We have entered a new era where climate disruption is reality and the scientific predictions have struck home.  We shouldn’t be surprised any longer as the improbable becomes the norm. As NWF Senior Scientist Dr. Amanda Staudt explains, “Global warming is putting hurricanes on steroids and we’re beginning to see the effects.”  The near-record warmth of the Atlantic waters that spawned the storm is the new normal, thanks to the warming caused by one trillion tons of carbon pollution that has been dumped in our atmosphere from burning oil, coal and gas.  More water in the atmosphere is the new normal, because warm air holds more water.  Higher sea levels from warmer waters and melting ice shelves are the new normal, amplifying the impacts of storm surges.

NASA GOES image of Sandy’s approach to the Eastern U.S. seaboard.

“What do you want to do if we think the future has sea level rising four inches, six inches? Where are the impacted areas, and what do you want to do to adapt to that? And as human beings as a — as a — as a species, that’s why we’re all still here. We have spent our entire existence adapting, OK? So we will adapt to this. Changes to weather patterns that move crop production areas around — we’ll adapt to that. It’s an engineering problem, and it has engineering solutions. And so I don’t — the fear factor that people want to throw out there to say we just have to stop this, I do not accept.”

At the same event, Tillerson criticized the American public as being too ignorant to embrace ExxonMobil’s vision of a fossil-fuel dependent future:

“Ours is an industry that is built on technology, it’s built on science, it’s built on engineering, and because we have a society that by and large is illiterate in these areas, science, math and engineering, what we do is a mystery to them and they find it scary. And because of that, it creates easy opportunities for opponents of development, activist organizations, to manufacture fear.”

Tillerson’s attack on the public as the problem, rather than offering responsible solutions to reduce pollution, was both insulting and frightening.  When do we stop letting oil companies write America’s energy plan because they think the drought that devastated farmers this summer and the storms ravaging our coasts are simply an engineering challenge?  What do you suppose Mr. Tillerson is doing today? I imagine it is just another day at work in Texas (earning $100,000 per day).

Where is the accountability for the decades of junk science Exxon funded to create confusion about the impact of burning fossil fuels on our climate, just as tobacco companies for so long funded efforts to deny the link between cigarettes and cancer?  Instead, Exxon and other oil companies are even now pursuing plans to make our fuel supply even dirtier and more dangerous than conventional oil, especially in Canada, where tar sands oil production creates three times as much carbon pollution as conventional oil extraction.

We can no longer afford to let Tillerson and his pals write the rules that put the rest of us in harm’s way. Right now, ExxonMobil and other companies don’t pay a penny for the carbon pollution that is pumped into the atmosphere from their products.  The rest of us, however, are paying an increasing cost.  Farmers are losing their crops.  Food prices have shot up.  Families are devastated by storms.  Governments spend billions of taxpayer money in emergency relief.  Insurance customers face higher premiums, if they can get insurance at all.  Until we have a fair system where companies pay a reasonable price for carbon pollution, cleaner energy alternatives will be bullied out of the way by big oil, and the bill we all pay from climate impacts will go up and up.

Tillerson is right about one thing: we need to better prepare for climate change.  The forecasters and emergency responders have done exceptional work to prepare for and respond to Sandy.  But long-term preparation should start with restoring natural systems such as wetlands that are the best coastal defense against storms.  We should have started 20 years ago, when Exxon was instead investing in its deception machine.  But we can make progress if communities and government agencies come together around common sense preparedness.  Where Tillerson is fundamentally wrong, however, is that adaptation alone can protect us.  Bailing only works if you aren’t making the hole in the bottom of the boat bigger. ExxonMobil’s energy vision would superheat the planet and sink the ship.  Instead, we should be working now to accelerate deployment of alternatives to oil and coal to safeguard our children’s future.

Donate now to help protect wildlife

Right now, Craig Newmark of Craigslist.org is matching donations made to NWF through CrowdRise.com in support of NWF’s efforts protect wildlife and continue our work to highlight the impacts of climate change. Give today at CrowdRise.com/NationalWildlifeFederation to have your gift for wildlife go twice as far.

A few hours ago, a news item about our old pals at the Heartland Institute was flying around the internet at light speed.

It seems that in preparation for their annual climate denial conference, which this year ends the day before NWF and concerned citizens will be gathering in Chicago for public hearings on proposed limits on carbon pollution from coal fired power plants, the partly Koch and ExxonMobil-funded right-wing think tank decided to suggest that ‘believing’ in climate change puts you in league with serial killers and terrorists. You know, MAYBE. Just throwing it out there.

Via The Guardian (and now many, many others):

The Heartland Institute, a Chicago-based rightwing thinktank notorious for promoting climate scepticism, has launched quite possibly one of the most ill-judged poster campaigns in the history of ill-judged poster campaigns.

I’ll let its own press release for its upcoming conference explain, as there’s simply no need to finesse it further:

Billboards in Chicago paid for by The Heartland Institute point out that some of the world’s most notorious criminals say they “still believe in global warming” – and ask viewers if they do, too…The billboard series features Ted Kaczynski, the infamous Unabomber; Charles Manson, a mass murderer; and Fidel Castro, a tyrant. Other global warming alarmists who may appear on future billboards include Osama bin Laden and James J. Lee (who took hostages inside the headquarters of the Discovery Channel in 2010).

Aside from being an example of the most ridiculous sort of ad hominem attack imaginable, this campaign is rife with logical and organizational inconsistencies. Kate Sheppard from Mother Jones points out that it hasn’t even been three months since Heartland issued a release carping about the need for “common decency” in discussing climate change. Classy move.

Heartland’s statement accompanying the project launch stated that “people who still believe in man-made global warming are mostly on the radical fringe of society.” And yet, “the United Nations, the so-called mainstream media, and leading political figures” are also talking about climate change. So, which is it? Fringe phenomenon, or incredibly widespread (and presumably conspiratorial) trend? As proof of its own bona fides, Heartland claims that “many of the world’s leading scientists, economists, and political leaders” have appeared at its climate denial conferences. WHOA—‘leading scientists?’ Aren’t those guys just fringe radicals? (actually, yes, the ones who attend Heartland conferences probably are.)

(Also of note: it’s highly questionable whether some of the featured madmen even had any special affinity for climate change as a cause. As E&E News reports (sub. req.), the words “climate change” don’t appear in the Unabomber’s manifesto, nor are there references to “global warming” or “carbon.”)

Less than an hour before people on the East Coast left work for the weekend, Heartland Institute President and CEO Joe Bast issued the following statement in response to a massive outcry:

We will stop running [the billboard] at 4:00 p.m. CST today. (It’s a digital billboard, so a simple phone call is all it takes.)

The Heartland Institute knew this was a risk when deciding to test it, but decided it was a necessary price to make an emotional appeal to people who otherwise aren’t following the climate change debate.

So, make a note: from now on, lying and acting like a disgruntled online commenter who invokes Hitler to end an argument = ‘an emotional appeal.’

General Motors pulled its funding of Heartland in March over the last round of climate denial messaging. One wonders how Heartland’s other funders will feel about this ‘test.’

Click here to view the embedded video.

“Human activity isn’t changing the climate…CO2 is harmless!…People can’t change the weather…A scientist will say anything if you pay them.”

Then, the coup de grace: “Of course it’s true. I learned it in school.”

Climate Reality is referring to the coal, oil and auto industry-funded Heartland Institute’s plan to “change the science taught in our public schools” by way of an under-development curriculum that purports to teach that climate change is scientifically “controversial.” Climate Reality asks: “Is the truth really for sale?” NWF and other organizations have posed similar questions in the last few weeks, only to be bombarded with cease-and-desist letters and vague threats.

To the untrained eye, Heartland is spitting in the wind. After all, American education is getting greener all the time. Witness the State Board of the Maryland Department of Education’s landmark new policy requiring high school students in the state to attain a basic level of environmental literacy before graduation, or the inclusion of environmental education provisions in an amendment to the reauthorized Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), marking the first time environmental education has been formally included in federal K-12 education policy. More significant still are the purely elective efforts, evidenced by an increase in environmental science Advanced Placement exams and ‘greening’ recognition across geographical and political lines (34 states have now opted in to the U.S. Green Ribbon Schools Award, and half of them have Republican governors and are generally viewed as ‘red’).

But Heartland didn’t get where it is by scrapping for half measures or lost causes. The “climate controversy” plan is actually incredibly canny—and highly cynical. Heartland senses that the decision-makers of generations to come are getting informed and chooses to exploit that awakening: sowing doubt under the pretense that more information, no matter the source, necessarily means a fuller understanding.

Basically, just as schools, teachers and students alike are starting to seek a clearer picture of how the world works and how they affect it, contrarian shysters are scrambling to smear the whole thing with Vaseline.

NWF cares about this issue. We support federal environmental education programs, many of which are in jeopardy. We are the U.S. host for the prestigious Eco-Schools program, which certifies schools that green their physical structures and curricula. We can use your help in making sure that America’s environmental education renaissance doesn’t drown in misinformation posing as legitimate “curriculum.”

If you’d like to help America’s kids learn accurate, balanced environmental science, ask Congress to pass the No Child Left Inside Act, a bill to help states develop stronger K-12 environmental literacy programs.

For more information on environmental education, check out Eco-Schools USA’s Climate Change pathway on incorporating global warming education into the curriculum in a practical and instructive way. You can also see the Guidelines for Excellence developed by the North American Association for Environmental Education or the reworked  Framework for K-12 Science Education, from the National Academies’ Board on Science Education.