Exclusive: Royal Society Under Internal Pressure To Cancel Venue Booking From Global Warming Policy Foundation

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The Royal Society is coming under internal pressure to cancel a booking on its premises made by climate science โ€œscepticโ€ group the Global Warming Policy Foundation, DeSmogUK canย reveal.

Several fellows and associates of the society โ€“ the worldโ€™s oldest scientific academy, founded in 1660ย โ€“ are angry over an agreement to hire its premises to the GWPF for its 17 October annual lecture, to be delivered by Lord Matt Ridley.

DeSmogUK also understands some scientists intend to raise the issue at a meeting of the Royal Societyโ€™s governing council on 6 October, with a request to cancel the GWPFย booking.

The GWPF, founded by former chancellor and Conservative peer Lord Nigel Lawson, was forced to split its operations in 2014 after a Charity Commission report found its materials lacked balance and โ€œpromoted a particular position on globalย warming.โ€

Professor Andrew Watson, a Royal Society Fellow and Royal Society Research Professor at the University of Exeter, who is not on the council, told DeSmogUK: โ€œI expect the RS agreed to this because they didn’t want to be accused of censorship, but the GWPF is not just interested in hiring a lecture theatre โ€” they are also hiring theย brand.โ€

Professor Andrea Sella, the 2014 winner of the Royal Society’s Michael Faraday prize for communicating science, told DeSmogUK: โ€œI feel that the Royal Societyโ€™s decision to allow the GWPF to hold their meeting on their premises is, let us say,ย ill-advised, and represents an error ofย judgement.โ€

He said providing space for theย lecture risked lending credibility to those views, adding: โ€œIf we have learned anything from recent politics it is that it is not what you say, but the impression you present that often matters most strongly in causing people to formย conclusions.โ€

Bob Ward, policy and communications director at the London School of Economicsโ€™ Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, said: โ€œI hope the Council of the Royal Society will recognise the enormous damage that hosting a pseudoscientific event like this does to the international reputation of the UK national academy ofย science.โ€

Ward ยญโ€” a long-standing and active critic of the GWPF โ€” worked in policy communication at the society between 1999 and 2006, but has no current formalย connections.

He said the GWPF was the โ€œantithesisโ€ of the societyโ€™s motto, meaning โ€œtake nobodyโ€™s word forย itโ€.

Ward added: โ€œIt is the equivalent of accepting money from other pseudoscientific groups, such as the astrologers and homeopaths. I think most of the scientific community will be disappointed that the Royal Society is providing a platform for the hereditary peer, Viscount Ridley, to misrepresent the scientific evidence for the risks of climateย change.โ€

News of the GWPF booking emerged after NewScientist journalist Michael Le Page wrote a scathing column, criticising the society for giving GWPF a โ€œveneer ofย respectabilityโ€.

The Royal Society has released a statement, saying the GWPF is just one of many organisations hiring space at the societyโ€™s London HQ, and this did not mean the society endorsed theย views of thoseย groups.

โ€œThe Society has a strong track record of opposing those who cherry pick or misrepresent evidence when it comes to the science of climate change and indeed we have had robust disagreements with the GWPF in the past,โ€ the statementย said.

A Royal Society spokesperson pointed DeSmogUK to a section of its terms and conditions for room hire that state that advertising and publicity material for events should โ€œnot imply that the Event is endorsed or organised by The Royalย Society.โ€

Any use of Royal Society logos in publicity also needed prior written consent, the spokesmanย added.

The societyโ€™s terms and conditions for room hire also say venue applications will be accepted โ€œonly if the nature of the function is considered appropriate by The Royal Society and in sympathy with the ethos of the Royal Society and that the function is to promote science, technology, education orย scholarship.โ€

DeSmogUK understands that several representations have been made to members of the Royal Society over theย booking.

There are concerns any attempts by the society to distance itself from the views of the GWPF will not be enough to remove potential damage to itsย reputation.

The Royal Society has also said that the GWPF event will not focus on science, but will instead focus on policy issues โ€“ย a valid area forย debate.

But one society associate told DeSmogUK: โ€œHow can policy be discussed if the organisers do not accept the scientific evidence?ย  There is a very real risk that this could undermine the RS‘s goal to promote evidence-based decisionย making.โ€

DeSmogUK askedย GWPF director Benny Peiser to respond to the concerns being raised and the questions over it’s hiring of the venue. ย His response, in full, read: โ€œThis will not be the first time the GWPF has held its annual lecture at the Royal Society.โ€ย ย 

Peiser was referring to the 2012 GWPF lecture from German Professor Fritz Vahrenholtย where the chemist dismissed the role of CO2 in climate change, said the โ€œclimate catastrophe will not occurโ€ and predicted the world would experience โ€œslight coolingโ€ for the next few decades. ย The years 2014 and 2015 both broke records for the hottest year, with 2016 likely toย follow.

Vahrenholt also dismissed chances of developing countries like China and India from joining a global agreement to limit greenhouse gas emissions. Since then, more than 190 countries signed the Paris agreement – including the countries Vahrenholt thought would not sign anyย deal.

GWPF Attacks Royalย Society

Last year, the GWPF produced a report accusing the Royal Society of giving a โ€œmisleading pictureโ€ on the science of climateย change.

Former society president Sir Paul Nurse, who is not on the council but has been critical of the GWPF in the past, told DeSmogUK the society โ€œencourages open debate on scientific issuesโ€ and so he believed the GWPF event wasย โ€œappropriate.โ€

The 2015 GWPF annual lecture was given by Canadian Patrick Moore, who claims there is โ€œno scientific proofโ€ that humans are causing climateย change.

Moore asked the audience to โ€œcelebrate CO2โ€ โ€“ the same line Moore delivered in his coal-industry sponsored talk to EU officials and MEPs earlier thisย year.

In November 2015, an article by Ridley and GWPFโ€™s director Benny Peiser, published in the Wall St. Journal, claimed to offer โ€œyour complete guide to the climateย debateโ€.

In the article, Ridley and Peiser said the Earth had been warmer in the recent past, that the planetโ€™s atmosphere was not as sensitive to CO2 warming as previously feared, and that future warming might beย beneficial.

Ridley Accused of Misrepresentingย Science

The article was analysed by scientists for Climate Feedback โ€“ a group established to offer expert reviews of media articles on climate science โ€“ and was found to have โ€œlow to very lowโ€ scientificย credibility.

One of those who analysed the article, Professor Steven Sherwood, of the University of New South Wales, said the column โ€œpeddles the usual false statements masquerading as opinion that we have been seeing for yearsโ€ and that it โ€œwould not be published by a reputableย publisher.โ€

โ€œMost of the scientific statements in the article are false or misleading,โ€ concludedย Sherwood.

In October last year, Ridleyโ€™s Northumberland family estate, home to a coal mine, was blockaded by protesters.

In December last year, several leading scientists, including NASA‘s Dr Gavin Schmidt, analysed a wide-ranging interview given by Ridley to the BBC. The scientists accused Ridley of numerous errors and misrepresentations.

In an article written for The Times, Ridley made several claims about the โ€œbenefitsโ€ of carbon dioxide, including that it was helping to โ€œgreenโ€ theย planet.

Ridley cited provisional work by Professor Ranga Myneni, of Boston University, that had found evidence that some plants were increasing their leaf cover as a result of the long known fertilization effect of extra carbonย dioxide.

But Myneni told DeSmog that he was worried about how his work was being represented, and that Ridley had cherry-picked the evidence on the dangers of human-caused climateย change.

Coral Reefย Claims

In the same article, Ridley also claimed that while coral reefs were in trouble from pollution and over-fishing, they were not in danger from emissions of carbonย dioxide.

Just weeks later, Australiaโ€™s Great Barrier Reef suffered its worst known mass coral bleaching event, triggered by record ocean temperatures which scientists have linked to human-caused globalย warming.

Almost a quarter of the reefโ€™s corals, mainly in the once pristine northern section, are now dead as a result of the bleaching, according to Australian Government authorities.

Professor Watson added: โ€œAs scientists, we fall for this stuff every time. We think discussion should be in the spirit of scientific enquiry, recognising the possibility of error, so we listen to people even when they hold untenable positions. The lobbyists and publicists on the other hand argue using rhetoric and opinion, and seize on any uncertainty in the opposition as weakness. They play the argument to dirtier rules, and for the non-scientist public, they usually come outย best.โ€

Main image: Lord Matt Ridley. Credit: Flickr/IAB UK

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