: increased sea levels; increased ocean temperature and acidity; extreme weather including heat and drought, as well as extreme precipitation events, wildfires, flooding, and more frequent, longer-lasting, and more severe storms.
These events threaten human health, food security, agriculture, economic productivity, water supplies, national security, and labour productivity. The effects of climate change also damage public infrastructure and social systems, and exacerbate economic inequality. Furthermore, a warmer planet poses a significantly increased risk for biodiversity, species loss and extinction, and ecosystem impacts, as well as enormous economic injuries and losses on individuals, communities, and public and private institutions.
The Attorney General’s Office was keen to reiterate that the defendants knew all of the foregoing. They knew that these increases in greenhouse gas concentrations would increase global temperatures, which would in turn wreak havoc on the planet, resulting in severe, pervasive, and irreversible impacts for people and ecosystems.
But instead of sharing what it was acutely aware of, the OAG stated that ExxonMobil and its counterparts hid the information and choose to deceive the public about the threat of global warming.

 

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