Tag: Global Climate Coalition

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Business Responses Denial United States of America

March 15, 2002 – GM bails from Global Climate Coalition

Twenty-two years ago, on this day, March 15th, 2002, a major automaker decided to leave the denialist/predatory delay outfit the Global Climate Coalition.

DETROIT — Environmentalists are claiming victory following General Motors Corp.’s decision to quit a lobbying group that has led the opposition to a 1997 global warming treaty reached in Kyoto, Japan.

Ford Motor Co. and DaimlerChrysler Corp. withdrew earlier.

http://www.corpwatch.org/article/usa-general-motors-quits-global-warming-lobby-group

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 374.3ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that almost everything the Global Climate Coalition had fought for, had been won – a weakened initial treaty followed by the avoidance of any domestic carbon tax followed by the avoidance of the US being involved in Kyoto (beforehand by the Byrd-Hagel resolution, and then afterwards in March 2001, by George Dubya Bush‘s announcement of pulling out of Kyoto in contradiction of his election promise to regulate CO2.) 

What we learn from this is that culture wars can get out of hand. The Global Climate Coalition had done some things that were reputationally risky and dubious. And you often see corporations which have to worry a lot about their reputation with customers getting nervous when the gloves come off, and lobbying becomes a vicious public bloodsport. It is not because they are in any way “woke” – it’s just that they worry that they won’t be able to flog their product as easily if they are regarded as assholes by customers. 

What happened next is very shortly after this, thanks to other outfits leaving, I think Ford, and so forth, the Global Climate Coalition basically dissolved itself, declaring “mission accomplished.” 

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Also on this day: 

March 15, 1956 – scientist explains climate change to US senators

March 15, 2019 – New Zealand school strike launched, called off.

Categories
Denial United States of America

July 23, 1998 – denialists stopping climate action. Again.

Twenty five years ago, on this day, July 23, 1998, the Global Climate Coalition (industry front group set up to stop any real climate action) is busy quote mining and distorting what people have said, to give the impression of doubt, confusion etc.  Age-old tactic, that keeps working, again and again.

 http://www.climatefiles.com/denial-groups/global-climate-coalition-collection/1998-kyoto-epa-implementation-selected-quotes/

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 368ppm. As of 2023 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that although the US  Senate had passed the Byrd-Hagel resolution, there was still the lingering threat that a new US administration might if not actually agree to the Kyoto Protocol, then at least take international action that the Global Climate Coalition didn’t like. 

What I think we can learn from this is that the Global Climate Coalition and similar outfits, just keep on keeping on grinding away. Whether they’re winning or losing, they keep grinding away in the kind of war of attrition against sanity. And they can do that because they’re well-funded.

What happened next

The Global Climate Coalition was able to shut up shop in 2002. There were two factors. One is they had lost some of their big public-facing companies, especially automakers, because denying the existence of climate change was becoming a reputational risk. And separately, they’d won: once Bush said the US was not going to go negotiate the Kyoto Protocol. The big big battle that had been their raison d’etre since their foundation in 1989 was won.

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

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Denial IPCC

May 30, 1996 – Denialist goons smear scientist

Twenty seven years ago, on this day, May 30, 1996, Fred Seitz, energetic and lunatic denialist, tries to smear the IPCC, focussing on one particular scientist, Ben Santer

“This controversial issue also resulted in two letters (dated 30 May and 26 June), being sent to me, one from the Global Climate Coalition (John Schlaes) and the other from The Climate Council (Donald Pearlman). Copies of these were also sent to ten key members of the US Congress as well as the Advisor for Science and Technology and Assistant to the US President (John Gibson), and the Assistant Secretary of State (Eileen Clausen).”

Bolin 2007, page 130

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 365.3ppm. As of 2023 it is 420ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the Global Climate Coalition was in full beast mode, trying to attack specifically Ben Santer. And as one of the authors of the lead authors of a particular chapter of the IPCC’s second assessment report (which said that there was evidence of a discernible impact of man’s activities on the climate). Almost 30 years later, it’s not really regarded as controversial. But this was the first statement of the IPCC to that effect. And the Global Climate Coalition was wanting to try to stop it or failing that, send a warning to other scientists. Let’s try and chill the debate or slow it down.

What I think we can learn from this

This is an age-honoured tactic, that you shoot messengers and hang the body on a gibbet with a sign that says “This is what happens if you open your big fucking mouth”. It was ever thus. And having it come from multiple sources, and be distributed to lots of people is also standard – makes a lot of noise, kicks up a lot of dust and dirt…

What happened next was that someone at the Wall Street Journal probably got a copy of that letter because a few days later, there was an editorial smearing Santer.

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong?  Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

See also –

Excerpt from Oreskes and Conway’s Merchants of Doubt https://billmoyers.com/2014/05/16/the-relentless-attack-of-climate-scientist-ben-santer/

Fred Pearce interview with Ben Santer, 2010…

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/feb/09/ipcc-report-author-data-openness

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Denial Industry Associations Kyoto Protocol United States of America

November 5, 1997 – Global Climate Coalition co-ordinates an anti-Kyoto conference

On November 5, 1997, twenty five years ago today, the Global Climate Coalition [bunch of oil companies, automobile companies and assorted denialists] co-ordinates an anti-Kyoto conference. With the third meeting of the UNFCCC (United Nations agreement on climate) looming, denialists funded by the oil and car industries (among others), met to try to make life even harder for the Clinton Administration.

1997  “On November 5, the GCC coordinated a national conference opposing the Clinton Administration’s involvement in the Kyoto conference. The conference was sponsored by a number of radical anti-environmental organizations, including the American Farm Bureau Federation, People for the West!, and the Environmental Conservation Organization  

A CLEAR view Vol 4, Number 16

[The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was xxxppm. At time of writing it was 416ppm- but for what it is now,well, see here for the latest.]

Why this matters

“Our” failure to act on climate is not JUST down to ignorance/laziness etc. It has also been helped on its way by determined and clever opponents of action.

What happened next

The Kyoto Protocol was agreed, but neither the USA or Australia ever ratified it. It limped into existence because Russia DID ratify it, as a quid pro quo for getting into the World Trade Organisation.   Kyoto was supposed to be replaced in 2012, but the 2009 Copenhagen meeting ended in chaos etc. And then Paris and… oh, what a shitshow.

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Denial Industry Associations International processes United States of America

August 24, 1994 – first signs of a split in the anti-climate action business coalition…

On this day, August 24th, in 1994 the first signs of a split in the business opposition to climate action appeared.

[The level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 357.59 ppm. Now it is 421ish- but see here for the latest.]

“An additional factor was the splintering of industrial interests. The Global Climate Coalition and the Climate Council had been the main industry participants in the INC, representing mainly coal and oil interests. However, a development within INC 10 was the emergence of an industry lobby in favour of the convention’s further C02 reductions (ECO, 24 August 1994: 4; 26 August, 1994: 1). There was now a wide coalition of industrial interests favouring action on climate change. One consisted of parts of the insurance industry, scared of losses from freak weather (and whose interests have been forwarded, interestingly, by Greenpeace). Another was the ‘sunrise industries’ of renewables and energy efficiency. Yet another was the gas industry. 

Matthew Paterson 1996 page 194

Why this matters. 

Splits in the previously united church/state/business sector are part of ‘how things change’ if you believe all that dialectic stuff. It’s immaterial now though, given how the atmospheric concentrations have climbed, will climb…

What happened next?

A few re-insurers turned up for a day at the COP1 meeting in Berlin the following year, but were of course outnumbered, outgunned and outfought by the fossil lobbyists. (See Jeremy Leggett’s “The Carbon War” for an account of this).

Then, in 1997, BP became the first sizeable defector from the Global Climate Coalition. Now actual outright denial is relatively rare. But resistance to appropriate action continues…

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Uncategorized

May 19, 1997 – BP boss says “If we are to take responsibility for the future of our planet, then it falls to us to begin to take precautionary action now.”

On May 19, 1997, 25 years ago, and months before the Kyoto meeting at which the world’s richest countries are supposed to agree binding emissions cuts, the Chief Executive Office of one of the world’s biggest oil companies, John Browne of BP, makes a speech at Stanford University.

This marks the end of the united anti-climate front of the oil majors, exemplified by the “Global Climate Coalition.”

Browne said, in part

“There is now an effective consensus among the world’s leading scientists and serious and well informed people outside the scientific community that there is a discernible human influence on the climate and a link between the concentration of carbon dioxide and the increase in temperature … it would be unwise and potentially dangerous to ignore the mounting concern.” He added: “If we are to take responsibility for the future of our planet, then it falls to us to begin to take precautionary action now.”

You can read the whole thing on the Climate Files website.

And here’s the video.

What happened next

BP changed its logo.

Why this matters

Fracture points and critical junctures that turn out to… well, not matter as much as they seemed to. What can ya do?

See also

“The overlapping and nesting of organizational fields implies that developments in one country or industry can disrupt the balance of forces elsewhere. For example, the landmark speech by British Petroleum’s Group Chief Executive, John Browne on 19 May 1997 represented a major fissure in the oil industry’s position, which bore implications for other industries in Europe and in the USA”. (Levy and Egan, 2003: 820)

Categories
Denial United States of America

April 23, 2009 – denialists caught denying their own scientists…

On this day, the 23rd of April 2009 journalist Andy Revkin broke a story in The New York Times about the Global Climate Coalition.

The Global Climate Coalition – cuddly-sounding name aside – was an industry pressure group that had between 1989 and 2002 been a major player in stopping any meaningful international action on climate change.

Revkin’s story – you can read it here – was that the head honchos at the Global Climate Coalition got given the truth about climate change by their own scientists,, and they chose to ignore it because it didn’t fit their in needs for predatory delay and doubt

Why this matters. 

We need to know in the words of Nick Tomalin, the British journalist who died in 1973, that “they lie, they lie, they lie”. If the truth is going to get in the way of their profits, they will lie. And these lies will be repeated by time policy wonks to create a “common sense” that maintains the status quo. Nothing that Gramsci would be surprised that nothing that you or I should be surprised that

What happened next?

People forgot because that’s what people do. 

If you want to know more about the GCC, check out the recently published article in the journal “Environmental Politics” by Robert Brulle.

Categories
Predatory delay United States of America

Feb 4, 2002- Global Climate Coalition calls it a day (“Mission accomplished”)

On this day in 2002, the Global Climate Coalition shut up shop, basically declaring mission accomplished. Well, they’d probably done it a few days earlier, but Imma use this – Anon. 2002. Global Climate Coalition Bows Out. Chemical Market Reporter, , Vol. 261, Issue 5, 4 February – as the marker.

The friendly sounding coalition – actually, an industry group dedicated to stopping action on climate change – had been formed in 1989, when it looks like serious action was possible and even probable, with new US President George HW Bush, having declared on the campaign trail, that those who were worried about the greenhouse effect should not discount the White House Effect.

Even then moves were  well afoot within Bush’s administration, especially under Chief of Staff, John Sununu, to make sure that the environmentally concerned people were sidelined. And that the whole issue just got kicked into the long grass. There were those who would cast active actual doubt on the science but usually, the Global Climate Coalition was a little bit more subtle. 

However, in 1995/6, it had gone too far, launching full throated vociferous attacks on the IPCC second assessment report. In 1997 Shell had pulled out because of the reputational risk. And this was followed later, by other groups, including Ford and GM. By February 2002 it was no longer needed. Because the administration of George HW Bush’s son, George W. Bush, was clearly not going to do anything on climate, having already pulled out of Kyoto. The Global Climate Coalition had therefore, lived as long as it needed to.

Why this matters

Don’t be fooled by names. When they say they’re something they are usually the opposite. They’re very determined. They’re very clever. They’re very well funded. They stick around, they do the work. They get what they want, usually, not always, but often. 

What happened next

Although the Global Climate Coalition was dead, individual companies continued to finance both outright denial and also predatory delay. And they’re still at it, of course. Full stop.