Can Energy Companies Be Held Accountable for Climate Change?
This question posed relates to knowingly polluting the environment with an awareness that it is affecting climate and hence the planetary support systems. It came into my mind after reading this. I can feel the counter movement already.
I just felt inspiration to check if Exxon is in Trump team. I am not monitoring the news, I allow it to come to me naturally as I need to know. Turns out the Exxon’s head is planning to be the Secretary of State. Refer https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/dec/13/rex-tillerson-secretary-of-state-experience
The next question: Is it appropriate for the Head of Exxon to be the Secretary of State when he has a bias towards fossil fuels that cause climate change and undermine planetary support systems?
It was put to me by a former journalist the question – should politicians be given training in public office with a focus on ethics, civics and citizenship etc.? good question.
Are business people going to make decisions in the best interests of those they represent – the public or will they make decisions based on business interests?
Another feeling… the gold bar or the earth?
Exxon Has to Release Decades of Internal Climate Change Documents, a Massachusetts Judge Rules
A Massachusetts judge has refused to excuse Exxon Mobil (xom, +1.02%) from a request by the state’s attorney general to hand over decades worth of documents on its views on climate change, state officials said on Wednesday.
The decision by Massachusetts Superior Court Judge Heidi Brieger denying Exxon ‘s request for an order exempting it from handing over the documents represents a legal victory for Attorney General Maura Healey, who is investigating the world’s largest publicly traded oil company’s climate policies.
“This order affirms our longstanding authority to investigate fraud,” Healey said on Twitter following the decision, adding that Exxon “must come clean about what it knew about climate change.”
Exxon spokesman Alan Jeffers said the company was “reviewing the decision to determine next steps.”
Healey is one of two state prosecutors, the other being her counterpart in New York, investigating whether Exxon knowingly misled its shareholders and the public as to what it knew about climate change.
The investigations follow separate reports by online news publication Inside Climate News and the Los Angeles Times showing that Exxon worked to play down the risks of climate change despite its own scientists’ having raised concerns about it decades earlier.
http://fortune.com/2017/01/12/exxon-mobil-massachusetts-climate-change/
Asked during the hearing if he believed human activity was contributing to climate change, Tillerson did not answer yes or no, but said, “The increase in greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere are having an effect. Our abilities to predict that effect are very limited.”