Put a Tiger In Your Think Tank

ExxonMobil has pumped more than $8 million into more than 40 think tanks; media outlets; and consumer, religious, and even civil rights groups that preach skepticism about the oncoming climate catastrophe. Herewith, a representative overview.

Organization	Funding	Hot Air	Fun Fact
Acton Institute for the Study of Religious Liberty	$155,000	Calls CO2 caps "a misguided attempt to solve a problem that may not even exist."	Advised by an AEI fellow.
Advancement of Sound Science Center	$40,000	Run by FoxNews.com's Steve Milloy.
American Council for Capital Formation	$250,000	"Science questions must be addressed before the United States and its allies embark on a path as nonproductive as that of the Kyoto Protocol."	Group netted nearly a million dollars from ExxonMobil from 2000-2003 but the real science bashing was in 2001 when they got a quarter million.
American Council on Science and Health	$90,000	"Policymakers can safely take several decades to plan a response" to global warming.	Michaels and Singer are advisors.
American Enterprise Institute	$960,000	Published 2004 climate article titled "Don't Worry, Be Happy."	Dick Cheney is a former senior fellow.
American Legislative Exchange Council	$712,200	Published Michaels' paper that claims "global warming could actually save lives."	Launched attack on "Sons of Kyoto" state legislation in 2004.
Annapolis Center for Science-Based Public Policy	$427,500	"Answering questions about global warming takes more than a few thermometers, an agenda and a press release."	Baliunas is an adviser; honored Senator Inhofe for "supporting rational, science-based thinking and policy-making."
Arizona State University Office of Climatology	$49,500	They got this amount in 2001 when the office was headed by Robert C. Balling, a well known climate change "skeptic."
Atlas Economic Research Foundation	$440,000	"As the science behind global warming becomes increasingly sketchy, many environmentalists clutch even harder to their views." Atlas fellow, Deroy Murdock , "You call this global "warming"?" The Washington Times, May 31, 1996.
Cato Institute	$75,000	One of the modern right's most respected think tanks	Michaels is a senior fellow.
Capital Research Center	$115,000	Right-wing nonprofit watchdog group	"Scientists disagree about climate change, but you wouldn't know that from the [Kyoto] treaty. It is based on a theory that man-made carbon dioxide, or CO2, gas emissions caused by industrial activities have created the so-called 'global warming' effect." CRC President, Terrence Scanlon, "Outside View: Hot air blows away," United Press International, February 8, 2002.
Centre for the New Europe	$40,000	"Not only is the scientific basis of global warming increasingly uncertain, but Kyoto will also ultimately prove to be an economic disaster for Europe--and the developing world," CNR President, Tim Evans, "Kyoto will chill the global economy," The Daily Telegraph (letter), October 2, 2004.	Singer offers up his contrarian commentary on their website.
Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise	$40,000	Called the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment "as phony as a three-dollar bill."	Driessen is a senior policy adviser.
Center for the Study of CO2 and Global Change	$55,000	Calls CO2 emissions "a force for good, enhancing the organic matter that sustains all of humanity."
Citizens for a Sound Economy	$305,250	"The science behind global warming is inconclusive, and to teach otherwise is fearmongering." Peggy Venable, director of Texas Citizens for a Sound Economy in, "Groups criticize proposed texts ; Conservatives duel liberals over books," San Antonio Express-N ews, September 7, 2001.	In 2001 its Texas branch fought to get rid of global-warming talk in school textbooks
Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow	$252,000	Website features "Some surprisingly clean facts about SUVs."	Driessen is a senior fellow; Baliunas and Michaels are advisers.
Competitive Enterprise Institute	$1,380,000	Likens the danger of global warming to that of "an alien invasion."	Milloy is a fellow.
Congress of Racial Equality	$40,000	Says there is no "convincing, real evidence that humans are disrupting the earth's climate."	This year's Martin Luther King Day civil rights honoree was Karl Rove.
Consumer Alert	$35,000	Funds the Cooler Heads Coalition's denialist website, globalwarming.org	Michaels is an adviser.
Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies	$30,000	"The mounting evidence over the most recent years demonstrates that the forecasts for global warming were greatly exaggerated. This new evidence suggests that global warming may not even be occurring." (PDF)
Foundation for Research on Economics and the Environment	$100,000	Montana-based thinktank	"Given the uncertainty around warming, and the fact that some models predict that temperature increases of up to 4.5 degrees Fahrenheit would have beneficial effects, increasing our adaptability to change may be more important than cutting emissions." FREE's Research Associate John C. Downen, "Resiliency is the Key to Climate Change," Bozeman Daily Chronicle, November 13, 2002.
Fraser Institute	$60,000	Vancouver-based thinktank questions the "still-speculative risk of global warming." Chief Scientist Kenneth Green, "Old school environmentalists need to become more business-minded," The Vancouver Province, June 2, 2003.	Soon and Baliunas co-authored Fraser's "Global Warming: A Guide to the Science."
Free Enterprise Action Institute	$50,000	Another of Milloy's projects, registered to his home address
Frontiers of Freedom	$612,000	"To listen to eco-radicals tell the story, it is a proven scientific fact that the climate is warming and that mankind is responsible...Nothing could be farther [sic] from the truth."	Driessen is a senior fellow.
George C. Marshall Institute	$310,000	Challenging global warming (and promoting missile defense) since 1989	Baliunas is a senior scientist; Michaels is a visiting scientist.
Heartland Institute	$312,500	Compares Michael Crichton to Rachel Carson and Upton Sinclair.	Publishes op-eds by Soon and Baliunas.
Heritage Foundation	$340,000	"For the next several decades, fossil fuel use is key to improving the human condition."
Hoover Institution	$140,000	Published "Happiness is a Warm Planet."	Singer is a former fellow.
Hudson Institute	$15,000	Got funding in 2000, the same year they published Singer's article, "Cool Planet, Hot Politics: The next president needs to know that the global warming hypothesis, though politically powerful, is scientifically weak."
Independent Institute	$30,000	Published 2003 report entitled: "New Perspectives in Climate Science: What the EPA Isn't Telling Us."	Singer is a former fellow.
Institute for Energy Research	$67,000	A 2003 "Letter to President George W. Bush" (PDF) advised that "the uncertain link between industrial emissions and global warming after a century of [greenhouse gas] buildup and decades of study points toward lower-range, benign warming scenarios."
International Policy Network	$50,000	"The temperature variations read in the past century could be part of a larger process that is alien to humanity." IPI author Kendra Okonski ed., Adapt or Die: The science, politics and economics of climate change, London: Profile Books, 2003. p. 205
Mackinac Center for Public Policy	$15,500	Funding amount from 2001when a board of scholars member opined: "The Kyoto Protocol seems to be built on the following two assumptions: First, global warming is a function of human activity (with the biggest villains being automobiles, factories, and power plants), and second, we are currently experiencing unprecedented levels of global warming. However, a review of the earth's most recent 'geological history' brings into question both assumptions and puts the entire subject in a different light."
Media Research Center	$50,000	Blasted the "networks' overwhelmingly one-sided picture of the global warming debate."	Robert Novak dubs MRC an "indispensable counterpunch to liberal reporting." (PDF)
Mercatus Center	$40,000	George Mason University shop that included an eight-page speech by Michael Crichton in its official comments to the White House Office of Management and Budget in 2003.
National Black Chamber of Commerce	$75,000	Kyoto could "reverse the…economic progress that blacks and Hispanics have achieved in recent years." (PDF)
National Center for Policy Analysis	$205,000	"There is still no conclusive evidence that human activity is causing global temperatures to rise."	Singer is an adjunct scholar.
National Center for Public Policy Research	$160,000	In their "Questions and Answers on Global Warming." it states, "There is no serious evidence that man-made global warming is taking place," and "There are many indications that carbon dioxide does not play a significant role in global warming."	Its Envirotruth.org website debunks "myths" of climate change, including, "Humanity is the primary cause of global climate change"; and "The consensus of world scientists, as revealed by the UN's IPCC agree--humanity is causing significant climate change."
Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy	$145,000	"No one seriously claims to know whether the past warming was caused by human activities; whether further warming will occur and, if it does, whether it will result from human activities, and whether such warming in some general sense would be a bad thing." Senior fellow Benjamin Zycher, "State's Auto Emissions Bill Is Just So Much Gas," Los Angeles Times, May 8, 2002.
Pacific Legal Foundation	$15,000	"Whether global warming is happening is a matter of debate" PLF attorney, Anne M. Hayes, "Legislature declares war on SUVs," San Diego Union Tribune, July 12, 2002
Property and Environment Research Center	$60,000	Gave Bush a B- on global warming, applauding his acknowledgment of "the importance of scientific uncertainty." (PDF)
Reason Public Policy Institute	$230,000	Their website reads, "The sun, not a gas, is primarily to 'blame' for global warming."
Science and Environmental Policy	$10,000	"We should have more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere"	Singer's pet project
Tech Central Science Foundation	$95,000	A virtual HQ for global warming deniers	Baliunas is a commentator; Soon is the science director; and Milloy is a contributing writer. Run by former FoxNews.com editor and hosted by an AEI fellow.
Total 2000-2003	$8,678,450

The Cold Earth Society
Some key “skeptics” show up again and again in the echo chamber funded by ExxonMobil.

SALLIE BALIUNAS, a Harvard-Smithsonian Institute astrophysicist, has, along with colleague WILLIE SOON, been giving deniers scientific cover since the mid-1990s. They began by claiming solar effects could account for the rise of the global thermostat. After that theory was debunked, Baliunas and Soon wrote a paper—partially funded by the American Petroleum Institute—for Climate Research that claimed that the 20th century hasn’t been all that warm. Their conclusions have been praised as the epitome of “sound science” by deniers, including Sen. James Inhofe. The journal’s editor, meanwhile, said the paper should never have been published. Baliunas and Soon are each connected to at least four ExxonMobil-funded groups.

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