The fracking executive selected by President-elect Donald Trump to run the U.S. Department of Energy, Chris Wright, has called the concept of carbon pollution “outrageous” and says that the influential climate crisis denier Bjorn Lomborg is a “friend.” 

Wright is chief executive officer of Liberty Energy, a Colorado-based fracking company. He’s an outspoken advocate for fossil fuels who frequently claims that fears about global temperature rise are overblown, calling this a “false and dishonest narrative.” 

Wright’s thinking about climate change appears to have been shaped in part by Lomborg, who is founder and president of a climate obstruction group called the Copenhagen Consensus Center and author of the book, False Alarm, which claims that climate change is “not the apocalyptic threat that we’ve been told it is.” 

During a podcast interview from 2020, Wright referred to Lomborg’s book as “fantastic,” and earlier this year described the Danish climate solutions denier as a “friend” on LinkedIn.  

Lomborg writes an internationally syndicated column about climate change that is filled with mischaracterizations of climate science, argues Bob Ward of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics. Lomborg regularly appears in mainstream media outlets like the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times and was featured in September on the HBO show Real Time with Bill Maher.

“By far, Lomborg is the world’s most influential climate change denier,” Ward told DeSmog. “And Chris Wright is in denial about the fact that the product he produces [oil and gas] is causing death and destruction around the world.”

Ward said it’s alarming that Wright – who has also voiced appreciation for the work of climate crisis deniers Matt Ridley and Michael Shellenberger – will hold one of the most important cabinet positions in the federal government as the deadly impacts of climate change are accelerating. “People’s lives are going to be destroyed. Americans are going to suffer as a result,” Ward claimed.

DeSmog sent questions to Wright via his company Liberty Energy but didn’t receive a response. Lomborg didn’t respond to a media request either. 

Wright’s Ties to Denier Networks

In addition to running Liberty Energy, which describes itself as “a leading North American oilfield services firm,” Wright frequently produces online videos and other content where he shares views about fossil fuel development and climate change that are far outside the scientific and economic mainstream. 

“There is no climate crisis, and we’re not in the midst of an energy transition either,” he said in a video posted on his LinkedIn page last year, seemingly ignoring that 2024 is set to be the hottest in recorded history while global investments in clean energy surpass $2 trillion. “Humans and all complex life on Earth is simply impossible without carbon dioxide. Hence, the term ‘carbon pollution’ is outrageous,” he added.

Those views may have helped forge relationships between Wright and powerful conservative networks that seek to obstruct climate action in the U.S. and internationally. Wright in 2022 spoke at an event hosted by the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF), a conservative think tank that has received at least $3.6 million since 1998 from foundations linked to the oil and gas billionaires Charles and David Koch. 

The board of directors at TPPF includes Tim Dunn, the religious-right fracking billionaire who helps run a pro-MAGA organization called the America First Policy Institute (AFPI). Trump’s pick to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, Lee Zeldin, is a chair at AFPI. 

Kevin Roberts, the former president of TPPF, is now head of the Heritage Foundation. The foundation produced the 900-page policy blueprint for the new Trump administration known as Project 2025. Roberts congratulated Wright on being selected by Trump, posting on X that he “will be an outstanding #EnergySecretary.” 

Wright is also connected to global anti-climate networks. He said earlier this year that he is a “personal friend” of Magatte Wade, the director of the Center for African Prosperity, a project of Atlas Network, a worldwide coalition of free-market think tanks with a decades-long history of backing climate obstruction and denial. 

The future U.S. energy secretary taped a podcast this spring with the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC), an international network of conservatives and climate crisis deniers launched by the Canadian rightwing influencer Jordan Peterson. 

Lomborg’s Global Influence

Lomborg is on ARC’s organizing board, and co-wrote an op-ed in 2023 with Peterson describing “a pervasive and false apocalyptic narrative” surrounding climate change. He appeared on stage with Peterson at the launch event for ARC last year in London, where he acknowledged that global temperature rise is real but downplayed its severity, saying, “We can fix this.”

Lomborg, unlike more explicit deniers of climate science, is able to maintain a regular presence in mainstream media because he portrays himself as “the voice of reason” on a complex issue, Ward argued. But Ward says the end result is still the same – diminished urgency for policies and technology investments that could lessen the mounting climate crisis.

“Climate change denial doesn’t just apply to people who deny the greenhouse gas effect,” he said. “It applies to people who deny the risks of climate change, and Lomborg clearly does.”

Lomborg has parlayed his writing and advocacy into real-world policy influence. This spring he traveled to Zambia, a country highly vulnerable to climate impacts, including droughts and floods, where he met with the country’s Minister of Finance and provided advice about sustainable development strategies. 

With Wright now tapped to serve in Trump’s cabinet, Lomborg’s influence could potentially extend into the highest levels of the U.S. government, something that Ward says all Americans should be concerned about. “Climate change denial is a real problem that leads to human suffering,” Ward said. “There is a big human cost to these guys not being able to deal with reality.”