BBC: pension fund invested in climate companies

7 February, 2010 by

Sunday Express

If you’ve ever wondered why the BBC has been so biased towards the global warming movement, perhaps the UK Express has provided the answer. It appears that huge swathes of the BBC’s own massive pension fund is invested in companies “whose success depends on the theory [of AGW] being widely accepted.”

The corporation is under investigation after being inundated with complaints that its editorial coverage of climate change is biased in favour of those who say it is a man-made phenomenon.

The £8billion pension fund is likely to come under close scrutiny over its commitment to promote a low-carbon economy while struggling to reverse an estimated £2billion deficit.

Concerns are growing that BBC journalists and their bosses regard disputed scientific theory that climate change is caused by mankind as “mainstream” while huge sums of employees’ money is invested in companies whose success depends on the theory being widely accepted.

The fund, which has 58,744 members, accounts for about £8 of the £142.50 licence fee and the proportion looks likely to rise while programme budgets may have to be cut to help reduce the deficit.

The BBC is the only media organisation in Britain whose pension fund is a member of the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change, which has more than 50 members across Europe.

Its chairman is Peter Dunscombe, also the BBC’s Head of Pensions Investment.

Prominent among its recent campaigns was a call for a “strong and binding” global agreement on climate change – one that fell on deaf ears after the UN climate summit in Copenhagen failed to reach agreement on emissions targets and a cut in greenhouse gases.

So if you were being cynical, you may think the BBC plugs the alarmist line in order to ensure the security of its own investments, which aren’t doing so well at the moment. Sounds like a serious conflict, undermining the Corporation’s editorial impartiality (and probably breaching its own guidelines).

Read it here. (h/t Jonathan S-B)

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: ,

BBC was sent CRU emails over a month ago

30 November, 2009 by

Climate bias

But because the BBC is the “Biased Broadcasting Corporation” and has already made up its mind on climate change (it’s all our fault), for some strange reason it didn’t think the content of the CRU emails was newsworthy enough to broadcast!

A BBC weatherman has admitted he was sent the controversial emails about how to “spin” climate data – more than a month before they were made public.

It has raised questions about why the BBC did not report on the matter sooner, and will reignite the debate over whether the Corporation is “biased” on the issue of climate change. [It is. Next question – Ed]

Thousands of emails and documents allegedly stolen from the University of East Anglia (UEA) and posted online indicate that researchers massaged figures to mask the fact that world temperatures have been declining in recent years.

The emails sent between world’s leading scientists apparently show researchers discussing how to ‘spin’ climate data and how that information should be presented to the media.

Paul Hudson, weather presenter and climate change expert, has disclosed he was sent the leaked emails, a month ago, and claims the documents are a direct result of an article he wrote.

In his BBC blog written last week , he said: “I was forwarded the chain of emails on the 12th October, which are comments from some of the world’s leading climate scientists written as a direct result of my article “Whatever Happened To Global Warming”.

“The emails released on the Internet as a result of CRU being hacked into are identical to the ones I was forwarded and read at the time and so, as far as I can see, they are authentic,” he added.

The BBC has previously accused of failing to cover the climate change debate objectively. Earlier this year, Peter Sisson, the veteran newsreader, claimed it is now “effectively BBC policy” to stifle critics of the consensus view on global warming.

He said: “The Corporation’s most famous interrogators invariably begin by accepting that “the science is settled”, when there are countless reputable scientists and climatologists producing work that says it isn’t.

“But it is effectively BBC policy… that those views should not be heard.”

Goebbels really would have been proud.

Read it here.

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: , , ,

The Age kisses Gore's backside

6 November, 2009 by

Try running three 30" monitors on sunbeams, pal

Try running three 30" monitors on sunbeams, pal

To the editors of The Age and all the other Fairfax media outlets, Al Gore is a brave warrior for the planet, courageously flying all over the world by private jet in order to make more money out of an imagined climate crisis. I beg to differ – the man peddles misinformation and refuses to debate, in other words, he’s a snake oil salesman.

But that doesn’t stop The Age, who put together a sycophantic, fawning piece about Big Al’s new book, Our Choice: A Plan to solve the Climate Crisis. That there is a “climate crisis” is a given, of course, since Gore put the tick in the “science is settled” box by way of An Inconvenient Truth, if you ignore the nine fundamental errors and the scores of other misrepresentations. So this one is all about solutions.

Gore’s new book, the result of more than two years of consultations with leading scientists, technologists, economists and, yes, neuroscientists, is his attempt to lay out a detailed solution to the climate crisis [and line his pockets at the same time – Ed]. It is an attempt to spell out in a way that ordinary readers can understand the current state of technology and what still needs to be invented to bring a low-carbon world to reality.

There are passages where it becomes a little dense, but for the most part it is a worthy sequel to An Inconvenient Truth, full of optimism about the promise of science to solve this urgent crisis — although perhaps it skims over the possible changes that we all might need to make to our lifestyles.

While it explores all technologies from nuclear to “clean coal”, the book leans heavily towards the renewables such as wind, solar and geothermal energy, arguing that the economics of nuclear and the uncertain viability of carbon capture and storage make them less viable.

Maybe Gore could set the example by running his mansion (and his three monitors), which consumes about as much electricity as all of sub-Saharan Africa put together, on sunbeams and wind power, as he suggests for the rest of us.

Read it here.

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: , ,
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