The U.S. Senate will soon decide whether Rex Tillerson, the longtime leader of the world’s largest oil and gas company, Exxon Mobil, is qualified to serve as the U.S. secretary of state.
His confirmation hearings this week came at a moment of climate emergency, when scientific studies indicate that dramatic international action is required to avoid massive deterioration of coastlines, intensification of drought, increased frequency of big storms, acidification of oceans, and all the other problems associated with climate change: mass migrations, violent conflicts, loss of languages, and species extinctions.
Although Tillerson faced a few tough questions from members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about his climate change record on Wednesday, he was also shown deference for his allegedly scientific views on climate, with senators particularly praising his perspective on the issue as that of an engineer.
And news stories favorably juxtaposed Tillerson’s acknowledgment of climate change with Trump’s 2012 tweet that the whole thing is a Chinese hoax.
But climate denial takes on many forms these days, some considerably more subtle than others, and at Wednesday’s hearing Tillerson displayed a mastery of obfuscation that only a son of Exxon Mobil, a chief benefactor of climate denial, could have achieved — ostensibly acknowledging climate change while still denying the need to actually do anything about it that might significantly slow the burning of fossil fuels.
Rex Tillerson, former chief executive officer of Exxon Mobile Corp. and U.S. secretary of state nominee for President-elect Donald Trump, sits during a meeting with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., not pictured, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 4, 2017.
Photo: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg via Getty Images
“Years of outright denial has lowered the bar to where someone says, as Tillerson does, ‘Yes I recognize greenhouse gases are causing a change in the atmosphere,’ and people are like, ‘Oh yay, he’s not a denier,’” said Stephen Kretzmann, head of the advocacy group Oil Change International. “I actually think Rex Tillerson is the worst case scenario for secretary of state on climate.”
Those listening to the hearing could be forgiven if they left believing Tillerson had committed to remaining a party to the Paris climate agreement, with its moderate goal of keeping the rise in earth temperature below 3.6 degrees. But his leaky language left plenty of space for promises to fall through. Tillerson said repeatedly that he would push for the U.S. to retain a “seat at the table.” Yet he noted President-elect Trump’s commitment to “America first,” and said that funding for international climate agreements would be reviewed from the “bottom-up.”
Asked by committee chair Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., to succinctly state his “personal position” on climate change, Tillerson replied, “The increase in the greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere are having an effect. Our ability to predict that effect is very limited.”
When Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., asked him to acknowledge the scientific finding that climate change increases the odds that certain types of extreme weather events will occur. Tillerson replied, “There’s some literature out there that suggests that; there’s other literature that says it’s inconclusive.”
Such obtuse answers are a hallmark of the contemporary denial movement and reveal a suspicious lack of enthusiasm about heeding what the most definitive studies say. Tillerson is right that we can’t predict exactly how deeply climate change will unravel us, but the range of possibilities laid out in innumerable studies warn against a wait-and-see attitude.
Despite Exxon Mobil’s promise under Tillerson to stop donating to some organizations that promote climate denial, the practice has continued. The company donated a reported $6.5 million to such groups from 2008 to 2015.
And while Tillerson in 2009 came out in support of a carbon tax, a policy that could reduce carbon emissions, he made that announcement at a moment when it conflicted with a major push for a bill that, had it passed, would have enshrined a totally different carbon reduction approach, called cap-and-trade.
The simple truth is that as Tillerson was shifting his corporation’s rhetoric away from climate doubt, he was also pushing forward a program of oil and gas extraction that, if it continues apace, would prevent nations from achieving the Paris agreement temperature goal.
The issue that senators focused on the most by far on Wednesday was Tillerson’s close relationship with Russia and his efforts with Exxon to convince the U.S. to end sanctions against the country, which stalled oil and gas deals reportedly worth billions.
But lost in that story has been the nature of the project Exxon Mobil had planned. In September 2014, Exxon and the Russian state oil company Rosneft discovered oil in the Russian Arctic Kara Sea only a week before U.S. sanctions went into effect against Russia for its annexation of Crimea.
According to Exxon, the Kara Sea licenses occupy an area “equivalent to all the leases in the Gulf of Mexico combined.” Arctic oil extraction is a long-term project — getting to the point where the oil is making it to market can take decades of work and an incredible investment of resources that, to be worthwhile, requires high crude prices. Because of this, a study published in Nature in 2015 stated that to achieve the 3.6 degrees emission scenario, no Arctic oil should be extracted. In fact, last May the oil company Total declared that it would not pursue Arctic exploration, because “the [3.6 degree] scenario highlights the fact that a part of the world’s fossil fuel resources cannot be developed.”
Meanwhile, Obama has banned drilling in large portions of the U.S. Arctic because of extreme conditions that make drilling difficult and cleaning up a spill even harder. Tillerson, for his part, pushed the U.S. government to embrace Arctic drilling. In 2015 he led an Arctic research group for the National Petroleum Council, an Energy Department advisory committee whose members mostly work for the industry, that published a report encouraging the Obama administration to expand Arctic opportunities in the U.S.
In an interview about that report with the Associated Press, Tillerson described a vision of long-term reliance on fossil fuels. “There will come a time when all the resources that are supplying the world’s economies today are going to go in decline. [Arctic oil reserves] will be what’s needed next. If we start today it’ll take 20, 30, 40 years for those to come on,” he said. “It’s back to that insatiable appetite that the world has for energy. Oil demand is going to continue to grow.”
Tillerson’s understanding of climate science and his stance on the Paris climate agreement could have major consequences for the planet. As secretary of state, he would become the agreement’s steward, playing a key role in determining how quickly countries decarbonize their economies and in holding the U.S. to its emissions pledges.
Failure to meet the Paris goal would likely have dire consequences for global populations. But the possibility of success is already spelling trouble for Exxon Mobil, because an agreement to burn fewer fossil fuels inevitably reduces the value of the vast oil and gas reserves currently held by the major oil companies.
In fact,the SEC in August began investigating whether the company was overvaluing the reserves that it plans to sell in the future. Similar probes have been launched by Attorneys General Eric Schneiderman of New York and Maura Healey of Massachussetts. A key aspect of those investigations is the question of whether Exxon Mobil deceived shareholders by failing to disclose its own decades of research, exposed by Inside Climate News and the Los Angeles Times, indicating climate change regulations could eventually prevent its product from going to market.
“Tillerson spent his career at a company whose current business model hinges on the failure of international efforts to address climate change, so that is really core to his entire working career and the DNA that he would bring to the role of secretary of state,” said Kathy Mulvey, corporate accountability campaigns director for Union of Concerned Scientists.
As secretary of state, Tillerson would be able to launch technology sharing programs like the Global Shale Initiative, launched under Hillary Clinton’s State Department, which involved teaching other countries to frack. He could help start electrification programs in energy-poor nations, like the State Department’s Power Africa program — although perhaps not with the current emphasis on renewables that has angered the coal industry. And in his tricky diplomatic negotiations he’d be able to use energy as a bargaining chip.
“You have a situation internationally where the big part of the climate problem that’s not being faced is the expansion of the fossil fuel industry. That is the part that Tillerson won’t touch,” Kretzmann said. “If you had a classic, full-on climate denier, the world would be that much more clear that they had to take leadership on their own. … People are going to say, ‘Well, we can talk to him on climate.’ And that’s going to be a problem.”
In fact, Tillerson repeatedly urged approval of the Keystone XL pipeline, which would have shipped tar sands oil out of the Kearl project, one of three Canadian oil sands projects that currently comprise more than a third of Exxon’s liquid reserves. Secretary of State John Kerry denied the pipeline a permit, a decision that will be up for reconsideration with Trump in the White House. Tillerson has downplayed the fact that oil sands release around 17 percent more greenhouse gases than conventional crude and would likely be unprofitable in a climate-safe energy market, stating that “despite what some claim, the greenhouse gas emissions from oil sands development are similar to many other heavy crudes.”
A flare stack is seen at Syncrude’s mine site north of Fort McMurray, Alberta, on June 3, 2016. Three Canadian oil sands projects currently comprise more than a third of Exxon’s liquid reserves.
Photo: Cole Burston/AFP/Getty Images
During the most aggressive exchange on climate change of the hearing, Sen. Tim Kaine, former running mate to presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, asked Tillerson “whether those allegations about Exxon Mobil’s knowledge of climate science and decision to fund and promote a view contrary to its awareness of the science, whether those allegations are true or false?”
Tillerson ducked, “The question would have to be put to Exxon Mobil.”
“Do you lack the knowledge to answer my question or are you refusing to answer my question?” Kaine asked
“A little of both,” Tillerson replied.
Top photo: A scarecrow floats in a tailings pond outside Syncrude’s mine site north of Fort McMurray, Alberta. Three Canadian oil sands projects currently comprise more than a third of Exxon’s liquid reserves.
The oil and coal companies’ objective is to make as much money as possible, even if that includes dumping greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere and various pollution into the air and water, and to make sure that as few regulations as possible force them to deal with those currently-externalized costs.
Climate Change Denialism is a tool for getting US Republicans to help them and reduce the number of Democrats interfering (or whatever other parties they can coopt in other countries – Australia, Canada, and Britain have right-wing parties that happily buy in as well.)
@Mike Sulzer
You don’t have to take the Low Road to make your ignorance and conditioning evident on this issue. You are being fed a lot of BS by politicians and their technocrat funders and you want to believe the whole agenda is benign and will address AGW but it’s an illusion full of half truths and outright lies.
The Deniers say they don’t ‘believe’ in GW because they ‘know’ what the Big Green agenda being forced on everyone will produce and it’s not much reduction in GW gasses. The Warmers who base their position on belief not knowledge are a dangerous bunch of ignorant political followers.
The woman in Florida doesn’t threaten anything with her rainwater and poop in a pot except maybe local sanitation. She is being persecuted under an international NWO dictate actually aimed at requiring local governments to supply these services.
As far as I know the DOE doesn’t have a single experimental LFTR reactor running, even as a test bed reactor at a university. They should have at least three or four running at different universities in the US and several more around the world.
Something tells me that if we really were looking at the end if the world caused by global warming, they would be working on a variety of solutions with LFTR at the top of the list. Instead, they mostly attend conferences, pass laws and sneer at people who don’t agree with them.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHs2Ugxo7-8
There’s a much simpler solution.
One that gets rid of nuclear waste?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_repository
I use to be one of the guys that took those “weather observations”. We had many other duties like Air Traffic Control. The OB was quick and imprecise.
.5 deg F accuracy was the accepted. That OB was away from the runways with a mercury in glass thermometer mounted in a white louvered box 5 ft off the ground over mowed grass. My how the definition of accurate has changed.
Very few people seem to actually want to stop Global Warming because it is only possible through large reductions in consumption. The Warmers are selling Big Green snakeoil with their technocrat friends waiting to build their giant smoking polluting industry that when installed looks much cleaner than it actually is.
The Deniers are actually the more honest of these groups when you get past the sound-bite exchanges. They are trying to protect their established industry with millions of good jobs and reliable relatively cheap energy. There are climate costs from using fossil fuels which don’t disappear when solar and wind are used.
Every solar plant requires a dedicated backup FF generator ready to perform 24/7/365. and about half of the time every day so we have to have and maintain two systems not one. There is still no viable solar based replacement for gasoline.
Trump’s quip about the Chinese was probably about the fact that they will be the ones getting rich from our conversion to solar, they make most of the solar today, with coal fueling the processes.
There are lies, damned lies, and then there is wayoutwest.
Well, some of the deniers are honest, but stupid. No, Rex Tillerson is not honest. He knows that the science is better than his testimony implies.
You know that renewals are gaining ground when it illegal to disconnect from the grid. Yes, that is Florida, but it could be everywhere.
http://www.collective-evolution.com/2014/03/09/florida-makes-off-grid-living-illegal-mandates-all-homes-must-be-connected-to-an-electricity-grid/
Carbon taxes?
Anyway, they had liquid salt reactors working back in the 1960s, but didn’t develop them because they wouldn’t provide plutonium need for the weapons industry.
It took them less than two years to build one in the 1960s, but somehow just can’t get one going today.
There’s lots of info on the web with some videos on Youtube.
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=thorium+reactor
you know things are really bad when the aliens have stopped comin’ ’round
Tillerson’s comments were stunningly scientific in a time when climate debate has become a religion on both sides. Yes, CO2 absorbs energy from the atmosphere and converts it to heat. But the direct heating affect of this is so small that it is insignificant given our current abilities to measure. All the hype is created around hypotheses of positive feedbacks that amplify the tiny direct effect into something substantial and scary, hypotheses that must be confirmed empirically and have yet to be confirmed.
The truth is, our ground temperature measurements are complete junk. The raw data shows barely any warming over the past century. The temperature stations are poorly placed, the types of stations have been changed (from Stephenson to MMTS), and they have been moved closer to buildings and asphalt as they’ve been converted to electronic types. It’s the 7+ “adjustments” (all based on tenuous assumptions and assumed correction factors) that turn this standard variability into a warming trend.
The Intercept authors are typically very good about keeping a skeptical eye on self-serving power structures. I hope they start using some of that healthy skepticism on the climate change cult.
Nonsense. The science is on one side only, and it is not the one Tillerson is on.
No, the CO2 absorbs radiation coming from the surface of the earth and stops it from escaping, thus keeping the energy level (hence temperature) higher. It is significant and it is the initial source of the observed rapid warming. That is, the net effect is that it puts energy into the atmosphere; it does not take it out.
gina gina gina….
come out of your coma….
1. global warming is about the RATE OF CHANGE vs HISTORICAL RATES OF CHANGE
2. The icecaps are melting far faster and far more in a shorter period of time than they ever have in the history of a STABLISED PLANETARY ENVIRONMENT
3. it is worse than that – AIR POLUTION is also trapping heat inside and reflecting sunlight out.
We are in a veritable microwave oven. The consequences will soon be irreversible. PARTY HARD, YOUR GRANDCHILDREN WONT MAKE IT.
Alleen, please do some research on why this planet is safely supporting 7.5 billion humans, twice as many as 50 years ago. I do not believe in the religion that says nature is more valuable then human live. Do you?
I believe in a human future with safe, reliable, and plentiful fossil fuels helping to clean up the environment around the world while providing more food. Here is a helpful link for your next story on how Exxon Mobil has saved humanity from starvation and pollution for the last 50 years.
http://www.moralcaseforfossilfuels.com/data/
Please encourage the end of wars for resources and seeking justice for the continuing war crimes created in Washington DC. The environment story is the wrong way to do this and a distraction.
WUT?! Exxon ‘s lobbyists push for war in the interest of securing oil reserves in the ME. Your views are maximally contradictory. Your shite link points to a site published by Alex Epstein of the Center for Industrial Progress, which is directly funded by big oil, including the Koch Bros.
As an aside, I would note that my personal view is that the diversity and – dare I say – purity of spirit of “nature”, perhaps factoring in the sheer outnumbering of birds, bees, trees, etc. over humans, makes the sum of all other life in our world greatly more valuable in virtually ever aspect , compared to our corrupt, ignorant, arrogant species.
Whether that perspective relegates me to a minority you likely see as nut-cases, however, does not detract from the insanity of your own opinion stated above: “…fossil fuels helping to clean up the environment…” – my God, man…
You need to demonstrate the sincerity of your beliefs by removing yourself and dependents from the corrupt, ignorant arrogant occupiers of Earth. Oh, that doesn’t describe YOU, just other people?
jerk
“I do not believe in the religion that says nature is more valuable then human live.”
Well, the Old Testament says humanity has “dominion over the earth”, so that basically says the planet is our responsibility.
Plus, despite our alleged “starry origin”, our bodies are products of earth nature and nurtured by the “web of life.”
Global warming will diminish the world’s population, which is even now barely sustainable, not the least because resources have been and continue to be stolen by oil barons from vast sections of humanity. ( War on Terror)
History may applaud the 20th century benefits of fossil fuels, but will frown upon its short-sighted 21st century use, despite numerous warnings.
Ah, yes, The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels. That would be Alex Epstein’s brilliant work. ;^(
Emphasis added.
If you want to peddle this nonsense successfully, you should probably try somewhere else. If you do it here, and end up in a thread with a lot of participation, you will be slaughtered (intellectually, of course).
You believe in the flying spaghetti monster, or, alternatively, turtles all the way down.
“See something, leak something…” And TI will privatize and bury it. What a con.
…”Tillerson replied, “The increase in the greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere are having an effect. Our ability to predict that effect is very limited.”
Rex is from the GW Bush school of inquiry: “We need more science!”
Let’s just wait and see what happens when we saturate the air with CO2. If anything goes wrong, we can blame it on the Russians. Or China. Or liberals.
Why do people keep acting surprised by this behavior from old people? These people grew up in a time of utter ignorance regarding climate science or the global effects of industrialization. If they refuse to learn then the social Darwinism they preach should kick into effect and they should get removed from society.
We have everybody’s stupid grandparents running our government and economy. Their thinking is obsolete. Their way of life is over. If they actually cared about their children’s futures they would work to make this a better place for them. That has not happened and likely will not happen, so we have every reason to believe the old and elderly are leeching off the youth. Their greedy fingers and minds plotting to consolidate control and power on the few industries they have left. They are killing their kids to add a couple years to their geriatric existence.
Thank God I’m not having kids. I don’t know how parents live with themselves when they consciously bring an innocent life into this world just to sacrifice it for their personal gain, or for the gain of some elder ruling class.
I wonder when the youth is going to rise up and take their world. There are a lot more of them then there are old people, and their bodies and minds more fit for survival. The milennials are the largest generation in history, and now they’re having kids. Wonder how long it will take to reach the tipping point.
I guess you forgot to include the link that shows that age is the primary factor in global warming denying. But I am sure yo will be back to rectify that.
It’s too bad we don’t, yet, have a simple and reliable test that would determine which newborns will grow up to be mean-spirited and stupid. If we did, we could drown them at birth, thus saving the otherwise-wasted resources that would be used to sustain them.
It’s a shame your parents didn’t feel the same way.
uncalled for,,since MS does a poor job in making a difference between the average old person…..just trying to get by…and the old people he sees as having control over power…which one minute of watching the senate hearings confirmed to me.
do you honestly believe sessons or the other alabama racist or the old cult member from utah.etc etc….dont fit the point he was making?
If we wanted the problem solved, it would be solved. Climate Change Cultists ( the opposite of deniers ), want to be the high priests of the New Climate Religion and tell the rest of us what to do.
If they were serious they would be pushing fusion and nuclear.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAFWeIp8JT0
What do mean by “pushing fusion”? Nobody has been able to solve the problem, which means that is very difficult to do. I doubt that it can be pushed any harder than it has. The prospect of a huge amount of energy with less of a problem with “leftovers” than fission has been the goal for decades. It just cannot be done now.
But when did reality ever get in the way of your fantasies?
And what is this nonsense about high priests? People looking for a rational response to global warming do not get a power or money out of it, not even a tiny smidgeon compared to what those who continue to pump oil and gas get.
Carbon taxes?
Anyway, they had liquid salt reactors working back in the 1960s, but didn’t develop them because they wouldn’t provide plutonium need for the weapons industry.
It took them less than two years to build one in the 1960s, but somehow just can’t get one going today.
I believe that “pushing” was meant to imply “better fund”. It’s no great leap to generalize that more money develops new technology faster.
The Earth is still technically in an Ice Age, year round ice at the polls.
The climate has been slowly warming and sea levels rising for the last 14000 years. The Industrial revolution didn’t start til the 18th century.
CO2 may add a tiny bit to the process but not anywhere near as much as deforestation. Plant trees, it would be a lot more cost effective.
Sometimes not so slowly.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0H5LCLljJho
That statement is based on nonsense, not science. It is wrong.
Oh, and by the way, your statement:
has nothing to do with the problem. The point is that the earth is now warming very quickly, not slowly. Thus, an explanation of the current warming is needed, and the current scientific explanation does the job. “Ongoing natural process” does not.
I watched most of the hearing.
Rex Tillerson is a cold and calculating corporate retainer, adept at telling people exactly what they want to hear.
There was no direct question about Russian agreements with Exxonmobil, drilling in the Arctic, or the extent of Russian dependence upon Exxonmobil expertise and resources.
Tillerson is not a rightwing sycophant like every other Trump appointee. I wonder how he got the call from Trump. Of all the possible Secretaries of State — from John Bolton to Frank Gaffney or Rob Portman, Tillerson sticks out like a man dancing Rockettes chorus line. He doesn’t fit.
I have to wonder what he’s doing there.
However, if I were Putin, he’s exactly the man I’d “recommend” to Trump. Russia’s main asset is oil and gas. Russia has already made huge deals with China and Europe.
Tillerson doesn’t fit in Trump’s closed circle of wealthy friends and associates and, heretofore, has shown little interest in diplomacy or politics — other than to fund and fudge climate issues and to lobby for tax breaks and fewer regulations.
Watch this man closely.
By “Climate Denier” do you mean “Castastrophic man-made global warming skeptic?” Or someone who denies that Earth’s climate is in a short-term natural warming trend, in the midst of a 10,000 year long warm spell (the Holocene) that is part of a longer term climate trend that includes 100,000 year long ice ages? Is that what you mean?
You kids are going to feel pretty silly in a few years because the entire edifice of man-made global warming belief is in the process of collapse after nearly 30 years of failed predictions of climate disaster. But I understand, since you’ve been taught this all your lives. Just saying: be ready to re-think this thing.
Nonsense. The earth is warming very quickly, and this must have a very specific explanation. The only thing that works is the increase in CO2 and the consequent feedback processes.
Your BS does not explain it.
He sounds like a global warming denier to me, just a more intelligent, careful, and highly motivated one than most. “Tony” is at the other end of the spectrum.
Many people say, ‘sure, the climate may be changing, but I don’t really care because I live in an air conditioned mansion well above seal level’. They are not true climate change deniers but merely poseurs.
I believe the word that is coming into vogue is “INDIVIDUALISTS” .
alleen, please, as a journalist used to scrutinize her tools – language, words – never talk/write of “climate deniers”. everybody knows what you mean but this does’nt make it any better.
The real problem is that “global warming” got changed to “climate change” in order to help cover up what is happening. If Alleen is to make any change it should be to “global warming denier”.
I assume Trump selected Tillerson, the CEO of the largest oil company in the US, to either kill or stall any international agreements involving climate change, and to further expand drilling for oil offshore in Alaska and Russia. Trump’s links with Russia keep popping up.
I watched most of the hearing.
Rex Tillerson is a cold and calculating corporate retainer, adept at telling people exactly what they want to hear.
There was no direct question about Russian agreements with Exxonmobil, drilling in the Arctic, or the extent of Russian dependence upon Exxonmobil expertise and resources.
Tillerson is not a rightwing sycophant like every other Trump appointee. I wonder how he got the call from Trump. Of all the possible Secretaries of State — from John Bolton to Frank Gaffney or Rob Portman, Tillerson sticks out like a man dancing Rockettes chorus line. He doesn’t fit.
I have to wonder what he’s doing there.
However, if I were Putin, he’s exactly the man I’d “recommend” to Trump. Russia’s main asset is oil and gas. Russia has already made made deals with China and Europe.
Tillerson doesn’t fit in Trump’s closed circle of wealthy friends and associates and, heretofore, has shown little interest in diplomacy or politics — other than to fund and fudge climate issues and to lobby for tax breaks and fewer regulations.
Watch this man closely.
zzzz
“climate denial”
This article suffers from English denial.
one minor error is what you focus on?
One minor error? Maybe just a little more “change in earth temperature” will get your and Aileen’s brains started.
why do you think it would change either my position or (from what we can reasonably infer) aileen brown’s position? it’s obvious brown realizes the science is solid from the way she has written the article. if the earth warms up further, it would only solidify her position. are you in the communete camp?
i hope you aren’t the type to cherrypick one minor detail in an otherwise well written and convincing article to try to discredit it; sadly, that his the classic denier tactic.
Neither I nor ChasDokus said a word about the substance of the article. Deny that.
There’s no accounting for taste.
you’re alluding to the article; you think the substance is wrong. you didn’t say anything substantive about why you disagree with it, i agree. still waiting.
you haven’t responded to the question either.
‘Maybe just a little more “change in earth temperature” will get your and Aileen’s brains started.” what does this mean? what is your criticism of the article?
Look at this fascist certainty opening:
“His confirmation hearings this week came at a moment of climate emergency, when scientific studies indicate that dramatic international action is required to avoid massive deterioration of coastlines, intensification of drought, increased frequency of big storms, acidification of oceans, and all the other problems associated with climate change: mass migrations, violent conflicts, loss of languages, and species extinctions.”
Yeah, Alleen, everyone knows that you are the cream of the crop, when it comes to science and especially climate science.
Indeed, what an alarmist, set-your-hair-on-fire-and-run-around-like-a-little-girl opening statement. The climate is always changing, having nothing to do with CO2 levels or any human activity.
There have been 6 planetary ICE AGES that we know of and we’ve been in a warming phase of the CURRENT one for the last 12 thousand years, with warming fluctuations along the way.
Get a grip!! Our sun drives our weather and climate systems.
The debate on THAT is over.
And leave me and my SUV alone.
we could listen to every national science academy on the planet, or we could listen to you. i personally think they know what you are talking about, and you don’t.
You’re indeed correct.
They, do all know what I’M talking about. It’s you that seems confused.
A piece of uneducated liberal crap.
Or, shall I say, intercept fake news.
people that deny the climate is changing, and that humans cause it, are almost always shills or ignorant. a few just refuse to believe it for ideological reasons.
What a bunch of crap.
ignorant, i believe. yep. go wake up communete and take yourself to the principal’s office.
I despise anyone who thinks they can control the temperature of the world and deny that Islam is a religion of hate. It was set up as a military branch of the old faith, bless YahWeh, but the world moved on. Islam did not, but they sit on an oil field. Found by Jed Clampet so MI-6 told me.
Should we give up the bounty of our earth. Hell no. Should we screw up our earth. Hell no. Keeping self serving individuals out of power is our only answer. And I am not referring to Trump. It’s all of the bureaucrats that have been created in the past 200 years and replaced by their children and cousins.
We will know we have a serious problem when the astronauts in the MIR spacestation refuse to return to earth.
comcom: “Major Smith, we need youback in Houston, over.”
major smith: “HALE NO! GO FRIK YERSELF!”
Yeah, thanks for the insightful article. Very important to point to Tillersons version of climate denial. I think his endorsement of Trump’s “America First”-policy means that a “seat at the table” of climate talks is just for securing America’s energy interests – rather than being prepared to turn to renewables or even lead the way.
Rex is a polygamist – married to his wife and married to oil. He is not a climate denier, he is a “climate? foregetaboutit”. He is one of those who then says “let it be the next gen’s problem”. What if i am right? What if life recycles like everything else? What if after you die you have to return as a human? What do you want to return to?
Nice article. Tillerson’s record on climate denial is very long. From Steve Coll:
Less exposed to lawsuits, that is:
The InsideClimateNews expose of Exxon’s 1978-era internal reports on the fossil fuel-global warming connection (which came out after Steve Coll’s Private Empire was published) gives more ammunition to that argument; for example coastal cities could likely successfully sue Exxon and friends for costs related to sea-level rise, such as costs of relocating waste treatment plants to higher grounds, etc.
Thank you for this article.