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  Yahoo News 20 Sep 06
Exxon Mobil accused of misleading public
By Jill Lawless, Associated Press Writer

PlanetArk 20 Sep 06
Exxon misleads on climate change: UK Royal Society
By Gerard Wynn

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's national academy of science, the Royal Society, has accused U.S. oil giant Exxon Mobil Corp. of misleading the public into thinking that the role of humans in climate change is still open to doubt.

Royal Society spokesman Bob Ward described Exxon's assessment of mankind's contribution to global warming as inaccurate and misleading in a letter to the company published by the Guardian newspaper on its Website on Wednesday.

Ward objected to an Exxon Corporate Citizenship document that described "gaps in the science" of climate change, casting doubt on the link between global warming and the greenhouse gases which humans produce by burning fossil fuels.

Exxon has said there were such gaps in the latest report of the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), published in 2001, which had used the peer-reviewed academic papers of several hundred scientists.

This report spoke of "new and stronger evidence" that human activities were warming the globe, a stronger stance than in its previous report in 1995.

"It's quite clear that what Exxon are publishing is not the IPCC (position)," Ward told Reuters.

His letter to Exxon, referring to two company publications this year, said: "I am writing to express my disappointment at the inaccurate and misleading view of the science of climate change that these documents present."

Exxon said in a statement, responding to the Royal Society's letter, that it did accept the contribution of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide (CO2) to climate change. "Contrary to The Royal Society's assertion, Exxon Mobil recognizes... CO2 emissions are one of the contributing factors to climate change," it said.

RESEARCH PROGRAMME

"We refute any suggestion that our reports are inaccurate or misleading," it said, adding that it had founded a climate and energy research program at Stanford University in the United States.

Ward said that at a July meeting with Exxon the oil company had pledged to him that it would stop funding lobby groups that misrepresented the consensus view on climate change science.

According to Ward's own analysis of Exxon's Corporate Giving Report, the company last year funded 64 groups conducting climate change research, of which 25 were in line with mainstream climate science and 39 were "misleading."

The latter category included the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, to which Exxon gave $25,000 in 2005, the Exxon website shows. The Centre's Website says: "There is no compelling reason to believe that the rise in temperature was caused by the rise in CO2."

An Exxon Mobil spokesman said that such funding did not mean that the company agreed with the views of all of these groups.

"We do take this issue very seriously," the Exxon Mobil spokesman said. "These organizations do not speak on our behalf, nor do we control their views and messages. They may or may not hold similar views to ours."

Exxon Mobil, the world's biggest publicly traded company, achieved a 42 percent increase in profits in 2005, reaching $36 billion, largely due to soaring oil and gas prices.

Yahoo News 20 Sep 06
Exxon Mobil accused of misleading public
By Jill Lawless, Associated Press Writer

LONDON - Britain's leading scientific academy has accused oil company Exxon Mobil Corp. of misleading the public about global warming and funding groups that undermine the scientific consensus on climate change.

The Royal Society said Wednesday that it had written to Exxon asking it to halt support for groups that have "misrepresented the science of climate change." The Sept. 4 letter was sent to Esso U.K., Exxon's British arm, by the society's official spokesman, Bob Ward.

The letter said Exxon had given $2.9 million to 39 groups that "have been misinforming the public about the science of climate change." The groups — among more than 50 listed on Exxon's Web site as receiving funding for "public information and policy research" — include the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a free-market advocacy group based in Washington, and the Tempe, Ariz.-based Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, which Ward said disputes the link between greenhouse gas emissions and global warming.

"It's bizarre that a company like ExxonMobil should be funding an organization that so clearly is putting out information that is at odds with the opinion of the scientific community," Ward told The Associated Press.

ExxonMobil confirmed it had received the letter.

In a statement, the company said it funded "organizations which research significant policy issues and promote informed discussion on issues of direct relevance to the company." "These organizations do not speak on our behalf, nor do we control their views and messages," it added.

ExxonMobil said its reports "explain our views openly and honestly on climate change." The company said it accepted that carbon dioxide emissions were "one of the contributing factors to climate change."

Founded in 1660, the Royal Society is Britain's leading academy of scientists, and counts Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin and Albert Einstein among its past members.

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