Sources: Misinformation, Greenwashing, Lobbying & Corruption

Particularly influential and summary pieces are marked with a *

General

InfluenceMap – independent think tank producing data-driven analysis on how business and finance are impacting the climate crisis

Drilled – an independent news outlet focused on climate accountability (i.e. investigating the various drivers of delay on climate action)

Half a century of dither and denial – a climate crisis timeline (2019, article/timeline in The Guardian)

Misinformation

DeSmog – investigative journalism for fact-based information on global warming misinformation campaigns, including databases on disinformation and lobbying, commentary on recent developments in energy, social justice, activism, etc.

Assessing ExxonMobil’s global warming projections (2023, article in Science)

Shell’s actual spending on renewables is fraction of what it claims, group alleges (2023, article in The Guardian based on report by Global Witness)

Governments urged to act after oil giants accused of misleading public: Documents suggest Shell and BP staff privately downplayed public commitments on climate crisis (2022, article in The Guardian)

Deny, Deceive, Delay: Documenting and Responding to Climate Disinformation at COP26 & Beyond – Summary (2022, report by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue)

Online misinformation on climate change (2019, overview article in Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change)

Australian regulator finds large-scale emissions misreporting by coalminer Peabody (2022, article in The Guardian)

How Exxon is using an unusual law to intimidate critics over its climate denial (2022, article in The Guardian)

Southern Company spent $62.1m over the years to deny the impact of fossil fuel combustion on climate crisis (2022, article in The Guardian)

The oil and gas industry’s digital advertising strategy (2021, report by InfluenceMap)

Facebook let fossil-fuel industry push climate misinformation, report finds (2021, article in The Guardian)

Fossil fuel firms among biggest spenders on Google ads that look like search results (2021, article in The Guardian)

America Misled: How the fossil fuel industry deliberately misled Americans about climate change (2021, report by scientists from the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication)

Misleading Narratives

Climate policy dragged into culture wars as a ‘delay’ tactic, finds study (2022, article in The Guardian, based on report by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue)

Melting ‘snowflakes’? How climate change became a new front in the right’s culture war (2022, article in The Guardian)

How oil companies rebranded deceptive climate ads as ‘free speech’ (2022, article in The Guardian)

The forgotten oil ads that told us climate change was nothing (2021, article in The Guardian)

Greenwashing

Oil and gas firms’ green investments fail to match promise of publicity – study: BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil, Shell and TotalEnergies spend $750m a year burnishing climate credentials but only 12% of capital on low-carbon development (2022, article in The Guardian based on study by InfluenceMap)

Criticism intensifies after big oil admits ‘gaslighting’ public over green aims: Fury as ‘explosive’ files reveal largest oil companies contradicted public statements and wished bedbugs upon critical activists (2022, article in The Guardian)

BP spent £800,000 on social media influence ads after Labour proposed windfall tax (2022, article in The Guardian)

Greenwashing is driving our descent into climate catastrophe. But we can stop it (2022, article in The Guardian)

Oil firms’ climate claims are greenwashing, study concludes – Most comprehensive scientific analysis to date finds words are not matched by actions (2022, article in The Guardian based on article in Plos One)

*The clean energy claims of BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil and Shell: A mismatch between discourse, actions and investments (2022, article in Plos One)

Canadian pipeline groups spend big to pose as Indigenous champions – Oil and gas companies are ‘Indigenous-washing’ their ads to garner support for projects on First Nation lands (2022, article in The Guardian)

Big oil’s ‘wokewashing’ is the new climate science denialism (2021, article in The Guardian based on article in Climatic Change)

Carbon offsetting is not warding off environmental collapse – it’s accelerating it (2021, article in The Guardian)

Anti-Environmental Lobbying & Corruption

UAE oil company employees given roles in office hosting Cop28 (2023, article in The Guardian)

UK climate minister received donations from fuel and aviation companies (2023, article in The Guardian)

‘Explosion’ in number of fossil fuel lobbyists at Cop27 climate summit (2022, article in The Guardian)

Russian oligarchs and companies under sanctions are among lobbyists at Cop27 (2022, article in The Guardian)

Industry Influence on Biodiversity Policy (2022, report by InfluenceMap)

Business groups block action that could help tackle biodiversity crisis, report finds (2022, article in The Guardian based on study by InfluenceMap)

How the gas industry capitalized on the Ukraine war to change Biden policy (2022, article in The Guardian)

How a top US business lobby promised climate action – but worked to block efforts (2022, article in The Guardian)

‘Condemning everyone alive’: outrage at US supreme court climate ruling – Limiting the Environmental Protection Agency at a time when fossil fuel emissions need to be curbed is ‘devastating’ (2022, article in The Guardian)

IPCC: We can tackle climate change if big oil gets out of the way – Experts say criticism of oil and gas’s ‘climate-blocking activities’ cut from final draft, reflective of industry’s power and influence (2022, article in The Guardian)

Oil firms accused of scare tactics after claiming climate lawsuits ‘a threat to US’ (2022, article in The Guardian)

Agribusiness giants tried to thwart EU deforestation plan after Cop26 pledge (2022, article in The Guardian)

Europe’s fishing industry to battle with conservationists over bottom trawling (2022, article in The Guardian)

Rightwing lobby group Alec driving laws to blacklist companies that boycott the oil industry (2022, article in The Guardian)

Joe Manchin leads opposition to Biden’s climate bill, backed by support from oil, gas and coal (2021, article in The Guardian)

How the plastic industry turned the pandemic to its advantage (2022, article in The Guardian)

Energy Charter Treaty: Secretive court system poses threat to Paris climate deal (2021, article in The Guardian)

World’s biggest coal, oil, beef and animal feed-producing nations are attempting to strip a landmark IPCC report of findings that threaten those domestic economic interests (2021, article by Greenpeace investigation team Unearthed)

The UK Conservative party and its MPs have registered £1.3m in gifts and donations from climate sceptics and fossil fuel interests since the 2019 (2021, news article in The Guardian)

Some of America’s most prominent companies, including Apple, Amazon, Microsoft and Disney, are backing business groups that are fighting landmark climate legislation, despite their own promises to combat the climate crisis (2021, news article in The Guardian)

The dirty dozen: meet America’s top climate villains (2021, article in The Guardian)

UK Ministers Met 1-on-1 with Fossil Fuel and Biomass Producers Nine Times as Often as Renewables in2029/2020 (2021, article by DeSmog)

Backlash against environmental legislation & policy change

ExxonMobil launches legal challenge to EU’s windfall tax on energy firms: US oil firm contests legal authority for ‘solidarity contribution’ to raise funds to offset soaring energy prices (2022, article in The Guardian)

‘Emotion and pain’ as Dutch farmers fight back against huge cuts to livestock (2022, article in The Guardian)