Exxon Accurately Predicted Global Warming, Years Before Casting Doubt on Climate Science

(Inside Climate News, 12 Jan 2023) New research shows the company’s scientists were as “skillful” as independent experts in predicting how the burning of fossil fuels would warm the planet and bring about climate change.

For climate activists, the term “Exxon Knew” has settled deeply into the lexicon of climate accountability, shorthand for the contradiction between the oil giant’s long campaign to publicly question climate science and its internal understanding that the science was sound. 

Now, new academic research lends statistical rigor to this concept by showing that the company’s own climate projections, dating back decades, consistently predicted the warming that was to come primarily from burning fossil fuels.

The peer-reviewed paper, published Thursday in the journal Science, analyzed all known climate predictions produced or reported by scientists at ExxonMobil and its predecessor from 1977-2003, and found that they were “at least as skillful” as those by independent experts (Exxon merged with Mobil in 1999). Like those independent models, most of Exxon’s proved to be accurate.

External link

Inside Climate News, 12 Jan 2023: Exxon Accurately Predicted Global Warming, Years Before Casting Doubt on Climate Science