Newly unearthed documents show that major oil companies, including Shell and the predecessors of energy giants Chevron, ExxonMobil and BP, were warned about the global warming effects of fossil fuels as early as 1954.
The warning, from the head of an industry-founded group known as the Air Pollution Foundation, was revealed by the Center for Climate Research and published by climate change website DeSmog on Tuesday. This could be the first time a major oil company has been made aware of the potentially dire consequences of its products.
“With every push to combat climate change, we see fossil fuel companies downplaying and denying the harms of burning fossil fuels,” said Rebecca, a researcher at the Center for Climate Research who discovered the historic memo. John says. “We now have evidence that they were doing this in the ’50s in early attempts to crack down on pollution sources.”
The Air Pollution Foundation was founded in 1953 by oil interests in response to public outcry over the smog that blanketed Los Angeles County.
Researchers had identified hydrocarbon pollution from fossil fuel sources such as automobiles and oil refineries as the main culprit, and Los Angeles officials had begun proposing measures to control the pollution.
The Air Pollution Foundation is primarily funded by the Western States Petroleum Association, a lobbying group, and although it has publicly stated that it wants to help solve the smog crisis, it was founded primarily to counter regulatory efforts. is shown in a new note.
Jeffrey Suplan, a climate disinformation expert at the University of Miami, said this is a common tactic used today.
“The Air Pollution Foundation appears to be one of the earliest and most brazen efforts by the oil industry to support front groups that exaggerate scientific uncertainties to protect business as usual,” Soupran said. “This helped lay the strategic and organizational foundation for decades of climate change denial and delay by big oil companies.”
The lobbying group, then called the Western Oil and Gas Association, gave the group $1.3 million (equivalent to $14 million today) to the Air Pollution Foundation in the 1950s. The money came from member companies including Shell and companies later acquired or merged with ExxonMobil, BP, Chevron, Sunoco and ConocoPhillips, as well as SoCal Gas, a Southern California utility.
The Air Pollution Foundation has hired respected chemical engineer Lauren B. Hitchcock as its president. And in 1954, the group, which had previously blamed households burning waste in their backyards, submitted a proposal to the California Institute of Technology to identify the main sources of smog. requested that it be submitted.
In November 1954, the California Institute of Technology submitted a proposal with grave warnings about coal, oil, and gas, stating that “changes in atmospheric CO2 concentrations in response to climate” would “ultimately be of considerable importance to civilization.” He said that there is a possibility that it “indicates sexuality.” Notes previously revealed on John’s show. Newly discovered documents show the Air Pollution Foundation shared a warning with members of the Western Oil and Gas Association in March 1955.
In the mid-1950s, climate researchers began to understand the effects of fossil fuels on global warming and began discussing new research in the media. But a newly revealed Air Pollution Foundation memo represents the oldest known warning message to the oil industry about the greenhouse effect.
The Air Pollution Foundation’s board of directors, which includes representatives from SoCalGas and Union Oil, which was later acquired by Chevron, approved funding for the Caltech project. The following month, Foundation President Hitchcock advocated for regulation of refinery pollution and testified before the California State Senate in support of state-funded pollution research.
Hitchcock was reprimanded by industry leaders for these efforts. At an April 1955 meeting, the Western Oil and Gas Association told him that he was drawing too much “attention” to refinery pollution and conducting “a research program that is too broad.” The Air Pollution Foundation aims to “protect” the industry and should publish “results that can be accepted as impartial” of the meeting minutes exposed by John Shaw.
After this meeting, the foundation made no further mention of the potential climate impacts of fossil fuels, according to publications reviewed by DeSmog.
“The fossil fuel industry is often seen as following the tobacco industry’s strategy of denying science and blocking regulation,” Soupran said. “But these documents suggest that Big Oil has had a public relations campaign that downplays the dangers of its products for as long as Big Tobacco, starting with air pollution in the early to mid-1950s. “
In the months that followed, many of the Foundation’s research projects were scaled back or designed to be conducted in direct partnership with lobbying groups. Hitchcock resigned as president in 1956.
Last year, Oregon’s largest county sued the Western States Petroleum Association for instilling doubts about the climate crisis despite long-standing knowledge.
The Center for Desmogging and Climate Research previously undertook the Air Pollution Foundation’s early research into CO2, conducted in 1955 and 1956 by renowned climate scientist Charles David Keeling, and how fossil fuels cause air pollution. discovered that paved the way for his groundbreaking “Keeling curve”. Increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Other previous research found that major fossil companies had spent decades conducting their own research on the effects of burning coal, oil and gas. In one 2023 study, Exxon scientists made “breathtakingly” accurate predictions about global warming in the 1970s and 1980s, but then spent decades questioning climate science. It turned out that it was planted.
The newly unearthed documents come from the archives of the California Institute of Technology, the U.S. National Archives, the University of California at San Diego, the State University of New York at Buffalo, and a Los Angeles newspaper from the 1950s.
The top U.S. fossil fuel lobby groups, the Western States Petroleum Association and the American Petroleum Institute, did not respond to requests for comment.
