Executives privately sought to downplay link between fossil fuels and climate change despite public pronouncements, WSJ reports

ExxonMobil executives privately sought to undermine climate science even after the oil and gas giant publicly acknowledged the link between fossil fuel emissions and climate change, according to previously unreported documents revealed by the Wall Street Journal.

The new revelations are based on previously unreported documents subpoenaed by New York’s attorney general as part of an investigation into the company announced in 2015. They add to a slew of documents that record a decades-long misinformation campaign waged by Exxon, which are cited in a growing number of state and municipal lawsuits against big oil.

Many of the newly released documents date back to the 2006-16 tenure of former chief executive Rex Tillerson, who oversaw a major shift in the company’s climate messaging. In 2006, Exxon publicly accepted that the climate crisis posed risks, and it went on to support the Paris agreement. Yet behind closed doors, the company behaved differently, the documents show.

  • fiat_lux@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    I understand what you were getting at, but I still think ‘having the numbers to insist’ is not something that will happen. 7000 people arrived on one of Italy’s islands in the last 2 days seeking refuge. Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya was established in 1992 but today holds 200k people. On the other side of Kenya is Dadaab camp which holds 240k people right now. On average, people spend 10-15 years in those camps.

    Sadly, the world will leave them to rot, as it always has. This will only be more true as people in richer countries begin to feel greater cost of living pressures - xenophobia is a typical response when people are angry that they have nothing.

    Either way, I’m opposed to dumping billionaires as punishment. Exile is not really feasible like it used to be. I say seize assets and garnish future income, like they’re someone trying to avoid paying child support.

    • Spendrill@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      Yeah, if there were proper consequences to them not paying up and not a toothless regulatory entity then I could go along with that, it’s not got as much schadenfreude but it’ll do.

      7000 is a lot but we’re talking about multiple countries being displaced here. If you’re old enough to remember, there was that whole Palestinians in Jordan thing where they were actually planning a coup and very possibly had a chance of pulling it off and then the King of Jordan (who turned out to be a CIA asset because of course it was the CIA) expelled them all from the country in Black September and then they ended up in the Lebanon.