Channel 4 could have made a real, scientific documentary on the arguments against the consensus view of climate change.

That would have required at least two vital changes to Martin Durkin's film -- while still allowing the 'skeptics' the chance to make their case.

(1). Let viewers know, in detail, how almost all of the 'leading scientists' interviewed are affiliated with various right-wing pseudo-academic "institutes", corporate PR and lobbying organisations etc; all heavily funded by big business (and in most cases, big oil)

(2) Allow a team of mainstream climate scientists a fair chance to answer the 'skeptics' arguments -- and point out any flaws, distortions or outright falsehoods.

These modifications would have made for a truly balanced, really interesting, and genuinely scientific documentary.

However, that's not what Martin Durkin, or the 'skeptics' wanted.

Their aim was an effective of anti-environmentalist propaganda -- highly plausible to people who don't know very much about either the science or the politics of climate change; particularly, those who are desperately keen to find an excuse for business as usual.

This film has no doubt gladdened the hearts of Jerermy Clarkson, George Bush and the CEO's of all their favorite oil companies... But for those of us who genuinely care about this planet -- and in particular, the fate of people in developing countries, who bear the least responsibility for global warming but are most vulnerable to its effects -- it's an outrage and a disgrace.

"The Great Global Warming Swindle" is certainly an apt title — because that’s eactly what this shamefully dishonest, misleading documentary is.

ANDREW CLIFTON

I've done some research on the various "leading scientists" interviewed in "the Great Global Warming Swindle. Here's what I found out about Dr Timothy Ball...

TIMOTHY BALL

Academic credentials with respect to climatology — currently disputed

Dr Timothy Ball is a retired university professor, who taught geography at the University of Winnipeg until 1996. He has been cited as the first Canadian to hold a Ph.D. in climatology. This claim has been disputed in a letter to the editor of the Calgary Herald, and is currently the subject of a lawsuit undertaken by Ball against the writer, the Herald and its publishers.

Political / Corporate PR Affiliations

Dr. Ball is Chairman of the Natural Resources Stewardship Project (NRSP), an institution which does not disclose its funding; however, it was founded by the president of a Toronto-based PR and lobbying firm, the High Park Group (HPG), with clients in the energy industry. The executive director of NRSP, Tom Harris, is a former HPG consultant; his two co-directors, Timothy Egan and Julio Lagos, are HPG executives.

Ball has previously served as a “scientific advisor” to the oil industry-backed organization, Friends of Science. Ball is a member of the Board of Research Advisors of the Frontier Centre for Public Policy, a Canadian free-market think tank, predominantly funded by conservative foundations and major corporations.

IAN CLARK

Academic credentials with respect to climatology — not his primary research field

Clark is a professor in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Ottawa. A search of 22,000 academic journals shows that, Clark has published over 45 research articles in peer-reviewed journals, mainly on the subject of hyrogeology and geochemistry; i.e., not climatology.

Political / Corporate PR Affiliations

Currently sits on the “scientific advisory board” of the Natural Resources Stewardship Project (NRSP). (see under Timothy Ball, above).Also writes for the Fraser institute (a right wing, pro-corporate, free-market ‘think tank’).

quote:

Originally posted by TheHeretic:

Their aim was an effective of anti-environmentalist propaganda -- highly plausible to people who don't know very much about either the science or the politics of climate change; particularly, those who are desperately keen to find an excuse for business as usual.

ANDREW CLIFTON

Couldn't agree more.
The science has been covered elsehwere. What I find it disappointing that there is so little discussion about (or ridicule of) the bizarre assertion that Margaret Thatcher somehow convince not only British scientists but apparently the global science community to produce research that would help aid her battle against the miners.
Isn't that a little bit silly?

At any rate, I truly fear this documentary is going to live in the memory of the people who can't imagine life with 4x4s and short haul flights, whether it harms the planet or not.
Channel 4 should be ashamed to have aired such propaganda.

JOHN CHRISTY

Academic credentials with respect to climatology — not his primary research field

John Christy, Professor and Director of the Earth System Science Center, NSSTC University of Alabama.

Political / Corporate PR Affiliations

Christy was a contributing writer to “Global Warming and Other Eco-Myths,” published by Competitive Enterprise Institute in 2002. He spoke at a June 1998 briefing for congressional staff and media, which was sponsored by the corporate-funded Cooler Heads Coalition. Also associated with CEI, Cato Institute, Independent institute, Marshall Institute — all conspicuously right wing, corporate-funded lobbying/PR organisations.

PAUL DRIESSEN

Academic credentials with respect to climatology — none.

Received BA in geology and field ecology from Lawrence University before launching his career as a public relations consultant.

Political and Corporate Affiliations

Driessen is co-editor of Capital PR News, the newsletter of the nation's largest chapter of the Public Relations Society of America. He is also principal of Global-Comm Partners, a Northern Virginia public relations firm specializing in energy and environmental public policy issues.

Driessen is a Senior Fellow with various corporate-funded institutions:

Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise (CDFE) — funded by various corporations including Coors Foundation, Georgia Pacific Louisiana,-Pacific MacMillan Bloedel, Pacific Lumber, Exxon, DuPont, Agricultural Products Division, Boise Cascade, Seneca Sawmills, Sun Studs, Burkland Lumber, F.M. Kirby Foundation.

Frontiers of Freedom — receives money of tobacco and oil companies, including Philip Morris Cos, ExxonMobil and RJ Reynolds Tobacco. According to the New York Times: “Frontiers of Freedom, which has about a $700,000 annual budget, received $230,000 from Exxon in 2002, up from $40,000 in 2001, according to Exxon documents”.

Atlas Economic Research Foundation — funded by conservative foundations and corporate donors including ExxonMobil and Phillip Morris.

Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT) — funded by conservative foundations and corporate donors, including ExxonMobil and Chevron.

He is also director of the Economic Human Rights Project — a project initiated and funded by CDFE

RICHARD S. LINDZEN

Academic credentials with respect to climatology — OK

Often described as the most respectable of the climate ‘sceptics’. Dr. Richard S. Lindzen is the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology, Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Political and Corporate Affiliations

According to an investigative report in Harpers’ Magazine in 1995, Lindzen was then charging “oil and coal interests $2,500 a day for his consulting services; his 1991 trip to testify before a Senate committee was paid for by Western Fuels and a speech he wrote, entitled Global Warming: the Origin and Nature of Alleged Scientific Consensus' was underwritten by OPEC.”

DR. PAT MICHAELS

Academic credentials with respect to climatology — OK

Michaels, who has completed a Ph.D. in Ecological Climatology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (1979) is Editor of the World Climate Report, Professor of Environmental Science at the University of Virgina. While Michaels referred to himself as the State Climatologist for Virginia, in Ausgust 2006 the Governor clarified that the appointment was one by the University for its accredited climatology office but not an appointment by the state administration.

Political and Corporate Affiliations

Dr. Pat Michaels is a Visiting Scientist with the George C. Marshall Institute and a Senior Fellow in Environmental Studies with the Cato Institute.

World Climate Review, a quarterly he founded that routinely debunks climate concerns, was funded by Western Fuels. Had acknowledged in an e-mail correspondence that he had received about $16,000 in industry funding. It has been alleged, however, that Michaels has received more than 10 times that amount from industry sources. In addition to funding both his publications, Western Fuels also provided a $63,000 grant for Michaels' research. Another $49,000 came from the German Coal Mining Association. A smaller grant of $15,000 came from the Edison Electric Institute. Michaels also listed a grant of $40,000 from the western mining company, Cyprus Minerals. For much of the 1990s, Cyprus Minerals was the largest single funder of the anti-environmental Wise Use Movement in the western part of the U.S.

PATRICK MOORE

Academic credentials with respect to climatology — none.

Political and Corporate Affiliations

Patrick Moore, claimed to be “founder of greenpeace”, and was a leading figure between 1981 and 1986, first in Greenpeace Canada, then Greenpeace international. He then left to embark on a career in corporate public relations. In 1991 Moore was appointed as Director of the British Columbia Forest Alliance which was described by O’Dwyer’s PR Services Report, as “a Burson-Marsteller created group, bankrolled by large timber companies”, which “is waging a PR war with environmentalists upset with the logging of rainforests in western Canada.” In the same year, Moore established his own PR consultancy business, Greenspirit Enterprises, “focusing on environmental policy and communications in natural resources, biodiversity, energy and climate change.”. In this capacity, he has since worked for the mining industry, the logging industry, PVC manufacturers and in defence of biotechnology. His clients include:

B.C. Hazardous Waste Management Corporation
Canadian Pulp and Paper Association
Westcoast Energy and BC Gas
BHP Minerals
the National Association of Forest Industries in Australia
the Canadian Mining Association
the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada
BHP Minerals (Canada) Ltd
the American Forest and Paper Association
the Council of European Paper Industries
State Forestry Associations in Texas, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, New York, Maine, and Florida
the National Hardwood Lumber Association
the Filipino Society of Foresters
the Agri-Food Canada
IPEX, the largest manufacturer of PVC in Canada

Prof S. FREDERICK SINGER

Academic credentials with respect to climatology — not his primary research area

Singer is a Distinguished Research Professor at George Mason University and Professor Emeritus of environmental science at the University of Virginia. He holds a degree in Electrical Engineering from Ohio State University and a PhD in Physics from Princeton University.

Political and Corporate Affiliations

Founder of yet another anti-environmentalist institution, Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP). No detailed records of donations are available, but Singer acknowledged during a 1994 appearance on the television program Nightline that he had received funding from ExxonMobil, Shell, Unocal and ARCO. It is also known that ExxonMobil donated $10,000 to SEPP both in 1998 and 2000.

Singer has also worked with other organisations with similar views, such as the Independent Institute, the American Council on Science and Health, Frontiers of Freedom, the Marshall Institute, and the National Center for Policy Analysis.

Further comments

Singer is tirelessly skeptical not only about the link between CO2 emissions and global warming about the connection between:

CFCs and ozone depletion
ultraviolet radiation and skin cancer
second hand smoke and lung cancer

FREDERICK SEITZ

Academic credentials with respect to climatology—none.

President Emeritus, Rockefeller University. Holds a degree in Mathematics (1932) and a PhD in Physics (1934).

Political and Corporate Affiliations

Seitz is a former Member of Advisory Council, National Strategy Information Center (right wing think tank for American military strategy and foreign policy). Shortly before his retirement from Rockefeller University in 1979, Seitz began working as a paid permanent consultant for the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, advising their research program. By 1989, however, the CEO of R.J. Reynolds, William Hobbs, concluded that “Dr. Seitz is quite elderly and not sufficiently rational to offer advice.”

However, he remains active as:

Chairman of the Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP) (See above under Frederick Singer);

Council member of the Environmental Literacy Council — funded largely by conservative foundations.

member of the National Advisory Board of Accuracy in Media — corporate sponsors include Bethlehem Steel, Chevron, Ciba-Geigy, Coors Foundation, Dressor Industries, Exxon, Getty Oil, Horizon Oil and Gas, IBM, Kaiser Aluminum & Chemical, Mobil Foundation, Pepsico, Phillips Petroleum Company, Texaco Philanthropic Foundation, Union Carbide. Aim vigorously opposes any media criticism of its sponsors’ businesses practices.

Director and Chairman Emeritus of the George C. Marshall Institute — funded by by Exxon Education Foundation and American Standard Oil.

PAUL REITER

Academic credentials with respect to climatology — OK, with reference to spread of disease.

Paul Reiter is Director, Insects and Infectious Diseases, Pasteur Institute, Paris, France

Political and Corporate Affiliations

Member of the Advisory council of the Campaign for Fighting Diseases - International Policy Network project, launched in June 2004, which advocates the development of regulation-free economies as the best route to reducing disease in developing countries. Policy areas include arguing for intellectual property rights for the pharmaceutical industry, and the reduction of taxes and tariffs. Reiter has also worked for:

International Policy Network — funded largly by corporate donors (85% of revenue), primarily drug companies.

Competitive Enterprise Institute — funded by conservative foundations and major corporate donors, including Philip Morris, Exxon Mobil, Amoco, Coca-cola, Texaco and the Ford Motor company.

Cooler Heads Coalition — a network of right wing, corporate friendly, anti-environmentalist ‘think-tanks’ and corporate PR shops.