Here’s a fun fact: Sea otters, the adorable creatures known for holding hands while sleeping so they don’t float apart, are playing a vital role in regulating the Earth’s climate. This is detailed in a new book by James Estes, who uncovers a food web that connects otters to the climate. Basically, kelp is a carbon sink. Urchins eat kelp. Otters eat urchins. In places where otters no longer live, the urchin populations grow so big as to decimate the kelp. So by keeping the urchin population in check, otters protect an important carbon sink.
In the significantly less cute world of climate denial, a somewhat similar food web exists, dubbed the #WebofDenial. Playing the role of urchins are groups like ALEC and CFACT, who are funded by Kochs, ExxonMobil, Peabody and others. They prey on the public to reduce demands to stop climate change, like how urchins obliterate the kelp that stores carbon and reduces warming. Fortunately, some Congressional climate leaders have stepped up to crack down on those deniers, like urchins cracked on adorable otter bellies.
These leaders introduced a Concurrent Resolution in the House and Senate yesterday that expressed the disapproval of the fossil-fuel industry funded #WebofDenial. The CR points out that these interlocking web of groups are acting like the lead and tobacco industries, and seek to “deliberately mislead the public” and “cast doubt on science in order to protect their financial interests.” It also called on those groups to “cooperate with active or future investigations” into climate change lobbying, with floor speeches calling out individual organizations by name.
This Congressional urchin-outing couldn’t come at a better time, as it was just revealed that despite its claims to have halted all denial funding nearly a decade ago, ExxonMobil continues to fund organizations that fight against climate action. With this info, we can now confidently trace $33 million in ExxonMobil money to denial groups. At the same time, recent reporting showed that the American Petroleum Institute is trying to figure out a new approach to climate change, indicating the industry’s increasingly worried position.
But if you’re disappointed to have missed the speeches yesterday, don’t worry! This evening speeches from Boxer, Franken, Warren, Markey and others are scheduled to air on C-SPAN2. And although the GOP majority in Congress is probably not even going to allow this to come to a vote, as Bill McKibben has pointed out, the biggest changes come not from specific legislation, but from a change in public perception- a shift in the zeitgeist.
So tune in tonight to see some denier-urchins named and shamed on the Hill, so that their efforts to prey on the kelp-public’s demand for climate action don’t go unnoticed. Between the #ExxonKnew investigations, and this #WebofDenial blitz, the urchins of denial really otter be worried.
Top Climate and Clean Energy Stories:
Hillary Clinton could run on strongest climate change platform ever | The draft platform calls for putting a price on carbon, making approval of pipelines contingent on a climate test, stronger regulation of fracking – especially concerning water – and giving priority to renewable energy
Meet the woman who took on Canada's tar sand barons | Environmental campaigner Tzeporah Berman was once branded an ‘enemy of the state’ for taking on oil companies. Now she’s talking to them, with surprising results
President Trump would be a climate catastrophe | His pro-coal, anti-wind dogma would set climate action back years – and leave a harmful legacy for generations
Wild Weather Powers South Australia’s Wind Farms to Milestone - Wind provided 83 percent of the state’s power needs in the 24 hours to 4 p.m. on Monday when turbines helped turn the wild weather whipping the state into renewable energy