Why Exxon makes Koch Giggle

onJun 29, 2007 @ 09:48 PDT

As regular readers of DeSmogBlog know, ExxonMobil has been a regular target of bad ink for their continued funding of “think” tanks and industry associations that spread misinformation about the scientific evidence for human-caused global warming.

While Exxon is continuously vilified as the leader of the attack on climate change science, the Koch Foundation is heavily involved in the same type of activity, but receives very little of the bad press.

Anyone want to start www.kochsecrets.org?

However, an organization that you may not have heard of is equally guilty of such activities.

The Koch (pronounced “coke”) Family of Foundations is run by David and Charles Koch, sons of the founder of Koch Industries, Fred Koch. Koch Industries is the world’s largest privately owned company and while it now boasts a diversified portfolio of companies, it cut its teeth in the 1940’s as an oil refining company and today produces 800,000 barrels of oil per day through one of its subsidiaries.

Some examples:

The Cato Institute was founded by Charles Koch in 1977, and has received a reported $13.2 million from the Koch Family foundations since 1986. Cato has received $110,000 from ExxonMobil since 1991.

The Heritage Foundation has received $2.4 million from Koch, while receiving $585,000 from ExxonMobil.

The Reason Foundation has received $2.2 million from Koch, while receiving $381,000 from ExxonMobil.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute received $666,000 from Koch, while receiving a whopping $2 million from ExxonMobil.

And the list goes on, but the media and NGO spotlight remains heavily focussed on the funding activities of the publicly traded oil company, while the private one remains, for the most part, private. We here at the DeSmogBlog are just as guilty of focusing most of our attention on the activities of ExxonMobil, as are many others. And why not. With ExxonMobil publicly disclosing its funding activities on an annual basis, they make an easy target.

In the Fall, 2006 the Royal Society in the UK issued a public letter demanding that ExxonMobil discontinue its think tank war on climate science and this demand was met with a small measure of success. ExxonSecrets.org, operated by Greenpeace, has done amazing work as well in this area. Such efforts are to be commended. However it is imperative that when it comes to such things we do not put on our Exxon blinders to the exclusion of all others.

To that end I have registered the website domain name www.kochsecrets.org if anyone is interested.

By Kevin Grandia

Kevin is a contributor and strategic adviser to DeSmog. He runs the digital marketing agency Spake Media House. Named a “Green Hero” by Rolling Stone Magazine and one of the “Top 50 Tweeters” on climate change and environment issues, Kevin has appeared in major news media outlets around the world for his work on digital campaigning. Kevin has been involved in the public policy arena in both the United States and Canada for more than a decade. For five years he was the managing editor of DeSmogBlog.com. In this role, Kevin’s research into the “climate denial industry” and the right-wing think tank networks was featured in news media articles around the world. He is most well known for his ground-breaking research into David and Charles Koch’s massive financial investments in the Republican and tea party networks. Kevin is the first person to be designated a “Certified Expert” on the political and community organizing platform NationBuilder. Prior to DeSmog, Kevin worked in various political and government roles. He was Senior Advisor to the Minister of State for Multiculturalism and a Special Assistant to the Minister of State for Asia Pacific, Foreign Affairs for the Government of Canada. Kevin also worked in various roles in the British Columbia provincial government in the Office of the Premier and the Ministry of Health. In 2008 Kevin co-founded a groundbreaking new online election tool called Vote for Environment which was later nominated for a World Summit Award in recognition of the world’s best e-Content and innovative ICT applications. Kevin moved to Washington, DC in 2010 where he worked for two years as the Director of Online Strategy for Greenpeace USA and has since returned to his hometown of Vancouver, Canada.