Message From the Editor

Question: What are executives from some of the world’s largest oil and gas firms, major religious right groups, and far-right politicians from the U.S., UK, EU, and Australia all doing in London this week?

Answer: Attending a conservative conference hosted by the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC), an event billed as an effort to “re-lay the foundations of civilization.” Conservative Canadian influencer Jordan Peterson, who decries “the alarmist treatment of climate,” is convening the ARC event featuring panels that are filled with prominent deniers of the climate crisis. 

President Trump’s new Energy Secretary and former fracking services CEO Chris Wright called the transition to renewable energy “lunacy.” In a conference speech delivered via video link, he also vowed to “get out of the way” of coal, oil, and gas, and deemed the UK’s 2050 net zero target “a sinister goal” that would “impoverish” people. Read more.

DeSmog viewed a leaked list of thousands of ARC conference attendees, revealing that representatives of BP, Koch Inc, Valero Energy, and Energy Transfer signed up to rub elbows alongside leaders of prominent religious right groups closely linked to President Trump, including Focus on the Family and Family Research Council. According to the attendee list, other major corporations sending senior figures include JP Morgan, Meta, and Palantir, including its founder billionaire Peter Thiel. Read the full story.

The ARC conference’s keynote speakers include Kevin Roberts, the leader of the Heritage Foundation — the group that published the Project 2025 blueprint for a second Trump term — and other panelists include U.S. House speaker Mike Johnson and UK Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch. 

ARC’s conference will also play host to politicians, commentators, and think tanks from across the UK and Europe, including elected representatives from radical right-wing parties based in France (National Rally) and Denmark (Danish People’s Party) to Norway (Progress Party) and Spain (Vox).

The attendees list also features a former leader of the far-right German party Alternative für Deutschland and includes a senior advisor from Viktor Orbán’s far-right Hungarian government, which has severely restricted political, media, and judicial freedoms in Hungary over recent years.

Oil and gas companies, like most corporations, generally avoid publicly linking their brands to controversial cultural issues. But the corporate representatives at the ARC event are on the same attendees list as influential religious right activists that have campaigned aggressively, and successfully, against abortion and LGBTQ+ rights.

Why such a large tent? “The bigger your coalition and the stronger the solidarity within the coalition, obviously this is going to turn into political power and influence,” Adrian Bardon, a professor of philosophy at Wake Forest University who has studied evangelical movements and climate denialism, told DeSmog.

DeSmog will continue investigating this global story with implications for democracy and the climate. We’re so grateful for your support.

Have a story tip or feedback? Get in touch: [email protected]. Want to know what our UK team is up to? Sign up for our UK newsletter. 

Thanks,
Brendan DeMelle
Executive Director

P.S. Readers like you power our journalism dedicated to climate accountability. Can you donate $10 or $20 right now to support more of this essential work?

Credit: Crop of ARC Forum / CC0

LEAKED: Oil Execs and Trump Allies Attend Jordan Peterson’s ARC Conference 

— By DeSmog (7 min. read) —

A list of attendees viewed by DeSmog shows fossil fuel companies represented alongside major religious right groups at the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship event.

U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright Backs Coal and Attacks ‘Sinister’ Climate Targets at ARC Conference

— By Adam Barnett (4 min. read) —

The Trump appointee and fossil fuel executive called the transition to renewable energy “lunacy” at an event packed with climate science deniers.

EU Defends Hiring Trump-Linked Oil Trade Group

— By Adam Barnett and Phoebe Cooke (4 min. read) —

DCI Group’s 2024 clients include the American Petroleum Institute, which has a history of undermining the scientific consensus on climate change.

Ad Firms Make Oil Companies Look Green. Here’s Six Ways They Greenwash Themselves.

— By Kathryn Clare and Cartie Werthman (14 min. read) —

New research reveals how Dentsu, Havas, Interpublic Group, Omnicom, Publicis Groupe, and WPP cast themselves as climate champions.

Alberta's Energy Regulator Is ‘Fully Captured’ by Industry, Study Finds

— By Danielle Paradis (3 min) —

The AER significantly underreports the number and scale of spills, says researcher Kevin Timoney.

From the Climate Disinformation Database: Jordan Peterson

Jordan Peterson is a psychologist, professor at the University of Toronto, and conservative Canadian influencer who decries the climate movement as “alarmist.” In 2023, he launched the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC), an “international community” of writers, politicians, and academics including Peterson, Bjorn Lomborg, Michael Shellenberger, Tony Abbott, and Vivek Ramaswamy, among others. Peterson’s YouTube channel was highlighted as a case study in a report by the Center for Countering Digital Hate on “The New Climate Denial,” with “New Denial” consisting of claims such as “The impacts of global warming are beneficial or harmless,” “Climate solutions won’t work,” or “Climate science and the climate movement are unreliable.”

Read the full profile and browse other individuals and organizations in our Climate Disinformation Database, Ad & PR Database, and Koch Network Database.