A new study published today in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science (PNAS) shows that the climate denial echo chamber organizations funded by ExxonMobil and Koch family foundations produced misinformation that effectively polluted mainstream media coverage of climate science and polarized the climate policy debate. 

The abstract and full text of the study can be found here: Corporate funding and ideological polarization about climate change.

The analysis of 20 years' worth of data by Yale University researcher Dr. Justin Farrell shows beyond a doubt that ExxonMobil and the Kochs are the key actors who funded the creation of climate disinformation think tanks and ensured the prolific spread of their doubt products throughout our mainstream media and public discourse.

“The contrarian efforts have been so effective for the fact that they have made it difficult for ordinary Americans to even know who to trust,” Dr. Farrell told the Washington Post which was first to cover the news of the study's release. “This counter-movement produced messages aimed, at the very least, at creating ideological polarization through politicized tactics, and at the very most, at overtly refuting current scientific consensus with scientific findings of their own,” Dr. Farrell said.

From PNAS’s press briefing note about the article by Dr. Farrell:

Corporate funding likely influences the nature and content of polarizing texts pertaining to climate change, according to a study. Political polarization has become a hallmark of climate change policy discussion, with multiple groups in various sectors contributing to public discourse regarding climate and energy. To quantify the influence of corporate funding in climate change discourse, Justin Farrell analyzed more than 39 million words of text produced by 164 organizations active in the climate change counter-movement between 1993 and 2013. The author examined the ideological content of the produced texts, as well as the funding behind the organizations that produced the texts.

Organizations with corporate funding were more likely to have produced polarizing texts, the author found, with ExxonMobil and the Koch family foundation acting as influential funders (emphasis added). Further, according to the author, corporate funding may have influenced the ideological content of produced texts. The results suggest quantitative evidence of the influence of funding in the climate change debate that had previously been hypothesized, and suggests an analytical model for integrating texts with the social networks that created them, according to the author.

This study confirms once again the central thesis of industry-funded attacks on climate science, which inspired the DeSmog book Climate Cover-up and countless articles about the deception campaign over the past decade.

Now let’s see how the mainstream media cover this story — that is what I’m most curious to see. (The Washington Post article was pretty straightforward, although it gave ExxonMobil an unchallenged last word, and Joby Warrick seemed to pose a bogus question to Dr. Farrell equating the fossil-funded disinformation campaign with pro-climate-action campaigns, but Dr. Farrell correctly rebutted such a comparison.)

Will this study, published in a highly authoritative journal, finally compel the newsrooms and boardrooms of the traditional media to take responsibility to undo some of the damage done by their complicity in spreading fossil fuel industry-funded misinformation?

Will false balance — quoting a distinguished climate scientist and then speed-dialing Pat Michaels at the Cato Institute for an opposing quote — finally stop?

Will editors commit to serving as referees to ensure the same industry PR pollution isn’t published any longer?

It’s critically important today that the public hears the scientific facts about climate change without the confusion injected into the policy debate by well-funded think tanks and their highly paid PR operative counterparts.

Dr. Farrell’s research also provides further evidence of the public deception orchestrated by the fossil fuel industry, and should prove valuable to investigators examining ExxonMobil as well as other current and future efforts to hold polluters accountable for their PR pollution.

Here is a video produced years ago, "Doubt" by The Climate Reality Project, which provides a nice overview of this issue:

Also highly suggested: track down access to Merchants of Doubt, the full-length documentary by Food Inc. director Robert Kenner that exposes the history of tobacco-to-climate denial and their common PR manipulators such as Marc Morano and Fred Singer.

It's far beyond the time to end the climate cover-up. And responsible media can lead the way.

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Since the tragic Bakken oil train accident that extinguished 47 lives in Lac-Megantic, Quebec in July 2013, seven more Bakken oil trains have derailed, resulting in accidents involving large fires and explosions. We now know that oil produced in North Dakota's Bakken Shale formation is extremely volatile due to its high natural gas liquid content — resulting in the “bomb train” phenomenon.

DeSmog’s new investigative video, written and produced by Justin Mikulka, details a coordinated effort by the oil industry, members of the U.S. Congress, regulators and the Department of Energy to challenge the known science of crude oil characteristics with the goal of delaying or avoiding any regulatory changes requiring Bakken crude oil stabilization, a safety measure that would protect the millions of people currently living in bomb train blast zones.

Stabilization is the process that removes the volatile natural gas liquids from the crude oil, resulting in a “stable” petroleum product with greatly reduced volatility and flammability.

DeSmog has reported extensively on the oil-by-rail policy battle, including an investigation that revealed the direct role of the White House in working with North Dakota regulators to avoid any requirements for oil stabilization for the Bakken crude. 

The success of their misdirection campaign is evident — the mainstream media is largely overlooking this critical issue when the public needs referees to ask the tough questions on this vulnerability in our crude oil by rail protocols. Yet a Wall Street Journal article this week on how to make oil safe to transport didn’t even mention stabilization.

The video uses archival information from American Petroleum Institute videos, Congressional hearing testimony, news clips and more to reveal how the oil industry has avoided regulation in order to continue transporting dangerous Bakken crude by rail at maximum profit.

Warning: This video contains science, humor and political theater all in one — a volatile mix indeed!

WATCH: DeSmogCAST: The Science of Bomb Trains

Image credit: Oil train passing through Seattle, by Brendan DeMelle

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This week's episode of DeSmogCAST covers the Edelman TransCanada dirty PR campaign, DeSmogBlog's new report on the gas industry revolving door lobbying push for LNG exports, and the outcome of the BC elections.

Hosted by DeSmogBlog contributor Farron Cousins, the DeSmogCAST guests this week are Emma Gilchrist, Brendan DeMelle and Steve Horn. 

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Documents obtained by Greenpeace detail a desperate astroturf PR strategy designed by Edelman for TransCanada to win public support for its Energy East tar sands export pipeline. TransCanada has failed for years to win approval of the controversial border-crossing Keystone XL pipeline, so apparently the company has decided to "win ugly or lose pretty" with an aggressive public relations attack on its opponents.

The Edelman strategy documents and work proposals outline a “grassroots advocacy” campaign plan to build support for TransCanada’s Energy East pipeline as well as to undermine public opposition to oil and pipelines generally.

The documents should cause well-deserved embarrassment for Edelman, the largest PR company in the world, as well as TransCanada. 

But this is not just a temporary black eye for a PR firm and its corporate client. The Edelman documents reveal a broader industry campaign to undermine the public interest and attack the oil industry’s critics across the board. 

In one of the files, titled Grassroots Advocacy Vision Document, Edelman emphasizes that TransCanada would not be alone in adopting this kind of aggressive strategy. 

The document notes the oil industry’s other extensive astroturf campaigns (including Edelman’s $52 million campaign for the American Petroleum Institute) to promote the Keystone XL pipeline and fracking, defeat climate legislation and attack renewable energy:

“Companies like ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell and Halliburton (and many more) have all made key investments in building permanent advocacy assets and programs to support their lobbying, outreach, and policy efforts. In launching a program like this, TransCanada will be in good company with a strong roadmap to follow.” (Grassroots Advocacy Vision p. 5-6)

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The Edelman TransCanada documents once again confirm the fossil fuel industry’s desperate and expensive “permanent advocacy assets and programs” designed to attack grassroots organizers, nonprofits and charities, and ordinary citizens who are concerned about further fossil fuel infrastructure investments in an era of increasingly dangerous climate change.

The Globe and Mail, which broke the story of Edelman’s TransCanada plan, notes that the elaborate PR campaign plan is one more befitting the U.S. where aggressive PR has a longer history.

The Globe describes Edelman’s “reputation for aggressive tactics in the United States,” and quotes Greenpeace campaigner Keith Stewart expressing concern about TransCanada hiring Edelman’s services for "dirty tricks" PR:

“They’re bringing a much more aggressive, U.S.-style politics here,” Mr. Stewart said. “They’re employing pressure tactics that I would characterize as dirty tricks.”

But what I find particularly revealing about this story is how TransCanada has responded. From the Globe:

TransCanada spokesman James Millar said Monday the company learned valuable lessons in its battle over the long-stalled Keystone XL pipeline in the U.S., and is eager to enlist supporters and blunt the impact of opponents as the Energy East debate heats up. But he said it opted against pursuing some of Edelman’s more controversial proposals, such as quietly providing support to nominally independent pro-pipeline citizens’ groups.

TransCanada’s Energy East pipeline would ship 1.1 million barrels per day of tar sands and other western Canadian crude to refineries and export terminals along the Canadian Atlantic coast. The project faces stiff public opposition on both sides of the border, most significantly in Quebec.

Edelman isn’t coaching TransCanada on anything new in its PR arsenal. Most of the tactics described in the campaign plan originate with the PR industry’s lengthy and desperate efforts to protect the tobacco industry from accountability for its own dangerous product.

For example, the Edelman documents discuss efforts to put pressure on industry opponents by “distracting them from their mission and causing them to redirect their resources.”

Edelman suggests working with “supportive third parties who can in turn put the pressure on, particularly when TransCanada can’t.”

As anyone familiar with the tobacco industry PR playbook knows, these buzzwords such as “supportive third parties” are old techniques designed to help companies that, like the tobacco industry, don’t have much credibility with the public.

The idea is to get “independent experts” and credible-sounding front groups like the “Global Climate Coalition” or the “Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide” to parrot your message and play defense on your behalf because the public doesn’t trust you. You’re an oil company that makes money off pollution. You have zero credibility. So you follow the shady PR advice, "Put your words in someone else's mouth."  

"Think of this as an endless war"

The story of this dirty PR approach is sadly one with a long history. There are scores of books written on the subject, including Climate Cover-Up by DeSmog co-founder Jim Hoggan and Richard Littlemore.

Just last month, Richard Berman — known as “Dr Evil” for his many iniquitous public relations campaigns — was caught on tape coaching oil industry executives to “win ugly or lose pretty” and to “Think of this as an endless war…. And you have to budget for it.”

It seems the oil industry is content to continue pumping tens of millions of dollars into deceiving the public and attacking its critics with the help of notoriously sketchy PR companies.

Rather than do the right thing, this industry is clearly more interested in fighting dirty.  

Read the Edelman TransCanada Energy East campaign documents:

• Energy East Campaign Organization: Promote, Respond Pressure (August 5, 2014) • Digital Grassroots Advocacy Implementation Plan (May 20, 2014) • Grassroots Advocacy Vision Document (May 15, 2014) • Strategic Plan: Quebec (May 20, 2014) • Research Synthesis (no date)

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This week’s episode of DeSmogCAST covers the two major developments from Washington, D.C. this week — the historic climate deal between the United States and China and the upcoming GOP majority leaders' plans to attack the EPA’s carbon emission standards — along with new developments in the Kinder Morgan and Keystone XL tar sands export pipelines and the coalition of Canadian scientists standing up to Harper's attacks on science.

Hosted by DeSmogBlog contributor Farron Cousins, the DeSmogCAST guests this week are Carol Linnitt, Brendan DeMelle and Steve Horn. 

For more information on these stories, visit the DeSmog articles listed above, and for additional coverage of these issues, check out:

Kevin Grandia – U.S.-China Climate Pact Leaves Prime Minister Harper With Few Excuses Left Not to Act

Chris Rose – Kinder Morgan Oversells Benefits of Trans Mountain Pipeline, Underplays Costs, Says New Report

and much more at DeSmogBlog, DeSmog Canada and DeSmog UK.

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A welcome message from DeSmogBlog executive director Brendan DeMelle.

We’re pleased to introduce DeSmog UK, a brand new investigative journalism and research outlet dedicated to clearing the PR pollution that clouds climate science and exposing the individuals and organizations attacking solutions to global warming.

The newest addition to the international DeSmog network, DeSmog UK seeks to expose the same fossil fuel industry funded attacks on science and democracy that its colleagues at DeSmogBlog and DeSmog Canada investigate every day. 

DeSmog UK has appointed as Editor the intrepid British journalist Brendan Montague, who has spent the past three years examining climate denial and the origins of the think tanks and front groups that have waged war on climate science and policy solutions to global warming.

A small number of individuals and organizations have crafted a polluter-friendly echo chamber to confuse the public about the scientific consensus on global warming.

They hope to gain an outsized amount of influence over public policy debates on a range of environmental and public health priorities, most notably climate change and energy policy.

Their goal is simple: to delay action to curb global warming pollution and foster a clean energy future by creating doubt in the minds of the public. They use the same tactics — and many of the same PR firms and individuals — deployed by the tobacco industry in its decades-long campaign to protect cigarette profits and avoid accountability for killing millions of people.

Wherever the climate deniers and anti-science disinformers go, DeSmog will be right on their heels working to expose their spin and holding them accountable.

Although the UK government used to be respected for understanding the urgency of identifying policy solutions to combat global warming, the country’s leadership has shifted in recent years to an anti-science position that is leading Britain and much of Europe in the wrong direction on climate and energy policy.

Through original investigative journalism and crowd-powered deep research, DeSmog UK will expose the individuals and organizations responsible for delaying action on climate change in the UK.

With the international climate negotiations process stalled in dire straits, and the critical COP 21 meeting of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change coming up in Paris in December 2015, there is an urgent need to clear up the denial campaign that has hindered progress toward climate policy solutions around the world.

The science is clear, the clock is ticking and yet the public debate on solutions remains polluted by industry-funded misinformation and propaganda.

DeSmog UK seeks to hold accountable those responsible for these attacks on science and democracy, clearing the way for informed public discourse and political action to avert runaway climate change.

You are invited to partner with us in this important endeavor — in fact, we’re counting on you — so let’s get started.

First, take a minute to follow us on Twitter and Facebook and sign up for our newsletter so you can stay up to speed on all of DeSmog UK’s activities.

Now let’s begin with an introductory series by DeSmog UK editor Brendan Montague.

Image credit: Kris Krug

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Looking for something inspiring to watch tonight instead of Game of Thrones? Check out this sneak peak of Years of Living Dangerously, which will premiere on Showtime on Sunday, April 13 at 10pm. Years Of Living Dangerously is a 9-part series produced by James Cameron, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jerry Weintraub along with former 60 Minutes producers who have 18 Emmys between them. Showtime and the producers were gracious enough to provide the first episode in full on YouTube.  

Once you see it, I bet you'll want to sign up for Showtime to see the rest of the series this spring. (Yes, it's on Showtime which not many households or establishments subscribe to. But wouldn't you like to support the network that hosts such an important series about climate change?)

Watch the first episode of Years of Living Dangerously in full below:

Pretty awesome, right? Sign up at Showtime.com so you don't miss future episodes, including one about the attacks on renewable energy that I was interviewed by America Ferrera for, airing in May. 

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Did the Obama administration's decision on the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline just get delayed again? Quite possibly, since the State Department Inspector General announced today that it has delayed until January the release of its review of the scandals surrounding Environmental Resources Management, Inc., the contractor chosen by TransCanada to perform State's Keystone XL environmental review. 

Although the State Department was evasive about whether the IG's announcement signals a delay in the administration's decision, it would seem odd for President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry to decide on the fate of the KXL export pipeline without waiting for the results of this critical report.  

Bloomberg News and The Hill broke the news about the delay, and all signs point to the fact that State's "inquiry" has morphed into a thorough conflicts-of-interest investigation into ERM's financial ties to TransCanada and other scandals. 

Ever since the March 2013 release of the State Department's environmental impact statement, critics have pointed to ERM Group's historical ties to Big Tobacco, its green-lighting of controversial projects in Peru and the Caspian Sea, and its declaration that a tar sands refinery in Delaware made the air "cleaner," among many other industry-friendly rulings.  

Worst of all, perhaps – and potentially in violation of federal law – ERM Group lied on its State Department contract, claiming it had no business ties to TransCanada and the tar sands industry. The facts showed otherwise. 

This latest development certainly raises the prospect of a further delay, if not another sign that the Keystone XL will be rejected by President Obama.   

Image credit: Kris Krug

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Today, as hundreds of people joined First Nations leaders to walk 14 kilometers through the tar sands in Fort McMurray on the Tar Sands Healing Walk, news of several new oil disasters spread through the crowd and over social media networks.

Details are sparse so far on an oil spill reported in the Athabasca River near the Poplar Grove First Nation. Members of the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation oil spill response team report seeing a 5 kilometer-wide oil slick spanning the width of the river. Stay tuned for details. **Update July 11: ACFN testing reveals the oily sheen on the river likely resulted from a blue-green algae bloom.**

Meanwhile, in the eastern Quebec town of Lac-Megantic, rescue workers are searching for survivors of a series of deadly explosions that followed the derailment of a train carrying crude oil originating from North Dakota's Bakken Shale. 

At least one person is dead, an estimated 60 town residents are missing, crude oil has spilled into Megantic Lake and the Chaudiere River, and the inferno has destroyed some 30 buildings. The disaster in the middle of the night led to the evacuation of 1,000 residents.

The first explosion occurred shortly after 1 a.m., sending fireballs through the downtown core, where a popular bar with an unknown number of patrons was reportedly destroyed completely. Residents, who say the first blast felt like "an atomic bomb," ran towards the scene of the first explosion, only to be surprised by several more explosions.

The train, owned by American company Montreal Maine & Atlantic Railway Ltd, was likely carrying the Bakken light crude to a refinery in Saint John, New Brunswick, according to sources familiar with the line.

According to BBC News, "the train's 73 cars reportedly uncoupled from a parked engine and derailed," reportedly at a high rate of speed.

The Montreal, Maine & Atlantic train had five locomotive engines and 73 cars filled with light crude oil, and was parked outside Lac-Megantic during an overnight driver shift-change, a company spokesman told Canada's La Presse newspaper.

The cars filled with fuel somehow became uncoupled, causing them to roll downhill into the town and derail.

Officials have set up a 1-kilometer exclusion zone around the town center, fearing further explosions as fire crews from as far away as Maine battle the ongoing blaze. 

Watch a bit of footage following the explosions:   

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The Alberta government has hired a team of "foreign special interest groups" to lobby the U.S. Congress and the White House in a desperate attempt to garner support for the risky Keystone XL pipeline that would carry (and certainly spill) tar sands crude through the heartland of America to the Gulf Coast and on to export markets overseas. Given the Exxon tar sands spill in Arkansas, dilbit train derailment in Minnesota and other tar sands disasters in recent weeks, I suppose Alberta figured it needs all the help it can muster.

Politico reports that Alberta is spending $200,000 over the next few months to retain the lobbying and PR services of Rasky Baerlein Strategic Communications and Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti. 

Politico quotes a filing from the Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti firm that says it will provide "strategic consulting in educating U.S. government officials about the Keystone XL pipeline and Alberta's energy resources," while the Rasky firm will "assist in communicating priority issues and promoting the principal's energy and environmental positions to the executive and legislative branches of government as well as other U.S. institutions."

While the ultimate fate of the Keystone XL pipeline rests squarely in the hands of President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry, Alberta is ramping up its all-out Washington blitz to win support for the controversial proposal in Congress and anywhere on the Hill their lobbyists can get in the door. 

Here is a brief look at the specific lobbyists retained to curry favor on behalf of the Alberta government. Note that at least two have experience working on the presidential campaigns of Barack Obama and John Kerry.

Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti

David Castagnetti – Partner.  Castagnetti is a "Democratic uber lobbyist" and political strategist. Castagnetti's bio at mvc-dc.com states that prior to joining Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti Inc., "David served as the day-to-day point person to Congressional leaders and Members of the House and Senate for Senator John Kerry's 2004 Presidential campaign." Castagnetti was also a donor to the pro-Obama PAC Priorities USA Action.  He has lobbied on behalf of oil giant Koch Industries as recently as 2011, according to OpenSecrets. He began his career in the Office of Congressman Ed Markey (D-MA). 

Alex Vogel – Partner. A co-founder of Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti and a veteran Republican Party lawyer, Vogel claims to have a "true insider's perspective on Washington." Prior to starting the firm with Bruce Mehlman, Vogel served as Chief Counsel to Tennessee Republican Sen. Bill Frist, M.D.  

Kelly Rucker Bingel – Partner. A former newspaper reporter and veteran Democratic Hill staffer, Bingel is a moderate Democrat who served for many years as a top staffer to former Arkansas Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln, including her time as chief of staff from 2003-5. Bingel's mvc-dc.com bio states that she "helped moderate Democrats create the fiscally conservative Blue Dog Coalition" with then Rep. Lincoln. And "as a Legislative Director and Chief of Staff on the Senate side [for Sen. Lincoln], she helped create the Senate New Dems." In the 1990s, when Bingel served as Communications Director for Rep. Blanche Lincoln, she "helped craft legislative language" during negotiations on the Telecommunications Act of 1996, and "later parlayed her telecom background as a lobbyist for AT&T's Office of Law and Government Affairs." But a previous version of her bio, accessible at LittleSis.org, reveals her classic revolving door move straight from the Hill to lobbying for AT&T "during implementation of the Telecom Act." It also states that: "In fact, Kelly served as Sen. Lincoln’s liaison to the telecommunications and technology industry for more than 12 years. Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti’s high tech clients are reaping the rewards of this experience today." 

Rasky Baerlein Strategic Communications

Graham Shalgian – Senior Vice President at Rasky. A long-term staffer of former liberal lion U.S. Senator Ted Kennedy, Shalgian's Rasky.com bio notes that Shalgian's "experience includes both the "Obama for America" and "John Kerry for President" campaigns."

David Tamasi – Senior Vice President at Rasky. Tamasi's Rasky.com bio states that he is "recognized by National Journal as a GOP "Insider" and regarded as a leading Republican fundraiser serving on the national finance committees for Mitt Romney for President and U.S. Senator Scott Brown."

Benjamin Nguyen Wexler – Nu Wexler is Vice President of Public Affairs at Rasky. He joined the firm only a few weeks ago. Wexler previously served as communications director for Connecticut Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal. In addition to his jobs in government, Wexler worked at Ogilvy PR Worldwide and Wal-Mart Watch, according to his LinkedIn profile. 

I'll update this post on Thursday with further details as I find them. 

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ForestEthics Advocacy released a game-changing research brief today documenting the massive foreign control of Alberta's tar sands oil industry. Publicly traded oil companies with active tar sands operations have a very high level of foreign ownership – 71 per cent.

Some supposedly "Canadian" oil companies including Suncor, Canadian Natural Resources Limited, Imperial Oil and Husky are predominantly owned by foreign interests. More than half of Canada’s oil and gas revenue goes to companies under foreign control.

This revelation stands in stark contrast to the talking points of the Harper administration and its media echo chamber, which insist that there is too much foreign influence over Canada's resource decisions from environmental groups. In fact, the evidence shows overwhelmingly that foreign interests are influencing tar sands and other resource decisions – chiefly Chinese and other foreign oil companies. 

Cue Ezra Levant's outrage at this foreign influence in Canadian interests! Where's Vivian Krause when you need her? Surely the Ethical Oil Institute will agree that this level of foreign intervention is a dangerous threat to Canada's future? 

Recall that when the Ethical Oil Institute launched its allegedly "100% Canadian" OurDecision.ca website, this was the statement by spokesperson Kathryn Marshall:  "We’ll never take foreign money to undermine our country’s national interests." 

The group admits that it receives funding from companies active in the tar sands. Now that it's been revealed that all these companies are predominently foreign-owned, the group's claims to be 100% Canadian are highly misleading. We await their statement correcting the record.

Anticipating that someone, perhaps from the 'ethical oil' team, will quickly attempt to do damage control by claiming that this is just some ginned up report by ForestEthics, let's be crystal clear that the data underlying the report are all from independent sources including Bloomberg Professional and industry journals. 

The ForestEthics Advocacy brief concludes:

"The Conservative Harper government is increasingly ruling in favour of foreign-oil companies instead of Canadians. We need foreign investment and shareholders in this country, but it does not need to be at the cost of democracy, our environment, and future generations."

Read the full Forest Ethics Advocacy brief [PDF]: Who Benefits? An Investigation of Foreign Investment in The Tar Sands  

Update: Rick Mercer's takedown of this "foreign-owned" nationalism talking point is increasingly accurate with every passing day. (H/T AnOilMan).  

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