Oil company knew about the impact of its activity on global warming, but lied, says UN

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres accused big oil companies this Wednesday (18) of spreading a "big lie" about their role in global warming, days after the publication of a study on what the American giant ExxonMobil knew about this risk four decades ago. The research, published in the journal Science, revealed that the oil and gas multinational disregarded its own scientists' findings about the role of fossil fuels in climate change. 🤯

Posted by

Isabella Caminoto

January 18, 2023 11:51

“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.

ExxonMobil internally predicted how burning fossil fuels would cause "potentially catastrophic" global warming.

Despite this, they continued to publicly cast doubt on climate science and lobby against action on global warming. pic.twitter.com/td1DoirmBa
- Human Rights Watch (@hrw) January 18, 2023

“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.”

Since the late 1970s, ExxonMobil's own scientists accurately projected and modeled global warming due to fossil fuel burning and produced results that were consistent with independent academic and government climate models, a new #ScienceReview finds. https://t.co/WvcYgJOySw pic.twitter.com/tbPhjelU0R
- Science Magazine (@ScienceMagazine) January 17, 2023

“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.”

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 leadersariais present in the audience to present, by the end of the year, “credible and transparent” plans on how to achieve net zero emissions.

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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This post was last modified on January 19, 2023 01:06 pm

Isabella Caminoto

Lawyer and master's student in International Law, I have democracy and freedom as undeniable flags. I am passionate about animals and believe that the well-being of our planet should be the daily highlight of our society's agenda.