Memorandum for the Petitioners \ 45
climate risks created by those emissions. At an event marking the 100th
anniversary of the oil industry at Columbia University, Mi'. Teller said:
It has been calculated that a temperature rise
corresponding to a 10 per cent increase in carbon dioxide will
be sufficient to melt the icecap and submerge New York. All
the coastal cities would be covered [in water] ... I think that
this chemical contamination is more serious than most
people tend to believe.162
5.51. Based on the archival documents he retrieved, Dr. Franta
concluded that even before the Keeling Curve (a graph of carbon
dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere) was published in the 1960s, “oil
industry leaders were aware that their products were causing CO2
pollution to accumulate in the planet’s atmosphere in a potentially
dangerous fashion .” 163
2.
C
1960s
5.52. Respondent Shell was individually on notice of the role of its
fossil fuel products in causing climate change no later than 1962 five
decades ago with the Chief Consulting Geologist, Marion King Hubbert,
producing a lengthy report that Mr. Muffett noted, “ bears striking
similarities to global climate models released even many years later.« 164
—
—
r
5.53. Mr. Hubbert’s report also describes a 1961 presentation by Yale
University Professor, Evelyn Hutchinson, that concluded, “ [t]here is evidence
that the greatly increasing use of the fossil fuels ... is seriously contaminating
the earth’s atmosphere with CO2.« 165 Mr. Hubbert notes that CCEmay already
be producing “ climatic change in the direction of higher average temperatures.
This could have profound effects both on the weather and on the ecological
balance.” 166 Hubbert also recounts Professor Hutchinson’s urging of “serious
consideration of the maximum utilization of solar energy «167 This means
that respondent Shell was aware , or should have been aware, of the need
to shift to renewable energy five decades ago.
,
Franta, B. (01 January 2018), On its 100th birthday> in 1959, Edward Teller Warned the Oil Industry
About Global Warming, The Guardian, available at https://www.theguardian .com /environment/climateconsensus-97-per-cent/2018/jan/01/on-its-hundredth-birthday- in-1959-ed ward-teller-wamed-the-oilindustry-about-global-warming ( last accessed on 12 September 2019).
163
Franta, B., supra note 149, p. 1024.
164
Muffett, C., supra note 141, p. 20.
165
Id., p. 21, Fig. 3.
166
Ibid
167
Ibid
162
Select target paragraph3
Connect to a paragraph
Connect to an entity
Disable highlights
Add to table of contents