comm-appendix-support-cross

8/1/2016 More Exxon Documents Show How Much It Knew About Climate 35 Years Ago | InsideClimate News
Edward E. David, Jr., president of Exxon Research
and Engineering, in case the topic came up at an
Exxon symposium in San Francisco where David
would be speaking.
Based on documentary evidence, it appears the
summary went through several drafts and the final
version went to David's office on May 15.
The bullet points that Shaw presented to David start
with the idea that "there is sufficient time to study
the problem before corrective action is required."
Shaw based his caution on estimates that higher
global temperatures caused by rising CO2 would
only be felt around the year 2000, and that CO2
concentrations in the atmosphere would double in
about 100 years. Those gaps, Shaw wrote, permit
"time for an orderly transition to non-fossil fuel
technologies should restrictions on fossil fuel use be
deemed necessary."
The document did not raise doubts about the links
between fossil fuel use, higher CO2 concentrations
and a warmer planet. Shaw wrote:
• "Atmospheric CO2 will double in 100 years if
fossil fuels grow at 1.4%/ a 2 .
• 3 0 C global average temperature rise and
10 o C at poles if CO2 doubles.
—Major shifts in rainfall/agriculture
—Polar ice may melt"
Eleven other staff and managers at Exxon Research,
besides David, were sent the paper with the
corporate position on global warming that Shaw had
articulated.
By the end of the 1980s, Exxon would publicly pivot
away from open consideration of any restrictions on
fossil fuel use because of its effect on the
atmosphere.
In 1996, when climate research was more certain
about the link between fossil fuel combustion and
App. 585
https://insideclimatenews.org/news/01122015/documents-exxons-early-co2-position-senior-executives-engage-and-warming-forecast 5/9