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Yet another bastion of science puts the interests of Big Oil before those of scientific integrity: UK @ScienceMuseum scoffs at concerns its sponsorship deals legitimise fossil fuel industry by rattling off, erm *checks notes*, industry talking points. 1/n ft.com/content/9aa519…
2/n: The director of @ScienceMuseum Sir Ian Blatchford argues that oil & gas companies “have the capital, geography, people & logistics to find the solutions [to climate change]." This is naive on so many levels. 
3/n: First, @ScienceMuseum is legitimising fossil fuel industry's favourite false premise: that solutions to the climate crisis don't already exist. *THEY DO*. And Sir Ian knows it; just last week he wrote about how the Museum has been implementing solutions for years (bravo!).
4/n: Reference ⬆️: blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/sustainability…
5/n: Second, @ScienceMuseum is perpetuating the misleading narrative that the climate challenge is now primarily a technical problem and not a sociopolitical one, which is convenient given the industry he's defending has had a stranglehold on sociopolitical will for decades.
6/n: See for example:
7/n: Third, oil cos may have "capital, geography, people & logistics", but they're invested in fossil fuels, not clean energy. It's called carbon lock-in. As @jonathonporritt has put it, "All oil majors are trapped by a short-term mandate that leaves little room for manoeuvre.”
8/n: Reference ⬆️: theguardian.com/environment/20…
9/n: By citing Big Oil's “extensive research” on reducing emissions, Sir Ian misleads his staff with industry greenwash. In 2018, the 24 largest investor-owned oil & gas companies spent an average of just 1.3% of their total capital expenditures on low-carbon energy tech.
10/n: Reference ⬆️: reuters.com/article/us-oil…
11/n: Bottom line: @ScienceMuseum's naive desire to "engage" fossil fuel cos is 30y too late. Research by me & colleagues shows the fossil fuel industry has known about the potential dangers of its products for 50y. It's had *50 years* to change course. sheredling.com/wp-content/upl…
12/n: Instead, it did the opposite, orchestrating massive anti-science disinformation campaigns that would make Big Tobacco proud. It's this 30y track record of denial & delay that has led even those who've spent decades trying to engage Big Oil to realise that it's "impossible".
13/n: Reference ⬆️: theguardian.com/environment/20…; theguardian.com/environment/20….
14/n: It's telling that @ScienceMuseum chastises @Tate for declaring a "climate emergency", because that's precisely the sense of urgency @ScienceMuseum is clearly lacking. As I've written before, we need our scientific institutions to be braver. huffpost.com/entry/scientif…
15/n: Instead, @ScienceMuseum is taking same technocentric path as @MIT, which 4y ago chose not to divest from fossil fuel cos, but rather to "bring them closer". Calls for at least *conditional* engagement by me et al. fell on deaf ears. 4y later, 'engagement' has led nowhere.
16/n: Reference ⬆️: web.mit.edu/vpr/climate/MI…
17/n: @BenFranta & I have a term for the sort of thing happening at @ScienceMuseum: the invisible colonization of academia by the fossil fuel industry. With headlines in the @FT like "Science Museum defends oil and gas sponsorship", Big Oil is really getting its money's worth.
