Well, despite Exxon's protestations of squeaky-cleanness earlier this year, it looks like climate change skeptics can rest easy in their beds; climate change denial is going to be a lucrative industry for a while yet.
Exxon's apparent U-turn on global warming began in September last year, when Britain's leading scientists challenged them to stop funding climate change denial. Exxon cried foul; they were just "misunderstood”, they said. They were reforming. They were helping to save baby seals at the weekend. (OK, I made that bit up.) The world’s largest oil company wasn’t a climate change denier, honest.
Then the PR campaign kicked in. The company announced that it "would not be providing any further funding to these organizations". Ken Cohen, Vice President of Public Affairs and Chair of the grantmaking foundation for ExxonMobil, repeatedly told the media that Exxon had stopped funding climate skeptic organisations.
It worked. Exxon got the headlines. Some people even believed them.
Well, after poring over Exxon's tax documents, the folks at ExxonSecrets have found out that Exxon's only stopped funding those whose covers have been comprehensively blown in the media – like the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) and Steve "Junk Science" Milloy.
The rest of them are still on the payroll. The Heartland Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the George C Marshall Institute, the American Enterprise Institute are all still being funded by Exxon. To the tune - in 2006 - of $2.1 million.
Our colleagues over in the US have the full story. (And by the way, you can vote for ExxonMobil in the 2007 Corporate Hall of Shame.)
