The Paradox of Energy Efficiency

[bananas]

3. Rush Limbaugh: Institute for Energy Research is "the energy equivalent of the Heritage Foundation"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=213908&mesg_id=213930

bananas (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-20-09 09:12 AM
Response to Original message

3. Rush Limbaugh: Institute for Energy Research is "the energy equivalent of the Heritage Foundation"
Edited on Tue Oct-20-09 09:33 AM by bananas

The IER has been described by Rush Limbaugh as "the energy equivalent of the Heritage Foundation".
Not a very good source.

http://sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Institute_for_En...

Institute for Energy Research
From SourceWatch

The Institute for Energy Research (IER), founded in 1989 from a predecessor non-profit organisation, advocates positions on environmental issues which happen to suit the energy industry: climate change denial, claims that conventional energy sources are virtually limitless, and the deregulation of utilities.

It is a member of the Sustainable Development Network. The IER's President was formerly Director of Public Relations Policy at Enron.

IER has been established as a 501(c)(3) non-profit group. It is a "partner" organization of the American Energy Alliance<1>, a 501c4 organization which states that it is the "grassroots arm" of IER.<2> AEA states that, by "communicating IER’s decades of scholarly research to the grassroots, AEA will empower citizens with facts so that people who believe in freedom can reclaim the moral high ground in the national public policy debates in the energy and environmental arena."<2> AEA states that its aim is to "create a climate that encourages the advancement of free market energy policies" and in particular ensure drilling for oil is allowed in the Arctic National Wildlife refuse and in US coastal waters.<2>

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_Energy_Resea...

Institute for Energy Research
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Institute for Energy Research (IER), a Houston, Texas-based public foundation, was founded in 1989 from a predecessor organization.<1> The IER conducts research and analysis on the functions, operations, and government regulation of global energy markets. The group promotes free-market energy and environmental policy.<2>

IER is a tax-exempt public foundation and is funded entirely by tax deductible contributions from individuals, foundations and corporations. No financial support is sought for or accepted from the government.<1> Some of its funding comes from the Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation.<3>

The IER has been described by Rush Limbaugh as "the energy equivalent of the Heritage Foundation"<4>. It positions include opposition to energy efficiency and other demand side management programs, opposition to renewable energy, and denial of climate change science.

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Their affilitate The American Energy Alliance:

http://climateprogress.org/2009/04/30/american-energy-a... /

Mysterious industry front-group affiliated with Ken Lay’s former speechwriter launches anti-Waxman-Markey ads with phony MIT cost figures
April 30, 2009

Memo to Media: Who the heck are these guys and what are they hiding by apparently misstating their origin?

E&E News (subs. req’d) reports on a new advertising campaign from a “conservative organization”:

The American Energy Alliance (AEA) campaign targets 11 key members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee — all of them moderates whose votes could be critical to the climate bill’s success or failure.


Who is the AEA? Good question. The AEA says on its website:

AEA is an independent affiliate of the Institute for Energy Research (IER)….


Aside from the cryptic nature of the oxymoronic phrase “independent affiliate,” it is worth noting that the Institute for Energy Research “has received $307,000 from ExxonMobil since 1998.” The President of IER is one Robert Bradley “who previously served as Director of Public Policy Analysis at Enron, where he was a speechwriter for CEO Kenneth Lay,” who was “convicted on fraud and conspiracy charges on May 25, 2006.

Elsewhere on the site, AEA says it is “the independent grassroots affiliate” of IER. The only people who think AEA is a “grassroots” organization are people who are actively smoking grass.

Now here is where it gets really confusing, apparently by design.

The AEA also says on its website it was “founded in May, 2008.”

But Sourcewatch (here) points to a 1993 Time magazine article (here)

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