Can't Make This Shit Up: Exxon Now Attacking Rockefeller Family For Climate Activism, Donations

[hatrack]

Exxon Mobil Corp. has a strategy for firing back at supporters of climate change litigation against the oil giant: Blame the Rockefellers. In recent court filings and public statements, Exxon has accused people who support climate liability lawsuits of engaging in a conspiracy bankrolled by members of the elite Rockefeller family.

The allegations, which pit one of the world's largest oil and gas companies against one of America's wealthiest dynasties, are more than a little ironic. For one thing, Exxon is the largest descendant of Standard Oil Co., the business that John D. Rockefeller founded in 1870. The family's wealth today largely stems from the 19th-century oil tycoon. For another, the climate liability lawsuits accuse Exxon itself of engaging in a far-reaching conspiracy to obscure the scientific consensus on climate change and block global efforts to rein in planet-warming emissions.

EDIT

The Exxon-Rockefeller feud is not a new phenomenon. The New York Times detailed the controversy in a 2016 piece titled "Exxon Mobil Accuses the Rockefellers of a Climate Conspiracy." But in the five years since then, the mud-slinging has intensified, as Exxon has funneled its attacks on the Rockefellers through a network of high-powered consultants and lawyers.

FTI Consulting Inc., a global firm whose fossil fuel industry clients include Exxon, has written a flurry of posts blasting the Rockefellers on Energy in Depth, a news and media site run by the Independent Petroleum Association of America. In a 2019 post titled "How the Rockefellers Manufactured the Climate Liability Campaign," FTI's Spencer Walrath wrote that backers of the climate liability lawsuits "have all been bankrolled by the Rockefellers, a wealthy family that owes its riches to the very company it is now seeking to destroy."

EDIT

FTI has described Earthrights as a "shadowy group" that has "connections to all the major anti-fossil fuel players backed by wealthy environmentalist foundations." Marco Simons, general counsel at EarthRights International who is on the legal team representing the three Colorado governments, said the Rockefellers don't exert control over his work. "We never allow funders to interfere with our attorney-client relationships or call the shots in terms of litigation strategy. That would be a serious ethical violation," Simons said. "On a more general level, I'm not sure why it's surprising that people who care about climate change are funding work on climate change," he added. "So if that's a conspiracy, I don't know what to say."

EDIT

https://www.eenews.net/stories/1063731625

[-misanthroptimist]

1. I wonder what Exxon-Mobil thinks it's doing?

They themselves put out a simple climate model in 1982 that's remarkably close to where we are wrt surface temperature.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2015/sep/29/is-the-fossil-fuel-industry-like-the-tobacco-industry-guilty-of-racketeering

[hatrack]

2. Simple - keeping the old game alive for as long as possible . . .

Just one more decade, just one more year, just one more quarterly profit statement . . .

[-misanthroptimist]

4. But even that makes no sense

Had they thought about the 1982 projection, they could have jumped on green technologies. With their economic resources, there's little doubt that they could have been a, or the, world leader in renewables. The money would still be pouring in, fossil fuels or no.

[Miguelito Loveless]

3. What they are doing is

everything possible to protect their share of the roughly $1.5 trillion in oil revenue generated each year. To do that they will lie, cheat, steal and murder.

Each day they can stop meaningful regulation, is billions in their pockets.