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It is always possible to find information and people who agree with your own personal beliefs, but what you discover may not always be true. Go to original sources to get to the crux of any matter. Check out the official websites of Exxon, BP, Shell, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, the World Coal Association, etc. It is hard to deny human-caused climate change and its disastrous aftereffects when these companies have done their own research and admit their complicity.

Fossil fuel industries have known for decades that climate change is real and is caused by the burning of their own products. They all know that the resultant proliferation of carbon dioxide is the primary reason for the increase in number and severity of devastating storms. They even predicted the dire consequences we are now experiencing around the globe.

On their websites, these massively profitable corporations acknowledge their role in climate change because their own research has been exposed in recent years. To curry public favor, they all promise to do better, clean up their acts, reduce their emissions, and become better stewards of the planet.

However, it is wise to remember that big corporations are not generally altruistic. Most rely on cost/benefit analysis to make their operating decisions. This makes sense until one realizes they will poison, pollute, even destroy living things until it is no longer profitable, or until public outcry becomes a threat to their very existence.

Sadly, it is always about rapacious greed and money. There is no heart in that equation.

Gail Colegrove

Sandpoint