Exxon's Own Research Confirmed Fossil Fuels' Role in Global Warming Decades Ago (Parts 1 and 2)

September 17, 2015

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by Neela Banerjee, Lisa Song and David Hasemyer (Inside Climate News) Top executives were warned of possible catastrophe from greenhouse effect, then led efforts to block solutions. ... This untold chapter in Exxon's history, when one of the world's largest energy companies worked to understand the damage caused by fossil fuels, stems from an eight-month investigation by InsideClimate News. ICN's reporters interviewed former Exxon employees, scientists, and federal officials, and consulted hundreds of pages of internal Exxon documents, many of them written between 1977 and 1986, during the heyday of Exxon's innovative climate research program. ICN combed through thousands of documents from archives including those held at the University of Texas-Austin, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

The documents record budget requests, research priorities, and debates over findings, and reveal the arc of Exxon's internal attitudes and work on climate and how much attention the results received.

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Exxon's early determination to understand rising carbon dioxide levels grew out of a corporate culture of farsightedness, former employees said. They described a company that continuously examined risks to its bottom line, including environmental factors. In the 1970s, Exxon modeled its research division after Bell Labs, staffing it with highly accomplished scientists and engineers.

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Exxon budgeted more than $1 million over three years for the tanker project to measure how quickly the oceans were taking in CO₂. It was a small fraction of Exxon Research's annual $300 million budget, but the question the scientists tackled was one of the biggest uncertainties in climate science: how quickly could the deep oceans absorb atmospheric CO₂? If Exxon could pinpoint the answer, it would know how long it had before CO₂ accumulation in the atmosphere could force a transition away from fossil fuels.

Exxon also hired scientists and mathematicians to develop better climate models and publish research results in peer-reviewed journals. By 1982, the company's own scientists, collaborating with outside researchers, created rigorous climate models – computer programs that simulate the workings of the climate to assess the impact of emissions on global temperatures. They confirmed an emerging scientific consensus that warming could be even worse than (a senior company scientist named James F.) Black had warned five years earlier.

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Still, corporate executives remained cautious about what they told Exxon's shareholders about global warming and the role petroleum played in causing it, a review of federal filings shows. The company did not elaborate on the carbon problem in annual reports filed with securities regulators during the height of its CO₂ research.

Nor did it mention in those filings that concern over CO₂ was beginning to influence business decisions it was facing.

Throughout the 1980s, the company was worried about developing an enormous gas field off the coast of Indonesia because of the vast amount of CO₂ the unusual reservoir would release.

Exxon was also concerned about reports that synthetic oil made from coal, tar sands and oil shales could significantly boost CO₂ emissions. The company was banking on synfuels to meet growing demand for energy in the future, in a world it believed was running out of conventional oil.

In the mid-1980s, after an unexpected oil glut caused prices to collapse, Exxon cut its staff deeply to save money, including many working on climate.

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Exxon's about-face on climate change earned the scorn of the scientific establishment it had once courted.

In 2006, the Royal Society, the United Kingdom's science academy, sent a harsh letter to Exxon accusing it of being "inaccurate and misleading" on the question of climate uncertainty. Bob Ward, the Academy's senior manager for policy communication, demanded that Exxon stop giving money to dozens of organizations he said were actively distorting the science.

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Part 2

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Exxon's extensive research was driven by the threat accumulating CO₂ posed to the company's core business, according to participants and documents.

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Bold research projects were not uncommon at Exxon, which in the 1970s considered gradually shifting from oil to become a diversified energy company. Through its research units, Exxon explored ways to encourage more efficient consumption of petroleum and a wide range of alternative fuels.

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"The rationale for Exxon's involvement and commitment of funds and personnel is based on our need to assess the possible impact of the greenhouse effect on Exxon business," (Henry) Shaw wrote. "Exxon must develop a credible scientific team that can critically evaluate the information generated on the subject and be able to carry bad news, if any, to the corporation.

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In a November 1979 memo to Weinberg, he (Shaw) wrote, "It behooves us to start a very aggressive defensive program in the indicated areas of atmospheric science and climate because there is a good probability that legislation affecting our business will be passed."

Depending on its findings, the research might provide an escape valve from the carbon problem, or point to some new direction in energy.

The research "could well influence Exxon's view about the long-term attractiveness of coal and synthetics relative to nuclear and solar energy" ( Edward E.) David wrote in a November 1979 letter to senior vice president George T. Piercy.

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As Exxon worked to reduce the uncertainties of climate science, its employees developed a sophisticated understanding of the potential effects of rising CO₂concentrations, documents show. They understood that the Earth's poles would warm more quickly than the rest of the planet, and how a reduction in ice and snow cover would change the planet's ability to reflect sunlight.

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They also discussed among themselves and with corporate executives other potential effects of climate change, including an increase in weeds, pests, and human migration, the documents show.

Some of the company's highest-ranking executives were told of the studies and of estimates about when the impact of global warming might be felt. READ MORE (Part 1) and MORE (Part 2) and MORE (Exxon)

Excerpt from Exxon: And since 2009, we’ve supported a revenue-neutral carbon tax as the most effective, transparent and efficient way for governments to send a signal to consumers and the economy to reduce the use of carbon-based fuels. READ MORE

Click here for Part 1, an overview of Exxon’s history with climate change; Part II, an accounting of Exxon’s early climate research; Part III, a review of Exxon’s climate modeling efforts; Part IV, a dive into Exxon’s Natuna gas field project; Part V, a look at Exxon’s push for synfuels; Part VI, Exxon sowing doubt in a public campaign of climate denial.