Koch Quacks Appointed To DOE Led The Charge To Politicize Studies, Bury Renewable Energy Data
Two Trump Energy Department appointees with deep ties to Koch Industries and the Koch donor network have been burying reams of agency research that looks favorably on renewable energy, according to an in-depth investigation by Grist and InvestigateWest. Published October 26, the investigation reveals how the appointed high-ranking officials mandated political review of research, watered down reports, and slow-walked or shelved scientific findings and studies when they favored renewable deployment over continued reliance on fossil fuels.
Documents obtained by InvestigateWest reveal clear political interference in the Department of Energy's (DOE) Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), much of it coordinated by Dan Simmons, the office’s Assistant Secretary, and Alex Fitzsimmons, the former Chief of Staff to Simmons. While the article notes the lobbying histories of DOE’s top brass, Simmons and Fitzsimmons also have recent ties to the Koch network.
Daniel Simmons and Alex Fitzsimmons: Career Koch Cadets Leading Trump’s Renewable Energy Office
Before being tapped by the Trump team to run lead on renewable energy policy, Simmons had a long career promoting fossil fuels, bashing renewables, and even calling for the elimination of the very office he was tapped to run. From 2008 until he took over EERE in 2017, Simmons worked at the Institute for Energy Research (IER), a free-market think tank that receives the majority of its funding from dark money groups associated with the Koch network and from oil refinery trade groups. Simmons was vice president of policy at IER and had the same title at IER’s lobbying arm, the American Energy Alliance (AEA). In 2015, while Simmons was in charge of policy, AEA actually recommended that Congress eliminate EERE.
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Simmons’ antagonism to renewable energy before he joined the DOE cannot be overstated. As the utility industry watchdog Energy and Policy Institute has noted, he routinely traveled the country for IER and AEA to bash renewable portfolio standards, relying on inaccurate and cherry-picked data. Before joining IER, Simmons served as the director of the American Legislative Exchange Council’s (ALEC) Natural Resources Task Force, where he “helped to write [ALEC’s] anti-clean energy playbook.” ALEC functions to connect state legislators with corporations and create mock legislation that serves as models for actual bills.
Simmons’ prior employers share extremely close ties to petrochemical billionaire Charles Koch and the extensive Koch donor network. The Institute for Energy Research was founded by Charles Koch himself and is currently run by the former top lobbyist for Koch Industries. The AEA and IER both receive funding from foundations in the Koch donor network, and the country’s leading oil refiners trade group, the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM), gives three times more to AEA than it does to any other group.
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https://www.desmogblog.com/2020/10/28/koch-simmons-fitzsimmons-trump-censor-renewable-energy-science
