Tag Archives: climate science

1982 Exxon speech “Inventing the Future: Energy and the CO2 ‘Greenhouse’ Effect”

This is a speech to a 1982 gathering of climate scientists at the Lamont-Doherty Geophysical Observatory by Dr. E. E. David, Jr., president of the Exxon Research and Engineering Company, regarding the “greenhouse effect,” i.e. climate change, and the importance of scientific research in figuring out how to respond to it – how to “invent […]

1981 Internal Exxon “CO2 Position Statement”

On May 15, 1981, Henry Shaw, a manager with Exxon Research & Engineering’s Technology Feasibility center, sent a “Preliminary Statement of Exxon’s Position on the Growth of Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide” to Edward. E David Jr., president of the Exxon Research and Engineering Company. The inter-office correspondence outlined Exxon’s “current position on the CO2 Greenhouse effect” […]

1980 Internal Exxon Memorandum: Greenhouse Program

June 9, 1980 internal memorandum from Exxon Research and Engineering’s H.N. Weinberg to H. Shaw and N.R. Werthamer about Exxon’s CO2 research initiative, the “Greenhouse Program.” Shaw was a manager of the Environmental Area in Exxon Research & Engineering and an early advocate for the company’s research of atmospheric CO2. Werthamer was Shaw’s boss. This […]

1979 Climate Research Board: “Carbon Dioxide and Climate: A Scientific Assessment”

At the request of President Carter’s Executive Office, the National Academy of Sciences convened the Climate Research Board to assess the scientific basis for “future climatic changes resulting from man-made releases of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.” The study concludes that at the present rate of carbon emissions the global surface will warm 2 to […]

1974 Mobil Senior VP Dayton Clewell speech to MIT Alumni Advisory Council

This document is a 1974 speech by Senior Vice President of Mobil, Dayton Clewell, to the MIT Alumni Advisory Council titled, “Gasoline Supply and Emission Control: A Case Study of Today’s Complex Inter-Relationships.” Clewell blames the 1970s energy crisis on climate scientists and the “sensation loving public.” Clewell urges Congress to freeze the 1974 emission […]

1965 API President “Meeting the Challenges of 1966”

This document, uncovered by Benjamin Franta in a letter to the Editor of Nature, contains the annual remarks of the American Petroleum Institute’s (“API”) President, Frank Ikard. Delivered in 1965, Ikard was preparing the oil industry for the challenges in the coming year. Significant for his acknowledgement of the 1965 Science Advisory Committee report (“Report”) that highlighted climate change and carbon emission hazards, Ikard worried of the industry’s challenges as they “grow in number, size, and complexity year by year.” In the face of The Water Quality Act, Clean Air Act amendment, and local regulations addressing pollution, Ikard said “[i]t takes no crystal ball to see that our involvement in government matters will intensify in the year ahead.”

1959 Shell “The Earth’s Carbon Cycle” Article

This article by Shell International Chemical Company’s Dr. M. A. Matthews, “The Earth’s Carbon Cycle,” was featured in the October 1959, Volume 6 Number 151 edition of the weekly publication The New Scientist. A rebuttal to Dr. Edward Teller’s 1957 address to the American Chemical Society, this piece shows the interest and attention the oil […]