News:

Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for justice: for they shall be filled. Mine eye also shall see my desire on mine enemies, and mine ears shall hear my desire of the wicked that rise up against me. The glory of the Lord shall endure for ever: the Lord shall rejoice in his works. He looketh on the earth, and it trembleth: he toucheth the hills, and they smoke. I will sing unto the Lord as long as I live: I will sing praise to my God while I have my being. My meditation of him shall be sweet: I will be glad in the Lord. Let sinners be consumed out of the earth, and let the wicked be no more. Bless thou the Lord, O my soul. Praise ye the Lord.


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Topic Summary

Posted by: AGelbert
« on: July 05, 2023, 02:08:58 pm »

milo
Four reasons why warmer oceans are not a good thing.

1) Warmer waters hold less oxygen. Fish require oxygen to produce energy. So all the higher fin fish, the ones we like to eat, have less ocean to live in. Ergo, fewer fish.

2) Warmer water changes pH, so shellfish like clams and corals find it more difficult to make shells. Without shells they die.

3) Warmer waters absorb less CO2. So at some point the oceans become saturated. They stop absorbing the extra CO2 we produce and start outgassing it back into the atmosphere. This hasn't happened yet but will become a very big deal when it does start.

4) Warmer waters are more energetic. So besides intensifying El Ninos they also create more violent hurricanes and extreme rain events.

AGelbert > milo
You are right.

milo > AGelbert
Charts like that enrage the anti-AGW crowd, who I think of as the Flat Earth crowd, who refuse to admit such things have been happening. Their belief systems are as brittle and well-defended as those of the anti-vax crowd. I put a lot of effort into refuting their claims... but I know it's an exercise in futility. I'm up against rigid articles of belief.

AGelbert > milo
Agreed. I've often pondered about how the intractable mindset you accurately described comes about. I have never come to a firm conclusion as to the chain of causation that reduces an otherwise reasonable individual into a 🙊🙉🙈 propagandized weapon against common sense thinking and action. 🤦‍♂️

Quote
"By the skillfull and sustained use of propaganda, one can make a people see heaven as hell, or an extremely wretched life as paradise." -- Adolf Hitler

The best I have been able to reason out is that, somewhere along the line, a 😒 person decides that truth is "relative" 🙃. As soon as that unreality based assumption becomes firmly ensconced, said individual is easily convinced of irrational baloney by the morally bankrupt 🦖 legerdemian pushing 😈 greedballs who wish to add more suckers to their crowd of victims.

A lot of people out there claim that people don't actually believe all the baloney they peddle and that they are just doing it for the money. I disagree. If it was just the money, the suckers would figure out pretty quick who is getting the lion's share of that profit over planet at the expense of the biosphere we all depend on and would QUIT. But, the crowd of willfully stupid seems immune to that in-their-faces logic.

Critical Thinking Skills are in short supply in this "Brave New World".







milo > AGelbert
The thought that there are millions of people out there, all agreeing to lie to us because they're getting paid to do so by shadowy forces, and that for many decades now no one has broken the silence surrounding the Vast Plot, is the sure sign of a shallow, poorly thought out mind.

milo > AGelbert
It's pretty simple, really. The deniers come from authoritarian households, where their parents assured them they knew beyond any doubt what life was like. Usually because the Bible told them. So in later life their worldview becomes rigid, and they come to believe in their convictions far more than they believe the evidence they see in the world around them. "No! It's not getting warmer! Why just last winter we had over an inch of snow. "

AGelbert > milo
Quote
"The deniers come from authoritarian households, where their parents assured them they knew beyond any doubt what life was like. Usually because the Bible told them. So in later life their worldview becomes rigid, and they come to believe in their convictions far more than they believe the evidence they see in the world around them."

I actually was an atheist from the age of 18 to around 28.

By force of reason I slowy became a Deist.

A decade or so later I became a nominal Christian.

Decades later, I now believe the Bible is the Word of God. I come from an authoritarian household. My dad was an inflexible US Army Major that admired Mussolini! My mom was a devout Roman Catholic. I have always been able to reason out right from wrong. I firmly  believe that I owe that skill to the fact that Truth was never taught to me as a "relative" concept. Having Faith in a Creator God never inhibited my critical thinking skills, though I believe I did reason well during my youth as an atheist (that is why, as long as they are advocates of egalitarianism and common sense, I can see atheist Socialists as people of good will. 🌞).

Thus, while I recognize that my Faith cannot prove the existence of God or our obligation to worship Him, when pondering causes and consequences of irrational socially destructive behavior among humans, I concentrate on root causes. As you surmise, belief systems certainly can get people to go full Red Queen in Through the Looking Glass, but misguided Christians do not have a patent on willful denial of viable biosphere math. Making them the whipping boy is choosing an easy target. I'm sure the 🦖 Hydrocarbon Hellspawn smile broadly 😈 when they see Socialists placing the lion's share of the blame for our polluted biosphere on 🦖 Fossil Fuel Industry propagandized 🙊🙉🙈 Christians.

Though I am NOT absolving the propagandized Christians from their folly, I suggest you look at the top 100 💰🦀 🐘🦕🦖🐍 🦍🐉 🎩👿  corporations on the planet. THEY are responsible for far more than half of the degradation of the biosphere now dooming so many mammalian vertebrate species to ☠️ extinction. If you think there are ANY ☝🏻 Bible believing Christians in decision making positions on those 😈🦍 Social Darwinist run corporations, I've got a bridge to sell you in Brooklyn.   

Mock Christians and brand the Bible as "dangerously irrational mindfork" all you wish, that's the expected reaction of non-Christians to Christianity (But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness; 1Corinthians 1:23), but recognize that the 🦍 Darwinian ideology widely accepted as "Evolutionary science based" is ALSO a BELIEF system (i.e. Atheism) based speculation, not "science".

Though you will certainly disagree (with vigor 😁), think it is irrational for any person with critical thinking skills to believe that all the complexity of living organisms in our biosphere "just happened" by random undirected processes. Modern Scientific Inquiry and the Scientific Method were both championed by God fearing, Bible believing  scientists, not atheists. If you were taught, or assume otherwise, you are the victim of Darwinian atheist mendacious propaganda.


Posted by: AGelbert
« on: March 20, 2023, 01:06:55 pm »

Mon, Mar 20, 2023 at 8:17 AM

Quote
The constant flood of 👿 online attacks against 🕊️ Thunberg  and 🕊️ Kianni serves as a sobering reminder that 🦖😈 climate disinformation and 👿 misogynistic hate speech are deeply intertwined.
Read more at
Posted by: AGelbert
« on: March 17, 2023, 12:53:32 pm »

Quote of the CENTURY:
Quote
Climate 😈🦖 disinformation doesn’t exist in a vacuum: it is inextricably intertwined with white supremacy, and it is a threat not only to the future of human life on this planet but also to Jewish people and people of color right now.
Learn more at
Posted by: AGelbert
« on: March 08, 2023, 05:05:04 pm »



March 7, 2023 By Andy Rowell

COP28 🦖 President pushes false fossil fuel solutions, such as CCS, at 🦖💰🦀🐘🦕🐍🦍🐉  CERAWeek


For anyone in the oil and gas industry, there is only one place to be this week. The great and good of the industry has converged on 🦖 Houston for CERAWeek, which bills itself as the world’s premier  🦕🦖😈 energy event.

Delegates will listen to  big oil bosses from BP, Shell, Exxon, and as well as political dignitaries such as John Kelly, the U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, and Jennifer Granholm, the U.S. Energy Secretary.

Also addressing the conference this morning was 🦖😈 Dr. Sultan Al-Jaber, who currently fulfills two completely contradictory roles. He is the Group CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), as well as President for the upcoming COP28 climate talks in Dubai later this year.

Many scientific, political, civil society commentators, including colleagues at Oil Change International, have already pointed out how utterly incompatible it is to be the boss of and oil company and a host of a climate conference at the same time. It is akin to a tobacco baron organizing a conference on smoking and health. The conflict of interest is palpable.

Speaking after his appointment, Tasneem Essop, executive director of Climate Action Network International, told the Financial Times that Al-Jaber’s presidency of COP28 was “tantamount to a full-scale capture of the UN climate talks by a petrostate national oil company and its associated fossil fuel lobbyists.”

Even the UN is worried about the appointment. In January, Politico reported that the secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) had sent “a series of questions to the presidency of the climate talks enquiring about whether the presidency will be independent of the oil company.”

You can see why the UN and others are worried. ADNOC, one of the world’s largest oil and gas producers, currently plans to increase fossil fuel production. A report by OCI published last year, titled, Investing in Disaster, revealed that ADNOC is on track to be one of the biggest expanders in terms of new Final Investment Decisions (FIDs) in new large scale oil and gas projects.

And although ADNOC has set net zero targets for Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions, it admits in its 2021 Sustainability report that ADNOC “does not currently monitor its Scope 3 emissions due to its current operational business model.”

So roughly eighty-five percent of the company’s emissions – from consumers burning their products – are not measured. 🤦‍♂️

Despite this, Dr. Al-Jaber was keen this morning to bolster his climate credentials by urging the oil industry to “up its game, do more, and do it faster."  The COP28 Presidency was also eager to tweet Dr. Al-Jaber’s comments.

"The oil & gas sector needs to up its game, do more and do it faster." #DrSultanAlJaber lays out the next steps for action:
Quote
-Triple renewable capacity

-Double hydrogen production

-Build out the hydrogen value chain

-Take carbon capture technologies to scale#CERAWeek #COP28UAE
pic.twitter.com/FvFIoehUEI

— COP28 UAE (@COP28_UAE) March 7, 2023

It is not difficult to rip up Al-Jaber’s green facade. While any comments encouraging the oil industry to increase action on climate change are welcomed, as long as the industry carries on drilling, such rhetoric is flawed.

And what type of stepping up is Al-Jaber proposing? It is a false dawn of flawed solutions to the climate crisis, such as hydrogen and Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS). These will only prolong our use of fossil fuels, not diminish them.

Responding to Al-Jaber's speech, Romain Ioualalen, OCI Global Policy Campaign Manager, said the COP28 President: “trotted out the tired old playbook of delaying action and relying on speculative technologies to ensure fossil fuel CEOs continue to get rich, at the expense of all of us. The science is clear: the only way to limit warming to 1.5°C is to halt all new fossil fuel projects and shift investments to renewables.”

The only way we have any hope of solving climate change is to massively increase renewable energy, a solution that has been obvious for decades. But one, if you remain an oilman to your core, you cannot countenance, you cannot see.

The theme of this week’s CERA Week is “Navigating a Turbulent World: Energy, Climate and Security." Investing in more fossil fuels and false solutions will only make our world more turbulent and more disruptive. Any climate scientist will tell you that. And maybe a climate scientist, not an oilman, should have been the President of the next COP too.

https://priceofoil.org/2023/03/07/cop28-president-pushes-false-fossil-fuel-solutions-such-as-ccs-at-ceraweek/
Posted by: AGelbert
« on: February 17, 2023, 04:25:44 pm »

Have you been told by the 😈🦖 Deniers that CO2 is plant food so MORE CO2 is 😒 "GOOD"? 🙄

Well, that is one of those 🐍 Orwellian tricks by the 🦖 Hydrocarbon 😈 Hellspawn that take advantage of the fact that most people do not have enough knowledge about HOW a plant leaf absorbs CO2 AND 💧 water VAPOR from the air to see through that 🐍 clever legerdemain.

Let me connect the 🌞 photosynthesis 'how it works' 🌱 DOTS for those here that didn't study Botany in college so you can call out the 🐍 liars for 🦖 hire claiming 🙃 burning hydrocarbon based fuels "😇 INCREASES the greening of our biosphere".

Plants absorb CO2 and H2O via pores calles STOMATA. Stomata are openings (i.e. epidermal pores) in the shaded part (i.e. bottom) of plant 🍃 leaves. Stomata are present in LARGE numbers in plant leaves. Stomata control the passage of gases into and out of a plant.

Please note that GASES are what is controlled. Liquids DO NOT get into a plant leaf via the stomata (Liquids get into plants almost exclusively via the roots).

To more fully understand why plants are 🚩 VERY NEGATIVELY affected by Catastrophic Climate Change, you need to fix in your mind that Stomatas are tiny.

Microscopic Photographic of Leaf Stomata:

A micrometer is  one millionth of a meter (or one thousandth of a millimeter, 0.001 mm, or about 0.00004 inch). A skin cell is about 30 micrometers (i.e. 30 millionths of a meter) across. Stomata are only about HALF across, at the longest part, as a human skin cell. The distribution of stomata on a leaf is, on the average, over 100 to the square millimeter. The mean size of the open pores is I7.7 X 6.7 millionths (i.e. micrometers) of a meter.

SOURCE: THE NUMBER AND SIZE OF THE STOMATA

Marked variations in number and size of stomata occur, not only in different varieties of the same species, but in the same varieties grown under different external conditions. So far as my observation goes, however, the variation is greater in number than in size. ... ...

 "... it is to be remembered, as BROWN and ESCOMB have shown,5 that in the passage of gases through stomata, it is the linear dimensions, and not the area, which is important."

AGelbert NOTE: So, you now know that 🍀🍃 plant leaves have, on the bottom side, about 100 tiny pores per square square millimeter, called Stomata, each which is smaller across than half the length of a skin cell, that take up gases to make the sugars that enable the plant to survive and thrive.

SO WHAT? 🤷‍♂️ Well, I'm glad you asked 😁. You see, Stomata are VERY sensitive to relative humidity. You all know what relative humidity is. During a 24 hour cycle, Stomata adjust their size to capture gases. "The pores of the stomata were found as a rule to be widest open at about 10 A. M. ..."

However, the plant Stomata size WILL NOT reach its optimum size (i.e. 10 A.M.) IF the relative humidity is too low (i.e. DRY AIR).

WHY is that BAD for plants?

1. Low relative humidity tends to suck moisture OUT of the plant through the Stomata. The plant Stomata reduce the opening size to preserve the plant's moisture content to keep it from dying from dehydration.

2. THUS, the plant CANNOT get enough H2O (AND CO2, even though the there is 🦖 MORE CO2 in the atmosphere!) through the Stomata to efficiently photosynthesize CO2 and H2O into sugars.

3. Consequently, the plant growth is arrested and withering will follow if dry conditions remain or increase.

And Lo and Behold, you will never guess what BURNING HYDROCARBONS does to the atmosphere. Well, most here will. There are a lot of smart cookies here. Yep, you've got it; THE EARTH IS BROWNING! 😵😱🥵

Here is the IRREFUTABLE EVIDENCE, along with a peer reviewed scientific paper. Please watch the video and pass both it and these graphics to anyone who is brainwashed into thinking that the hydrocarbon fuels based economy isn't DEGRADING PLANT LIFE!

Browning Earth from Catastrophic Climate Change:

Atmospheric Drying Reducing Terrestrial Vegetation Growth Since 1998: Part 2 of 2

Posted by: AGelbert
« on: January 19, 2023, 01:42:41 pm »

 

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January 19, 2023

The Gas Stove Backlash Is The Product of Nearly A Century of 🦖😈🐍 Industry Propaganda

If you bought something and it didn't work, you probably wouldn't buy it again the next year, or the year after, or every year for the foreseeable future. The 🦖 fossil fuel industry is no different—if it wasn't seeing a return on its annual investment in disinformation, it wouldn't keep spending billions of dollars on climate disinformation 🐍 campaigns

The explosion of support for gas stoves in Republican circles is the latest example of how the fossil fuel industry's near-century of public relations expenditures has created a surround-sound media machine to manufacture backlash against even the barest hint of a pending regulation. 

In a disinfo-free world, Republicans eager to show their support for rural and working-class communities wouldn't be so quick to lend their support to gas stoves because they're primarily used in urban areas, where Democratic voters are concentrated. Furthermore, gas stoves are often promoted by home renovation shows as a luxury good for the fanciest of kitchens. So, since new gas stoves are either a prized feature of lavish, elite kitchens or a common fixture in the poor Black and Hispanic communities that the GOP spends more time attacking than defending, the Republican gaslighting on gas stoves seems to make little sense. 

The fervent worship of gas stoves seems especially nonsensical since Consumer Reports finds that the innovative alternatives to gas stoves are so much better in every conceivable way: “Induction ranges and cooktops in particular often heat the fastest, simmer steadily, and provide quicker temperature changes when you adjust a burner.” (They also won't melt plastic measuring cups when you turn on the wrong burner…)

But this pro-gas hullabaloo begins to make sense when you consider the fact that the fossil fuel industry has been lying about 🦕 methane gas for nearly a hundred years, as Rebecca Leber explained in Mother Jones. In the 1930s, "the 🦕😈 industry embraced the term 'natural 😇 gas', which gave the impression that its product was cleaner than any other fossil fuel" and promoted the now-ubiquitous catchphrase "cooking with gas"

The 🦕 methane gas industry has been at it ever since. As recent reporting at the New York Times exposed, the industry is sponsoring TV shows to promote gas stoves, part of the hundreds of millions the industry has spent on disinfo organizations and the billions that it has spent on trade associations and public relations.

So when a federal regulator suggested looking into gas stove regulations, especially given the latest study showing that gas stoves cause as much asthma in children as second-hand smoke, the fossil-funded Republicans snapped into action, and the industry barely even needed to misrepresent past studies and activate its faux-media outlets and propagandists — though it still did. 

The Wall Street Journal's opinion page, the crown jewel of climate disinformation media, was true to form with its "Biden is Coming for Your Gas Stove" editorial, falsely ginning up fears that jackbooted Big Government agents were on their way to your kitchen. Professional PR people like Alex Epstein also sent talking points, but that was little more than an opening of the other barn door after the horses had already run all around the farm. The Daily Caller discovered a so-called 'conflict of interest' and did a story attempting to make the fact that the study was funded by an advocacy group into a controversy, which is an interesting frame for an organization funded to be a conservative advocacy group posing as a media outlet. 

Overall, the Right generated plenty of noise but not much heat, and that's sort of the point. Make enough noise so that regulators, who have been aware of gas stoves' health risks for decades, will be too scared to protect the public from that particular source of pollution. 

Because it's certainly not about the quality of 🦕 gas stoves. 

Literally the only thing Consumer Reports found that gas stoves did better than electric stoves is that they have a scary flame: "The visual feedback provided by a flame growing and shrinking as you adjust a burner is valuable when gauging heat." (A problem that was literally solved in 2015.)

So if you're so 🐵 dumb you need to see a 🔥 flame to know the stove is on, then 🐘🦖😈 Republicans have your back, and your stove. Hopefully it's worth the asthma and the climate-killing emissions.
https://climatenexus.org/hot-news/
Posted by: AGelbert
« on: December 22, 2022, 05:41:02 pm »



December 19, 2022


Here’s Why 32,000+ Abandoned & Orphaned Offshore Wells Litter the Outer Continental Shelf

SNIPPET:

In all, it’s estimated that the Taylor Energy spill has released up to 140 million gallons of oil to date.

Not all stories of abandoned and orphaned offshore wells are like Taylor Energy’s. Some have been decommissioned the right way, while others are long forgotten and pose unknown environmental and marine life risks. Inadequate records and limited monitoring have made it challenging to accurately track the number of abandoned wells and whether they’ve been adequately plugged.

According to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, however, more than 32,000 of the 55,000 offshore wells across the 10.9-million-acre Outer Continental Shelf are abandoned or orphaned.

But why? How can tens of thousands of oil wells sit out in the Atlantic, Arctic, and Pacific Oceans without demanding further attention or accountability?

Offshore wells are abandoned when they do not produce enough to offset operating costs. Some wells never produce at all. Some “dry up,” their accessible reserves exhausted based on current extraction methods. Some of these wells are temporarily abandoned, with the idea or promise that the owner will return to attempt extraction sometime in the future. Yet, the average length of time since the 3,364 “temporarily” abandoned wells in the Outer Continental Shelf were last drilled is 38 years.

Wells are considered orphaned when they have no owner. Offshore oil wells are often orphaned if the companies that own and operate them go bankrupt or close their doors for any other reason. With no known owner, orphaned wells present significant challenges when it comes to shutting in and decommissioning them.

Full article:


https://gcaptain.com/heres-why-32000-abandoned-orphaned-offshore-wells-litter-the-outer-continental-shelf

Agelbert NOTE: Only in the good old United States of Petroleum can a pollution contaminated site, irresponsibly abandonded without plugging and cleanup by profit over planet oil loving greedballs, be affectionately called an "Orphaned" Oil and Gas Well. Friends, if YOU made that kind of a mess in your yard, the authorities would have a hazmat team sent there quickly, followed by the police charging you with unlawful contamination. The wells spewing methane and other (even MORE toxic - i.e. Cancer causing) contaminants were 🦕 IRRESPONSIBLY 😈 ABANDONED, not "orphaned" by an "unfortunate" bit of Hydrocarbon Business "bad luck". It is absolutely breathtaking how the Hydrocarbon Hellspawn keep getting a free pass from the media for in-our-faces toxic pollution dumping on we-the-people.
"Orphaned " Oil and Gas Well❓❓❓

Other euphemisms worthy of Orwell that we have all been subjected to:

😠 ☠️ Highly toxic fisson reactor Uranium fuel 👉   "Enriched" Uranium

😠 ☠️ Abortion 👉 "Reproductive Right"

😠 ☠️ 🦕 "Natural" Gas 👉 "Bridge Fuel"


😠 😈 Greed is Good, 🦍 Might is Right, Losers Finish Last, It doesn't matter how you play the game, but whether you Win or Lose (etc. you get the morally bankrupt Social Darwinist Ideology Idea) 👉 🦖 "Evolutionary Advantage" of "Apex Predators"

AND all this time you actually believed the BIG LIE that "it was the Communists, not the Capitalists", that had the GOAL of CORRUPTING the Language. Now you know better.

Social Darwinist Business as Usual Destruction

Posted by: AGelbert
« on: December 17, 2022, 02:16:01 pm »

"On closer inspection, countless ambitious-sounding pledges ring hollow. Many commitments are little more than vague declarations of intent. Others hide huge chunks of a company’s CO2 pollution, or rely on dubious promises to compensate continued emissions, while lacking efforts to reduce fossil fuel use."



Dossiers   

CLEW focus: 'Climate neutral' products and companies - Greenwashing or sign of serious action?


Factsheets 🧐

How to unpick a company net zero target in 7 steps
Posted by: AGelbert
« on: December 12, 2022, 04:24:34 pm »


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December 12, 2022

SNIPPET:

Big Oil's Big Lies Revealed In Emails Obtained By House Oversight Investigation

Major 🦕🦖🐍 oil companies BP, Chevron, Exxon, and Shell, and the trade group the American Petroleum Institute, 😈 intentionally crafted the appearance of support for clean energy and environmental protection while internally working to ensure "the continued promotion of ☠️ natural gas," documents released Friday by the House Committee on Oversight and Reform show.

The documents, released as a part of an ongoing House investigation into the oil and gas industry's climate denial and greenwashing, "demonstrate how the fossil fuel industry ‘greenwashed’ its public image with promises and actions that oil and gas executives knew would not meaningfully reduce emissions, even as the industry moved aggressively to lock in continued fossil fuel production for decades to come — actions that could doom global efforts to prevent catastrophic climate change,” Chair Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.) and environment subcommittee chair Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) said in a statement.

The internal emails include a warning from 🦖 Bob Stout, BP's former U.S. VP and head of regulatory affairs, admitting BP's intention to make methane gas a permanent "destination fuel," adding "We would not want to spell all this out, but also not implicitly concede the point by referring to ☠️ it mainly as a ‘bridge.'"

The documents also include incredulity at criticism of oil majors' sale of oil and gas assets to smaller, less accountable firms. (Washington Post $, Reuters, The Guardian, NBC, Bloomberg $, CNN, CNBC, The Hill, Politico, NBC, E&E $, Al Jazeera)

Read more:
https://climatenexus.org/hot-news/
Posted by: AGelbert
« on: November 08, 2022, 12:45:54 pm »

 

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November 8, 2022

COP, Look 👀, Listen For 🔊 Regular Readouts of COP27 🦖😈🐍 Disinformation

SNIPPETS:

While we usually write these columns with little more at our disposal than our wits and a web browser, the Institute for Strategic Dialogue has developed an incredible dashboard that pulls data from some 3,000 social media accounts, millions of posts, and 250 media outlets, and we're working with them to produce regular bulletins about 🦖😈🐍 climate disinformation. ... ...

There's also a section on the Russia-Ukraine narrative, some tracking of over a million dollars in climate disinformation ads on Facebook, primarily from API's Energy Citizens 😇 front 🦖 group and their "American Oil First" framing, "a thinly-veiled dog whistle to former President Trump's anti-immigrant "America First" policy" and a section on how Elon Musk's Twitter takeover showed how right-wing 😈 "comedians" strategically use humor to spread disinformation.

Read more:
https://newsletter.climatenexus.org/20221108-cop27d02-deforestation-and-drought-world-cup-math-draft-nca
Posted by: AGelbert
« on: November 04, 2022, 12:33:23 pm »

 

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November 4, 2022


🦖 Big Oil Spent $15 Million 🐍😈 Watering Down Climate Action In New York


In 2019, New York state passed the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, which set emission targets and spending goals, prioritizing frontline communities and establishing other social equity goals. Now, if you only judged New York by what Fox News and other rightwing disinfo outlets said about it, you may be surprised there are any fossil fuels left in the state. But there are, and the industry has been plenty busy using its considerable resources to try and keep it that way. 

A new report from the Public Accountability Institute and LittleSis shows the extent to which fossil fuel interests are lobbying on New York's climate standards, and it's not the liberal love-fest you might expect. In addition to the $15 million spent by 10 fossil fuel interests on lobbying since 2016, they've also held multiple seats on the state’s Climate Action Council which oversees the CLCPA's implementation.
 

And then there's the 🦕 industry's front group, New Yorkers for Affordable Energy (NYAE). Its website claims the group is simply “dedicated to supporting access to cleaner , reliable and affordable sources of energy for residential and business consumers," but per the report, its IRS filings admit the true purpose is "to expand natural gas service." 

That IRS filing listed three founding 🦕 directors: Katie Gibbs; Karen Merkel, a communications manager for National Fuel Gas Company; and Michelle Hook, Danskammer Energy VP for Public Affairs. And the address they gave was the same as "the address of Albany-based law and lobbying firm Plummer & Wigger, which also represents other fossil fuel industry clients, such as Millennium Pipeline, where Hook is a former public relations executive." 

Hook is making $10,000 a month lobbying for the 🦕 group, through a contract with Virago Public Affairs, for whom NYAE is the only registered lobbying client.

But Hook's not their only lobbyist. The "Democratic-Party tied 🦕 lobbying firm" SKDKnickerbocker, "a powerhouse influencer in Albany," is "lobbying for the group 'on a pro bono basis'" that the report explains doesn't mean they're doing it for free, but rather "likely means that its lobbying is incidental to a larger, paid, public relations contract." 

Unclear what that contract may be, but "one of the SKDKnickerbocker lobbyists registered to advocate for New Yorkers for Affordable Energy is the managing director of the firm’s Albany office, Morgan Hook." 

Huh, 🐍 Morgan Hook is working on this project with 🐍 Michelle Hook. 

If you're wondering if there's any relation there, congrats! You win a "suspicious coincidence" prize, because the report states flatly that "Morgan Hook is married to Michelle Hook." 

Talk about playing the long game! Now they're arranging marriages between fossil fuel front group operatives and public relations professionals? 

Are there any lengths to which the fossil fuel industry won't go?

(We joke, but there is plenty more serious stuff in the report that you should go check out!)
Full Newsletter:
https://newsletter.climatenexus.org/20221104-unesco-glaciers-epa-air-monitoring-gem-methane-30-companies
Posted by: AGelbert
« on: September 22, 2022, 08:19:43 pm »

 

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September 22, 2022

Manchin Fossil 🦖 Fuel 💰 Streamlining Bill Panned By Dems 🤔, GOP 🤔: Coal millionaire and West Virginia senator Joe Manchin III released his long-awaited bill on Wednesday to streamline the construction of fossil fuel projects including methane gas pipelines.
House Natural Resources Committee Chair Raul Grijalva: The bill resembled a draft that had been leaked months ago. 📢 The very fact that this fossil fuel brainchild is being force-fed into must-pass government funding speaks to its unpopularity. I don’t want this.
The bill was promised to Manchin by Sen. Majority Leader 🐍 Chuck Schumer during the negotiation of the Inflation Reduction Act. Manchin has insisted the legislation be attached to a government funding bill, setting up the prospect of a government shutdown. The bill would require the approval of the beleaguered Mountain Valley Pipeline, a provision on which Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine was not consulted and to which he would not support because his constituents "have felt ignored" by the opaque process, the Virginia Mercury reported. “[The Mountain Valley pipeline section] is completely unacceptable,” he told reporters Wednesday night per E&E News. “I will do everything I can to 🦅 oppose it.”

Multiple Democratic senators have stated Manchin's fossil fuel streamlining bill should not be attached to a government funding package and Kaine joins Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in opposing it even if it is. Manchin has said he is seeking support from at least 20 🐘 GOP senators for the legislation which he says 🦖 Republicans have wanted for years and told reporters Tuesday “There’s no reason Republicans shouldn’t support it.”

Republicans have responded cooly to the bill, however, instead Manchin's fellow West Virginian senator, Republican Shelley Moore Capito, has released a far more aggressive bill to slash regulations on fossil fuel extraction and transportation. The 🦕 White House said Wednesday it supports Manchin's legislation . (Manchin bill & reception: E&E News, Washington Post $, E&E News, CNN, Politico, The Hill, Roll Call, New York Times $, The Hill, Houston Chronicle, Reuters, The Hill, National Journal, E&E News; MVP & Kaine opposition: Virginia Mercury, WFXR; Capito: Politico Pro $; Substantive details: E&E $)

Amnesty Accuses Egypt Of 'Shiny Cover-Up' Of Human Rights Violations: A second major international human rights group in less than two weeks accused Egypt of trying to conceal a decade's worth of “unrelenting violations of human rights” ahead of COP27 in November. Amnesty International, in a report released Wednesday, outlined crackdowns on dissent and individual freedoms, including the imprisonment of political opponents and journalists over the last ten years. It also detailed a "shiny cover-up" on the part of the el-Sissi administration intended to accrue goodwill from foreign governments and financial institutions ahead of the UN climate conference. (AP)



Diversity-Lather, Greenwash, Nature-Rinse, Repeat: EU Companies Dodging Climate Culpability Online

In the summer of 2022, a heat wave broke records across Europe, bringing unprecedented temperatures and drought worse than any in at least 500 years. Thousands died, wildfires burned out of control, and the companies complicit or causing the climate crisis were busy posting through it. 

Unsurprisingly, they weren't owning up to the impacts of their profits. Instead, as a new report from Geoffrey Supran and the Algorithmic Transparency Institute documents, they were distracting the public with posts about sports, using images of nature and diverse communities to improve their public image. 

The analysts looked at the social media output of 22 European companies across three sectors: fossil fuel companies like Shell and Total, airline industry players like Air France and Lufthansa, and car companies like BMW and Mercedes-Benz. The research examined 2,416 posts from 375 social media accounts run by these companies across five platforms- Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter and TikTok. 

They found that during the climate-driven extreme weather of the summer, "the 22 companies remained silent about climate change in the examined posts, with only a negligible handful (0.3%) making explicit reference to 'climate change' or 'global warming'." 

But they weren't being quiet. Instead, they found "that two-thirds (67%) of the 22 companies’ posts communicate a narrative of ‘Green Innovation’" which "avoids directly addressing climate change while nonetheless presenting companies as environmentally-conscious, engaged in or committed to low- carbon technologies and/or technological innovation." 

Another one in five of the posts "offer a narrative of ‘Misdirection’" which "uses messaging about sports, fashion, and social causes to direct attention away from firms’ core business roles and responsibilities."

Additionally, they "also show that a number of companies variously leverage imagery of nature, female- presenting people, non-binary-presenting people, non-Caucasian-presenting people, young people, experts, sportspeople, and celebrities to strengthen their messages of greenwashing and misdirection." 

The consequences of climate change, which Europeans were experiencing over the summer, "were never communicated (0%) by any industry." That said, they also avoided the explicit denial of claiming climate change isn't real or human-caused, and didn't attack the science, scientists or activists calling for climate action, but that's not surprising given that such toxic denial is why they covertly fund front groups to spread it, instead of tainting their brand with it.

What they DID post, though, was content that the report describes as its titular "Three shades of greenwashing": the idea that "green innovation" will save us, that other problems are more important, and that business-as-usual with its "visuals and language fetishizing luxury and performance, with no consideration of sustainability." 

And as much as the text, the imagery plays an important role, something these companies know and exploit by something known as "nature-rinsing", or more formally as "executional greenwashing." The report explains that "these findings demonstrate a systematic use of Nature/Environment visuals in fossil fuel interests’ social media posts to strengthen their ‘green’ messaging." 

Similarly,"fossil fuel interests variously leverage visuals of select demographics - sportspeople, celebrities, young people, and racial minorities - to misdirect audience’s attention with discourses about sports, social causes, and fashion and design." 

For example "car manufacturers and airlines additionally show more racially diverse casts to misdirect with posts about social goods such as LGBTQIA+ issues and Women’s rights" but "when car companies post about sports, particularly motor racing, the trend is reversed, with more people - including sportspeople - being all- Caucasian." 

"All told," lead researcher Geoffrey Supran tweeted, "our data show that 😈 fossil fuel interests are engaged in strategic brand positioning to establish themselves as 😇 green, 😇 innovative, & 😇charitable.  These subtle, 😈 systematic trends have been hiding in plain sight for too long."

Posted by: AGelbert
« on: September 04, 2022, 05:14:39 pm »

Southern California News Group By BROOKE STAGGS | bstaggs@scng.com |
PUBLISHED: August 24, 2022 at 10:28 a.m. | UPDATED: August 24, 2022 at 11:43 a.m.

Rep. Katie Porter wants to block tax credits for 😈🦖 marketing that promotes oil and gas

SNIPPETS:

Big 🦖 Oil has been 😈 lying to the American people for decades about the damage they’re causing our environment,” said Porter, who chairs the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations. “It’s bad enough these corporations poison the planet; they shouldn’t get taxpayer dollars to  cover it up.” ... ...
Critics call these “taxpayer subsidies” and have fought to get such benefits removed for the five major oil companies: ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, Chevron and ConocoPhillips. Those same oil companies and their defenders argue that such tax incentives are standard and encourage investment in a high-cost industry. ... ...

So what exactly would Porter’s bill 🗽 do?

Advertising is a traditional business expense and most companies are allowed a tax deduction for a portion of what they spend on it. But the tax code has a long list of expenses that can’t be deducted, from golden parachute payments to profits from “the illegal sale of drugs.” (That last clause is why cannabis businesses can’t deduct expenses even if they have state licenses, since cannabis remains illegal at the federal level.)

Porter’s End Subsidies for Fossil Fuel Advertising Act would add marketing that encourages the “extraction, distribution, and consumption of oil and gas and their derivatives” to the list of business expenses that can’t be deducted.

Read more:

Posted by: AGelbert
« on: September 04, 2022, 03:55:53 pm »

 
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Posted by: AGelbert
« on: June 13, 2022, 12:01:45 pm »

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June 13, 2022


2 Key Steps To Clean Up Climate Denial: Define Disinformation, Deplatform It


SNIPPETS:

Today we're turning to the really fun stuff, the top two of seven recommendations to clean up climate disinfo described in "Deny, Deceive, Delay: Documenting and Responding to Climate Disinformation at COP26 and Beyond." ... ...

And those 🦕👿🦖😈🐍 working the outrage economy thanks to the fossil fuel industry's support have certainly figured out how to game the social algorithms. One of the report's case studies found that "In the period from October 25 to November 21 2021, the tweets and quote tweets of just 16 Twitter accounts amassed a total 507,000 likes and retweets (“interactions”) on climate narratives alone." Those super-spreaders are well-known names to readers here, including holocaust denier 👿 Peter Sweden/Imanuelsen, Koch contractor 🦖 John Stossel, Homeless harasser 🐍 Michael Shellenberger, P.O. Box 🦖 Bjorn Lomborg, Obama birther and Sandy Hook conspiracy theorist  👿 Tony Heller, and Round-up refuser 😈 Patrick Michaels.

Given their many non-climate interests, the report noted that "Repeat offenders have often spread mis- or disinformation on multiple topics . This is most clearly observed in the number of high-traction accounts sharing misleading claims on climate and COVID-19, but encompasses a wider range of issues - from anti-vaxx sentiment and genocide denial to conspiracies such as QAnon, the Great Reset and electoral fraud. This should provide an even greater incentive for platforms to act, since an effective response against such accounts could have a ‘force multiplier’ effect and mitigate harm in multiple areas."

Turns out people who lie about climate change also lie about other stuff, which isn't exactly a huge finding, but it is a huge reason why social media companies should remove users who habitually make their websites a toxic and disinformation-filled mess.

Read more:
https://newsletter.climatenexus.org/20220613-heat-lng-ignoring-disabilities

The thoughts of the righteous are right: but the counsels of the wicked are deceit. Proverbs 12:5 King James Version