Rio Grande LNG’s Developer Led Ghostwriting Campaign to Get Federal Approval

A busy pier with Texas flags at sunset and silhouetted birds, a light house, and palm trees

In March, a man named David Irizarry wrote a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) in support of a liquefied natural gas (LNG) project to be built in Brownsville, Texas. The Rio Grande LNG project (RGLNG), estimated to cost more than $11 billion, would be the largest private sector investment in Texas’ history. […]

Effort to Give Oil Companies $97 Million Tax Break in Louisiana Halted

A man on a four-wheeler drives behind a black and white dairy cow through a field, with orange construction fencing and a fracking well flare and tanks beyond.

For the fifth time, a Louisiana lawmaker has introduced legislation to try to reduce the tax that fossil fuel firms pay on oil they produce in the state. The original version of the bill introduced by Rep. Phillip DeVillier this spring would have cost the state $97 million over the next five years, according to […]

Princeton Maps Reveal US Plans for Massive CO2 Pipeline Buildout

A yellow, black, and red metal sign warning of a buried carbon dioxide pipeline in arid rural country with hills and a few shrubs.

I have been calling the carbon capture CO2 pipeline buildout plan a “publicly-funded sewer system for the fossil fuel industry” for some time. In fact it’s their only lifeline, and in the meantime it’s also really good for greenwashing and TV ads. A reality check is in order. New analysis here of a major report published by […]

‘Fire Weather’ Author Recounts Alberta Wildfire Disaster in Terrifying Detail

A stream of water is 'inhaled' by the 2016 Fort McMurray wildfire disaster. Photo by Matthew Heikel

The costliest disaster in Canadian history took place in May 2016, when a vicious wildfire swept through Fort McMurray, forcing roughly 90,000 people to evacuate a city at the heart of Alberta’s oil sands industry. Seven years later, out-of-control wildfires once again threaten the province, forcing tens of thousands out of their homes and causing […]

Tory MP Andrea Jenkyns Joins Board of Climate Science Denial Group

Conservative MP Andrea Jenkyns has become a director of Net Zero Watch (NZW), a pressure group which denies climate science and campaigns for more fossil fuel extraction.  She is the latest high profile figure to ally with NZW’s parent organisation, the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), which is the UK’s principal climate science denial group […]

Revealed: 1 in 3 GB News Hosts Spread Climate Denial On Air in 2022

A majority of GB News hosts attacked climate action on the channel in 2022, while one in three spread climate science denial, a DeSmog analysis can reveal.  Opponents of green policies have seized on the energy crisis sparked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to denounce the UK’s net zero target and push for new, environmentally-damaging […]

Hoboken Lodges First State-Level Racketeering Charge in Big Oil Climate Lawsuit

In a first at the state level, the City of Hoboken, New Jersey recently added racketeering charges to its climate lawsuit against major petroleum producers and their national trade group the American Petroleum Institute (API). Hoboken is making this claim against fossil fuel companies under the state-level equivalent of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations […]

Cleaning Up After the North Sea Oil Industry Will Cost Billions – But Nobody Wants to Pay

This story is the start of The North Sea Investigations, a multi-year international reporting project on the battle for the future of the North Sea, led by Dutch investigative journalism platform Follow the Money in cooperation with Norwegian broadcaster NRK, Belgian newspaper De Tijd and DeSmog. Skimming across the waves in inflatable dinghies, activists closed […]