“Some producers of fossil fuels they were fully aware in the 1970s that their main product would burn the planet. But like the tobacco industry, they underestimated their own science. Some oil giants sold the big lie,” he said Guterres No. World Economic Forum in Davos.
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“Just like the tobacco industry, those responsible must be punished,” he added, referring to the $246 billion that US tobacco companies had to agree to pay in 1998 to 46 states over a 25-year period to cover expenses to cure smokers.
O ExxonMobil study (🇬🇧) showed that the company's scientists had modeled and predicted the global warming “with shocking accuracy,” only for the company to “spend the next few decades denying that same climate science.”
“Producers of fossil fuels and those who support them continue to fight to increase production, knowing that their economic model is incompatible with the survival of humanity”, he criticized Guterres in Davos. “This madness sounds like science fiction, even though we know that ecosystem collapse is pure, hard scientific fact,” he insisted, warning that “we are on the brink of climate disaster.”
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More generally, the secretary general of ONU criticized the “dubious” climate commitments of many companies in their goal of zero carbon emissions.
This “misleads consumers, investors and regulators with false information”, he reiterated, mentioning the “greenwashing” of companies, a term in English that consists of maintaining an ecological discourse while promoting the use of fossil fuels.
In this sense, the head of ONU asked business leaders present in the audience to present, by the end of the year, “credible and transparent” plans on how to achieve net zero emissions.
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QuestionCommented on the Science report, an ExxonMobil spokesperson said last week that the issue has come up several times in recent years and that in each case the company's response has been that “those who talk about how 'Exxon knew' are wrong in their conclusions.”
(To AFP)
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