New Congressional Report on Fossil Fuel Industry Disinformation

[Fort Fun Indiana]

What "evidence"

I will never understand why trolling is worth making yourself look so damn dumb.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

I will never understand why trolling is worth making yourself look so damn dumb.

Yeah, I’m not moved by your insults when all you had to do was post some of the “evidence”

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

Yeah, I’m not moved by your insults when all you had to do was post some of the “evidence”

Haha, you actually think this trolling is effective.

Evidence has been posted many times. You have been putting on this weak act for years.

Your mommy doesn't work here. Go educate yourself.

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

You "mocked me" by pretending to be totally ignorant? Weird... seems like that reflects more on you than it does on me....

I mocked you by pointing out that governments spend many multiples what the oil companies do.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

I mocked you by pointing out that governments spend many multiples what the oil companies do.

You didn't point anything out. You asked me questions. I think you confused yourself.

Why did you try to point out something so irrelevant that may or may not even be true? (I will give you partial credit for the effort in trying to make a point)

Actually, just kidding. I'm not here to hold your hand to help you make a point.

 

[Crick]

Then explain it and show everyone how stupid I was, cause I really don't think anyone else gets it either.

Still waiting.

 

[Crick]

Evidence? [from Oddball]

Evidence?

Evidence?

Evidence?

Evidence?

Evidence?

When was the last time you posted a link to some actual, honest-to-fucking-god science? Do you know how to do it?

Still waiting here as well.

 

[ding]

Feel free to examine some of the evidence:

DENIAL, DISINFORMATION, AND DOUBLESPEAK:
BIG OIL'S EVOLVING EFFORTS TO AVOID ACCOUNTABILITY FOR CLIMATE CHANGE
​

JOINT STAFF REPORT
April 2024

April 30, 2024

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY​

• This joint staff report on Big Oil’s decades-long deception campaign is the culmination of a nearly three year-long investigation by the Democratic staff of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability (House Oversight), which has worked with Democratic staff of the Senate Budget Committee staff during the 118th Congress. The investigation, focused on ExxonMobil Corporation (Exxon), Chevron Corporation (Chevron), Shell USA Inc. (Shell), BP America Inc. (BP), the American Petroleum Institute (AI), and the Chamber of Commerce (the Chamber), provides a rare glimpse into the extensive efforts undertaken by fossil fuel companies to deceive the public and investors about their knowledge of the effects of their products on climate change and to undermine efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
• 
  
• This final joint staff report builds on the House Oversight Committee’s earlier hearings, public memoranda, and document releases, and it presents new findings from the investigation. The key findings include:
• 
  
• Documents demonstrate for the first time that fossil fuel companies internally do not dispute that they have understood since at least the 1960s that burning fossil fuels causes climate change and then worked for decades to undermine public understanding of this fact and to deny the underlying science. In fall 2015, blockbuster reporting by Inside Climate News and the Los Angeles Times revealed that Big Oil companies such as Exxon knew that burning fossil fuels was a major contributor to climate change. Companies publicly rejected the reporting at the time, but new documents corroborate the reporting and show that fossil fuel companies internally did not dispute the findings but tried to dismiss them as “hyperbolic” and “journalistic malpractice.”
• 
  
• Big Oil’s deception campaign evolved from explicit denial of the basic science underlying climate change to deception, disinformation, and doublespeak. The fossil fuel industry evolved from denying climate science to spreading disinformation and perpetuating doublespeak about the safety of natural gas and its commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. New documents demonstrate that Big Oil companies:

• seek to position natural gas as a “bridge fuel” between coal and cleaner, renewable energy, while enmeshing natural gas in the U.S. energy economy for the long-term;
• 
  
• seek to portray natural gas as a green, climate-friendly fuel, while internally acknowledging that there is significant scientific evidence that the lifecycle emissions from gas are as bad as coal and are incompatible with scientific emissions reduction targets; April 30, 2024
• 
  
• make public pledges to support the Paris Agreement and to achieve net zero emissions while internally recognizing that they could not achieve those goals or referring to them as outside of their business plans;
• 
  
• privately lobby—either directly or through their trade associations— against pro-climate legislation and regulations that they publicly claimed to support;
• 
  
• publicly celebrate carbon capture technologies to help reduce harmful emissions while privately acknowledging that the technology is expensive and claiming that it cannot be scaled without federal government investment; and
• 
  
• publicly promoted algae-based biofuels as an innovative low-carbon technology while investing little in its research and development and then cancelling the programs entirely.

• The fossil fuel industry relies on trade associations to spread confusing and misleading narratives and to lobby against climate action. Fossil fuel companies use trade associations, think tanks, and other nonprofits to influence public policy proposals and messaging, including API and the Chamber, as well as the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative, Natural Gas Supply Association, and Western States Petroleum Association. New emails between fossil fuel executives and these groups demonstrate how the companies influenced and leveraged the associations and other organizations to control their messaging and use them to lobby for unpopular proposals that they do not want to be associated with.
• 
  
• The fossil fuel industry strategically partners with universities to lend an aura of credibility to its deception campaigns while also silencing opposition voices. Fossil fuel companies establish funded partnerships with academic institutions to enhance their credibility, shape academic research programs to provide studies supportive of a prolonged life for oil and gas, leverage the resulting research to their advantage, and bolster access to policymakers. New documents reveal previously unknown funding levels and show how companies condition their funding on academics’ cooperation and alignment with companies’ business needs. Additional documents demonstrate that companies actively tracked individuals and organizations critical of the industry and monitored their social media.
• 
  
• All six entities—Exxon, Chevron, Shell, BP, API, and the Chamber—obstructed and delayed the Committees’ investigation. Despite valid subpoenas, the entities refused to fully comply with the investigation, making baseless legal arguments and flouting longstanding congressional practices and norms for investigations. The companies further obstructed the investigation by significantly redacting or entirely withholding more than 4,000 documents without any valid basis.

https://www.budget.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/fossil_fuel_report1.pdf

So oil companies are to blame for Americans not believing in AGW?

 

[ding]

You didn't point anything out. You asked me questions.

Sometimes asking the question is all that's needed.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

So oil companies are to blame for Americans not believing in AGW?

Oh yes, very much so! That definitely includes you. They got you cruising all of their denier blogs and thinking you have a clue what you are talking about. You are actually a perfect example.

 

[ding]

Oh yes, very much so! That definitely includes you. They got you cruising all of their denier blogs and thinking you have a clue what you are talking about. You are actually a perfect example.

I'm pretty sure you should know I don't get my data from "denier" blogs. I guess because I reach a different conclusion I'm a "denier" in your mind. Too funny.

 

[Crick]

Feel free to examine some of the evidence:

DENIAL, DISINFORMATION, AND DOUBLESPEAK:
BIG OIL'S EVOLVING EFFORTS TO AVOID ACCOUNTABILITY FOR CLIMATE CHANGE
​

JOINT STAFF REPORT
April 2024

April 30, 2024

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY​

• This joint staff report on Big Oil’s decades-long deception campaign is the culmination of a nearly three year-long investigation by the Democratic staff of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability (House Oversight), which has worked with Democratic staff of the Senate Budget Committee staff during the 118th Congress. The investigation, focused on ExxonMobil Corporation (Exxon), Chevron Corporation (Chevron), Shell USA Inc. (Shell), BP America Inc. (BP), the American Petroleum Institute (AI), and the Chamber of Commerce (the Chamber), provides a rare glimpse into the extensive efforts undertaken by fossil fuel companies to deceive the public and investors about their knowledge of the effects of their products on climate change and to undermine efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
• 
  
• This final joint staff report builds on the House Oversight Committee’s earlier hearings, public memoranda, and document releases, and it presents new findings from the investigation. The key findings include:
• 
  
• Documents demonstrate for the first time that fossil fuel companies internally do not dispute that they have understood since at least the 1960s that burning fossil fuels causes climate change and then worked for decades to undermine public understanding of this fact and to deny the underlying science. In fall 2015, blockbuster reporting by Inside Climate News and the Los Angeles Times revealed that Big Oil companies such as Exxon knew that burning fossil fuels was a major contributor to climate change. Companies publicly rejected the reporting at the time, but new documents corroborate the reporting and show that fossil fuel companies internally did not dispute the findings but tried to dismiss them as “hyperbolic” and “journalistic malpractice.”
• 
  
• Big Oil’s deception campaign evolved from explicit denial of the basic science underlying climate change to deception, disinformation, and doublespeak. The fossil fuel industry evolved from denying climate science to spreading disinformation and perpetuating doublespeak about the safety of natural gas and its commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. New documents demonstrate that Big Oil companies:

• seek to position natural gas as a “bridge fuel” between coal and cleaner, renewable energy, while enmeshing natural gas in the U.S. energy economy for the long-term;
• 
  
• seek to portray natural gas as a green, climate-friendly fuel, while internally acknowledging that there is significant scientific evidence that the lifecycle emissions from gas are as bad as coal and are incompatible with scientific emissions reduction targets; April 30, 2024
• 
  
• make public pledges to support the Paris Agreement and to achieve net zero emissions while internally recognizing that they could not achieve those goals or referring to them as outside of their business plans;
• 
  
• privately lobby—either directly or through their trade associations— against pro-climate legislation and regulations that they publicly claimed to support;
• 
  
• publicly celebrate carbon capture technologies to help reduce harmful emissions while privately acknowledging that the technology is expensive and claiming that it cannot be scaled without federal government investment; and
• 
  
• publicly promoted algae-based biofuels as an innovative low-carbon technology while investing little in its research and development and then cancelling the programs entirely.

• The fossil fuel industry relies on trade associations to spread confusing and misleading narratives and to lobby against climate action. Fossil fuel companies use trade associations, think tanks, and other nonprofits to influence public policy proposals and messaging, including API and the Chamber, as well as the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative, Natural Gas Supply Association, and Western States Petroleum Association. New emails between fossil fuel executives and these groups demonstrate how the companies influenced and leveraged the associations and other organizations to control their messaging and use them to lobby for unpopular proposals that they do not want to be associated with.
• 
  
• The fossil fuel industry strategically partners with universities to lend an aura of credibility to its deception campaigns while also silencing opposition voices. Fossil fuel companies establish funded partnerships with academic institutions to enhance their credibility, shape academic research programs to provide studies supportive of a prolonged life for oil and gas, leverage the resulting research to their advantage, and bolster access to policymakers. New documents reveal previously unknown funding levels and show how companies condition their funding on academics’ cooperation and alignment with companies’ business needs. Additional documents demonstrate that companies actively tracked individuals and organizations critical of the industry and monitored their social media.
• 
  
• All six entities—Exxon, Chevron, Shell, BP, API, and the Chamber—obstructed and delayed the Committees’ investigation. Despite valid subpoenas, the entities refused to fully comply with the investigation, making baseless legal arguments and flouting longstanding congressional practices and norms for investigations. The companies further obstructed the investigation by significantly redacting or entirely withholding more than 4,000 documents without any valid basis.

https://www.budget.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/fossil_fuel_report1.pdf

Would any of you deniers out there care to compare the potential monetary incentives of climate research scientists and the fossil fuel industry?

I have found it difficult to separate funding for research from funding for adaptation and mitigation. But one could argue that without the research, governments wouldn't be spending that money on adaptation and mitigation (or would they). But, here, a scary number:

Since 1993, OMB has reported over $154 billion in funding for federal climate change activities, spread across the government—raising questions about fragmentation, overlap, or duplication.​

So, $154 billion over ten years. $15.4 billion/yr on average. What has the fossil fuel industry been doing over that time span.


Hmm... this doesn't go back that far, but...

it shows that in their worst years, the fossil fuel industry earned, net, almost sixteen times the average annual expenditures to research and fight the effects of AGW. In their better years, they earned roughly 200 times, net, what was being spent to offset the effects of their product.

So are any of you deniers willing to admit that the fossil fuel industry has a much larger incentive to act in some way to forestall action that existentially threatens them than research scientists have to lie?

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

Would any of you deniers out there care to compare the potential monetary incentives of climate research scientists and the fossil fuel industry?

I have found it difficult to separate funding for research from funding for adaptation and mitigation. But one could argue that without the research, governments wouldn't be spending that money on adaptation and mitigation (or would they). But, here, a scary number:

Since 1993, OMB has reported over $154 billion in funding for federal climate change activities, spread across the government—raising questions about fragmentation, overlap, or duplication.​

So, $154 billion over ten years. $15.4 billion/yr on average. What has the fossil fuel industry been doing over that time span.


Hmm... this doesn't go back that far, but...

View attachment 944104

it shows that in their worst years, the fossil fuel industry earned, net, almost sixteen times the average annual expenditures to research and fight the effects of AGW. In their better years, they earned roughly 200 times, net, what was being spent to offset the effects of their product.

So are any of you deniers willing to admit that the fossil fuel industry has a much larger incentive to act in some way to forestall action that existentially threatens them than research scientists have to lie?

According to Office of Management and Budget reports, federal climate change funding was $13.2 billion across 19 agencies in 2017.

Now how much did oil companies spend in 2017 to defend themselves?
The US oil companies.

it shows that in their worst years, the fossil fuel industry earned, net, almost sixteen times the average annual expenditures to research and fight the effects of AGW.

You'll have to post your calculation.
Your claim, even at the low end looks wrong, really wrong.

 

[Crick]

According to Office of Management and Budget reports, federal climate change funding was $13.2 billion across 19 agencies in 2017.

Now how much did oil companies spend in 2017 to defend themselves?
The US oil companies.

it shows that in their worst years, the fossil fuel industry earned, net, almost sixteen times the average annual expenditures to research and fight the effects of AGW.

You'll have to post your calculation.
Your claim, even at the low end looks wrong, really wrong.

950 billion (2020 net income) / 15.4 billion (annual average govt AGW spending) = 61.7 THANKS Todd, it was much worse than my dyslexia made me think
3 trillion / 15.4 billon = 194.8

And I was not comparing what each party was spending on the issue. I was comparing what the fossil fuel industry HAD AT RISK versus what was being spent in efforts that threaten them.

 

[ding]

Would any of you deniers out there care to compare the potential monetary incentives of climate research scientists and the fossil fuel industry?

I have found it difficult to separate funding for research from funding for adaptation and mitigation. But one could argue that without the research, governments wouldn't be spending that money on adaptation and mitigation (or would they). But, here, a scary number:

Since 1993, OMB has reported over $154 billion in funding for federal climate change activities, spread across the government—raising questions about fragmentation, overlap, or duplication.​

So, $154 billion over ten years. $15.4 billion/yr on average. What has the fossil fuel industry been doing over that time span.


Hmm... this doesn't go back that far, but...

View attachment 944104

it shows that in their worst years, the fossil fuel industry earned, net, almost sixteen times the average annual expenditures to research and fight the effects of AGW. In their better years, they earned roughly 200 times, net, what was being spent to offset the effects of their product.

So are any of you deniers willing to admit that the fossil fuel industry has a much larger incentive to act in some way to forestall action that existentially threatens them than research scientists have to lie?

Are you comparing the earnings of fossil fuel companies to government expenditures for climate research? How do you believe oil companies/NOC's are forestalling action? What is it that they control?

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

I'm pretty sure you should know I don't get my data from "denier" blogs. I guess because I reach a different conclusion I'm a "denier" in your mind. Too funny.

You definitely get your embarrassing denial from other people. You have no education or experience in any relevant field.

You are the perfect example of the thread title and the topic.

 

[ding]

You definitely get your embarrassing denial from other people. You have no education or experience in any relevant field.

You are the perfect example of the thread title and the topic.

No. I get my data from the geologic record. The conclusions are my own.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

No. I get my data from the geologic record. The conclusions are my own.

I am not talking about "your data", genius.This amateur bait and switch won't work for you.

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

950 billion (2020 net income) / 15.4 billion (annual average govt AGW spending) = 61.7 THANKS Todd, it was much worse than my dyslexia made me think
3 trillion / 15.4 billon = 194.8

And I was not comparing what each party was spending on the issue. I was comparing what the fossil fuel industry HAD AT RISK versus what was being spent in efforts that threaten them.

950 billion (2020 net income)

Now subtract the taxes they paid.

15.4 billion (annual average govt AGW spending)

Now compare that number to the amount the oil companies spent on defending themselves against government-funded idiocy.

And then maybe update the old $15.4 billion number?

Aug 22 (Reuters) - The U.S. government will spend more than $500 billion on climate technology and clean energy over the next decade under three recently enacted laws, an analysis by non-profit RMI found.
The tally is based on this month's Inflation Reduction and CHIPS acts and last year's Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Together they fund climate-related research and pilot studies and support manufacturing.

https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-spend-more-than-500-bln-climate-over-decade-under-three-laws-study-says-2022-08-22/

And now add the state spending.

In 2022 alone, California Climate Investments implemented nearly 19,500 new projects through $1.3 billion in funding, with $933 million directly benefiting disadvantaged communities and low‑income communities and households, collectively referred to as “priority populations.” California Climate Investments are funded by Cap‑and‑Trade Program auction proceeds deposited into the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund.

California Climate Investments reports nearly $1B in funding in 2022 to support communities facing the worst impacts of pollution, climate change | California Air Resources Board

SACRAMENTO — California today released its annual report for California Climate Investments, which highlights that 74% of investments from 2022 — almost $1 billion — supported communities and households facing greater economic and environmental challenges.

ww2.arb.ca.gov

Todd, it was much worse than my dyslexia made me think
3 trillion / 15.4 billon = 194.8

Why are you including national oil company revenue?
You think the Norwegian, Iranian, Venezuelan or Saudia Arabian state oil producers
are worried about defending themselves against US AGW idiocy?
Now subtract the non-American private producers.

Exxon, the largest US producer, had net income of $56B in 2022, $36B in 2023.

Keep trying. I wouldn't want to lump you in with healthmyths' and IM2's innumeracy.

 

[ding]

I am not talking about "your data", genius.This amateur bait and switch won't work for you.

There's only the empirical climate evidence from the geologic record and my conclusions from the data. That's it. You are tilting at windmills.