Gore: Energy Companies Mislead Public

SINGAPORE — Vice President Gore said yesterday that some of the world's largest energy companies, including ExxonMobil Corp., are funding research aimed at disputing the scientific consensus on global warming as part of a campaign to mislead the public. ExxonMobil, the world's largest publicly traded oil company, rejected the allegation.

"There has been an organized campaign, financed to the tune of about $10 million a year from some of the largest carbon polluters, to create the impression that there is disagreement in the scientific community" about global warming, Mr. Gore said at a forum in Singapore. "In actuality, there is very little disagreement."

"This is one of the strongest of scientific consensus views in the history of science," Mr. Gore said. "We live in a world where what used to be called propaganda now has a major role to play in shaping public opinion."

Mr. Gore likened the campaign to that of the millions of dollars spent by American tobacco companies years ago on creating the appearance of uncertainty and debate within the scientific community on the harmful effects of smoking cigarettes.

"Some of the tobacco companies spent millions of dollars to create the appearance that there was disagreement on the science. And some of the large coal and utility companies and the largest oil company, ExxonMobil, have been involved in doing that exact same thing for the last several years," Mr. Gore said.

After the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, made up of the world's top climate scientists, released a report in February that warned the cause of global warming is "very likely" man-made, "the deniers offered a bounty of $10,000 for each article disputing the consensus that people could crank out and get published somewhere," Mr. Gore said.

"They're trying to manipulate opinion and they are taking us for fools," he said.

Last year, British and American science advocacy groups accused ExxonMobil of funding groups that undermine the scientific consensus on climate change. The company said the scientists' reports were just attempts to smear ExxonMobil's name and confuse the debate.