ENVIRONMENT -- REPORT REVEALS OIL GIANT KOCH INDUSTRIES IS A 'FINANCIAL KINGPIN' OF CLIMATE CHANGE DENIERS: A new Greenpeace report has revealed privately owned U.S. oil company Koch Industries donated nearly $48 million to climate change denying groups from 1997-2008, outstripping even Exxon Mobil in its funding efforts and "also spent $5.7m on political campaigns and $37m on direct lobbying to support fossil fuels." According to the report, the Kansas-based company -- owned by billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, who have long worked to burnish their reputations by buying museum and opera halls -- has contributed $24.9 million to global warming denying groups since 2005 compared to Exxon Mobil's $8.9 million in contributions. The report also finds that Koch Industries "provided financing for organizations that heavily propagated the so-called 'ClimateGate' scandal." For example, Koch funded a 2007 junk science analysis that disputed the risks climate change posed for polar bears and financed supposedly independent Spanish and Danish studies that attacked green jobs and propagated a pack of lies about the costs of climate legislation. Responding to the report's charges that Koch Industries amounted to the "financial kingpin of climate science denial and clean energy opposition," the company's communications director Melissa Cohlmia said they have "worked to advance economic freedom and market-based policy solutions to challenges faced by society."

(The Progressive)