Welcome to the DeSmog Media Center. If you’re looking for information on noted climate change deniers and fossil fuel industry misinformation, or on the use of PR techniques and spin by politicians, scientists, and in the media, you’ve come to the right place.

Since we launched in January 2006, we’ve learned a lot about the tricks, tactics and misinformation on climate change that can side-track even the most experienced journalists and media outlets. This media center is full of resources to help you navigate through the PR spin and protect your audience from the smog of the climate science denial industry.

Should you want more information on a particular issue, denier or organization, and cannot find it here, please feel free to contact us at editor [at] desmogblog [dot] com.

As always, we’re happy to receive tips from our readers. Please submit those to editor [at] desmogblog [dot] com. Spin is everywhere, and it’s clouding climate science and confusing the public on the critical issue of our time. Help us in our mission for sound reporting on climate science and energy issues.

About DeSmogBlog
DeSmog exists to clear the PR pollution that is clouding the science on climate change and energy issues. An overwhelming majority of the world’s climate scientists agree that the globe is warming and that the indiscriminate burning of fossil fuels is to blame. We know that the risks are incalculable and, increasingly, we understand that the solutions are affordable and wise choices for many reasons.

Climate Change Facts

The Scientific Consensus

Most of us are not climate scientists, so we should refer to the experts.  Expertise might be gained from a strong track record of publishing in reputable peer-reviewed journals or from working at a non-partisan institute or university. There are also multiple disciplines that have expertise in different areas, such as climate modelling, attribution, impacts, atmospheric physics, climatology, paleoclimatology and oceanography.  Finding the most appropriate expert is a crucial task for journalists.

At least six independent and peer-reviewed studies from 2004 and 2016 have found that between 90 per cent and 100 per cent of scientists agree that climate change is real and caused by humans. A summary of these studies and their methods was published in 2016 in the academic journal Environmental Research Letters. 

The authors wrote: “An accurate understanding of scientific consensus, and the ability to recognize attempts to undermine it, are important for public climate literacy. “

Some 22 national science academies of the Commonwealth signed a “Consensus Statement on Climate Change” in 2018, which said:

“The consensus view of the global climate science community based on current evidence is that avoiding the worst impacts of climate change will require concerted global action to reduce atmospheric carbon.”

In 2014, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and UK‘s The Royal Society issued a joint report on the evidence linking human activity to climate change.  The report said:

“It is now more certain than ever, based on many lines of evidence, that humans are changing Earth’s climate. The atmosphere and oceans have warmed, accompanied by sea-level rise, a strong decline in Arctic sea ice, and other climate-related changes. The evidence is clear.”

NASA also maintains a list of position statements from U.S and international science groups and academies on climate change.

IPCC: The Scientific Basis

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change advises governments across the world on climate change through major assessments of the science.  The assessments, together with special reports, draw on the world’s scientific literature and are co-ordinated and authored by hundreds of leading scientists from around the world. 

Current and historic climate observations

• NASA publishes up-to-date observations on CO2 levels, global temperature, Arctic sea ice, ice sheets and sea level. 
• NOAA maintains a Global Climate Dashboard with easy-to-read charts on temperature, CO2, sea level, ocean heat, glacial ice, solar energy, snow cover and other greenhouse gases.
• NOAA has easy-to-read charts on ocean heat content. More than 90 per cent of the Earth’s warming in the past 50 years has been added to the ocean. 
• The U.K’s Met Office makes its global temperature dataset, HadCrut4, available to the public.
• Berkeley Earth – an independent climate science group – maintains extensive land and ocean temperature charts for the globe as well as regions and countries.

Fact checking

• Skeptical Science is a go-to resource for debunking the most common claims and arguments made by climate deniers. 
• Climate Feedback is a non-profit project that works with climate scientists to provide comprehensive fact-checking of published media stories on climate change.  
• The Climate Science Rapid Response Team is a service driven by volunteer climate scientists who can help put members of the media in touch with relevant experts.

Researching climate science denial

An entire industry has been created to hold back action on climate change, from think tanks and lobbyists, to partisan media outlets and compromised politicians. Some attack the science, some attack renewable energy, while others promote fossil fuels while pushing scare campaigns on jobs and economics. Some do all that and more.  A large body of academic research and expertise now exists, devoted to understanding and communicating the nature and structure of climate science denial.

Here we provide some resources to help you to better understand and research the machinery of climate science denial and pro-fossil fuel advocacy.

DeSmog’s Disinformation Research Database
A database of individuals, organizations, “think” tanks, PR pros and corporations actively involved in clouding the science on climate change and slowing the transition away from fossil fuels.

Climate Files
A project of the Climate Investigations Center providing a unique archival database of documents detailing what corporations “knew” about climate change decades ago, and a behind the curtains look at the fossil fuel industry’s many campaigns to manufacture “uncertainty” about climate science and delay policy action.

Exxon Secrets
ExxonSecrets exposes the campaign ExxonMobil has run for decades to fund climate change denial and delay political action.

PR Watch
Run by the Center for Media and Democracy, this site offers information on PR professionals in all sectors, including the fossil fuel industry and climate change. 

SourceWatch
Also run by the Center for Media and Democracy, Sourcewatch is an encyclopedia of well-documented information about corporate public relations (PR) campaigns, including corporate front groups, people who “front” corporate campaigns, and PR operations. 

ALEC Exposed
Also run by the Center for Media and Democracy, ALEC Exposed tracks the corporate-funded American Legislative Exchange Council’s efforts to undermine the public interest and democracy through lobbying and collaboration between corporations and politicians on “model bills” developed behind closed doors to shift state laws in favor of corporate interests instead of the public. 

Conservative Transparency
Formerly run by Media Matters Action Network, and now hosted by American Bridge 21st Century Foundation, this website is an interactive database that tracks the flow of money among conservative donors, organizations, and candidates.

Climate Science and Policy Watch
A program of the Government Accountability Project promoting integrity in the use of climate science in government, and tracking changes made to federal and administrative websites over time.

US Senate Lobby Filing Disclosure Program
A searchable database containing all US lobbyists, who they work for and the policies they are lobbying to change.

Government of Canada Lobbyist Registration
A searchable database containing all Canadian lobbyists, who they work for and the policies they are lobbying to change.

The Legacy Tobacco Documents
This site contains the entire library of documents relating to the Master Settlement Agreement between the US and the tobacco industry. In this searchable database you will find that many of the self-proclaimed climate change “skeptics” were also involved in confusing the public about the harmful effects of cigarette smoke.

DNS Stuff
Type in any website address in the “WHOIS” Lookup and see who really owns a website. We are constantly amazed at the information we find using this site.

Open Secrets
Check out this site for detailed information and analysis of industry donations to US politicians. A project of the Center for Responsive Politics.

Dirty Energy Money
Run by Oil Change International, this site tracks the oil, gas and coal industry money flowing into the U.S. Congress.

Government of Canada Corporate Registry
Find out the who’s who of a corporation or a non-profit registered under Canada’s corporate registry act. For example, we found that the founding directors of a non-profit called The Natural Resource Stewardship Project were also lobbyists for the energy industry.

Further research

Books covering climate science denial

• Merchants of Doubt, by Erik Conway and Naomi Oreskes
• Climate Cover-up, by James Hoggan
• Climate Change Denial: Heads in the Sand, by John Cook and Haydn Washington
• The Madhouse Effect: How Climate Change Denial Is Threatening Our Planet, Destroying Our Politics, and Driving Us Crazy,  by Michael Mann
• Dark Money, by Jane Mayer

News Tips and Confidential Information
Have some interesting news stories, or some information that you feel needs to get out? Fill out our news tips form.