BBC Exxon Archives: The best and the worst

Exxon is to Climate change what baked beans are to flatulence so Google will give you 796 000 results to the search term exxon climate change, but the BBC website search engine just thirty. Yes there are 30 references in the BBC archives linking these words, even though Exxon has spent millions denying climate change. So let's take a peek at some of those 30 contributions the BBC offers humanity in it's understanding of climate change and it's nexus with the world's largest oil company.  The best article is a point of view from that old stalwart Harold Evans . Harold takes on denialist has-been conspiracy theory writer Michael Crichton and Exxon and gets it through the censors at the Beeb. Here's Harold:

"Just bend an ear for a moment for the names of a few organizations very much concerned with global warming.

Advancement of Sound Science Centre Inc
Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow
Heartland Institute
Competitive Enterprise Institute
Annapolis Center for Science-based Public Policy


You wouldn't guess it but all these highfalutin bodies are dedicated to undermining the science of global warming and preventing America signing something like the Kyoto Treaty. And again, you wouldn't guess it, but they take thousands of dollars from Exxon Mobil. It's the world's largest oil company and a high profile opponent of Kyoto for imposing too many costs on the developed world."

For once and once only Exxon Junk Science Funding gets a mention on the BBC.  Harold , you da man.

And the worst , step forward Tom Feilden of Radio 4 Today programme for this piece . Tom's day job is at the BBC but there can be little doubt his real master is the fossil fuel lobby as he sums up with this news straight from Exxon -

"For their part Exxon Mobil say there are big holes in our understanding of climate change, and that time may be on our side. It may be 80 to 120 years before the real impact of global warming is felt, and by then technology will have come to the rescue."

The BBC like other broadcast media parrots this bollocks unquestioningly. If  Messrs Benson and Hedges were to say "keep smoking our cigarettes, it'll be years before you get cancer and by then the doctors'll find a cure, probably ",  the BBC would rightly ridicule it .  But Exxon can say whatever nonsense it likes confident double standards in BBC journalism will let them get away with it.  With a BBC mouthpiece like Tom Feilden doing the talking for them Exxon hardly need to fund their dodgy scientific bodies  . Here's how Tom introduces the conflict in his piece

"Exxon's "crime" has been to question received wisdom about the impact of climate change".

No Tom, they haven't questioned the recieved wisdom they provide a slush fund for front organizations to campaign against the scientific concensus on their behalf.