20 melt the polar ice caps and submerge heavily populated coastal areas— including New York City, where the symposium was convened.23 1962—Shell’s chief geologist reports growing concern among other eminent scientists and acknowledges the link between carbon dioxide risk and the need to seek alternative energy sources. In 1962, Shell’s Chief Consulting Geologist, Marion King Hubbert, authored a book length report on the world’s energy resources. (Submitted for the record as document annex to slide 28 of my presentation of May 23rd.) The report demonstrates the industry’s profound and sophisticated understanding of the Earth’s energy balance, including how solar energy flows into the earth as solar radiation before much of it is reflected back into space through longwave radiation, how a smaller portion of that solar energy is converted into carbon by plant and animal life, how that a portion of that energy is converted to fossil fuels over vast spans of geologic time, and how the rise of the fossil economy was releasing the vast stores of energy and carbon in these fuels back into society and into the world, at scale hitherto unknown in human history. In its sophistication, projections and systematic approach to the flow of energy into and through the earth’s physical and biological systems, King’s work bears striking similarities to global climate models released even many years later. Hubbert does not incorporate fossil related climate risk into his models, but a discussion late in his book demonstrates that Shell Oil—like Exxon—had been informed of those risks and their potential significance. (Fig. 3) Recounting a presentation by Professor Evelyn Hutchinson of Yale in 1961, Hubbert reports that “[t]here is evidence that the greatly increasing use of the fossil fuels…is seriously contaminating the earth’s atmosphere with CO2.” He notes that increases in CO2 may 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.” 23 Benjamin Franta, On its 100th birthday in 1959, Edward Teller warned the oil industry about global warming, THE GUARDIAN, January 1, 2018. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2018/jan/01/on-itshundredth-birthday-in-1959-edward-teller-warned-the-oil-industry-about-global-warming.