Climate misinformation campaigns run by fossil fuel firms and right-wing populist groups have become more sophisticated and capable of influencing policy-making through “backdoor channels”, according to the authors of a major new report.
Based on a review of over 300 scientific papers, the study from the International Panel on the Information Environment (IPIE) found that the dissemination of false and misleading information has shifted from denying the existence of climate change to sowing doubt over its causes and solutions.
“Strategic scepticism has been taking over from basic climate denialism,” said Professor Klaus Bruhn Jensen, chair of the IPIE’s scientific panel on information integrity about climate science.
“Much of the information is more muddied. It’s not a clear denial of climate change but it’s in a sense more sophisticated,” he added. “It’s suggesting to people, ‘Well, is this really the fault of particular emitters? Will the solutions being proposed both by scholars and policy-makers really work?’.”
The aim is to erode trust, delay responses to climate change and obstruct political and economic interventions, such as the transition away from fossil fuels and towards clean energy, the report said.
To that end, misinformation is increasingly targeting political leaders, civil servants and other public officials who hold the power to turn climate science into real-world action.
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While the general public is more likely to come across distorted information on traditional news outlets or social media, policy-makers are primarily targeted through channels that go “under the radar”, the report’s authors said.
Those include corporate sustainability reports painting a misleading picture of polluting industries, greenwashing public-relations (PR) campaigns, partisan policy briefs drafted by lobby groups or think-tanks and personal relationships between business and political leaders.
“It’s kind of a backdoor channel to gaining influence in both policy circles and through public debate,” said Jensen.
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As an example, the report cited a study based on 725 corporate sustainability reports that found substantial divergence between what companies say and what they do, including exaggerated claims about their positive impact on the environment.
It also highlighted the use of legal filings by fossil-fuel and other polluting companies involved in court cases addressing climate issues to spread narratives downplaying their role in the climate crisis and delaying action.
Growing influence of think-tanks
Ece Elbeyi, one of the report’s authors, underlined how purveyors of misinformation increasingly operate through an interconnected system that delivers key messages to policy-makers.
“Think-tanks have become especially important because they serve as a bridge between important actors such as political parties, policy-makers and sectoral players such as fossil fuel corporations,” she added.
In the US, conservative think tanks like the Heartland Institute and the Heritage Foundation promote climate-denying views and hold sway over the Republican Party led by President Donald Trump.
The Heritage Foundation coordinated the so called ‘Project 2025’, the controversial 900-page policy blueprint for reshaping the federal government. Amongst other things, it called for an end to “climate fanaticism” and the rollback of US funding for climate action at home and abroad.
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Since its return to the White House last January, the Trump administration has pulled the US away from international climate policy, gutted USAID – the country’s aid agency which has been a key channel for global climate funding – and moved to slash the domestic budget for measures to reduce emissions.
Amid a generally gloomy picture, the IPIE report offers some suggestions for how to combat climate misinformation.
It calls for the introduction of laws requiring the production of accurate and consistent climate information, as well as standardised reporting by private firms and public institutions on their carbon footprints.
“Coalitions of the willing” should be formed to counter the alliances of powerful interests, while education should deepen the scientific and media literacy of citizens and policy-makers, it added.
The post How ‘sophisticated’ climate misinformation gets to the heart of power appeared first on Climate Home News.
How ‘sophisticated’ climate misinformation gets to the heart of power
The case shows that climate change is a fundamental human rights violation—and the victory of Bonaire, a Dutch territory, could open the door for similar lawsuits globally.
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Climate Change
Greenpeace organisations to appeal USD $345 million court judgment in Energy Transfer’s intimidation lawsuit
SYDNEY, Saturday 28 February 2026 — Greenpeace International and Greenpeace organisations in the US announce they will seek a new trial and, if necessary, appeal the decision with the North Dakota Supreme Court following a North Dakota District Court judgment today awarding Energy Transfer (ET) USD $345 million.
ET’s SLAPP suit remains a blatant attempt to silence free speech, erase Indigenous leadership of the Standing Rock movement, and punish solidarity with peaceful resistance to the Dakota Access Pipeline. Greenpeace International will also continue to seek damages for ET’s bullying lawsuits under EU anti-SLAPP legislation in the Netherlands.
Mads Christensen, Greenpeace International Executive Director said: “Energy Transfer’s attempts to silence us are failing. Greenpeace International will continue to resist intimidation tactics. We will not be silenced. We will only get louder, joining our voices to those of our allies all around the world against the corporate polluters and billionaire oligarchs who prioritise profits over people and the planet.
“With hard-won freedoms under threat and the climate crisis accelerating, the stakes of this legal fight couldn’t be higher. Through appeals in the US and Greenpeace International’s groundbreaking anti-SLAPP case in the Netherlands, we are exploring every option to hold Energy Transfer accountable for multiple abusive lawsuits and show all power-hungry bullies that their attacks will only result in a stronger people-powered movement.”
The Court’s final judgment today rejects some of the jury verdict delivered in March 2025, but still awards hundreds of millions of dollars to ET without a sound basis in law. The Greenpeace defendants will continue to press their arguments that the US Constitution does not allow liability here, that ET did not present evidence to support its claims, that the Court admitted inflammatory and irrelevant evidence at trial and excluded other evidence supporting the defense, and that the jury pool in Mandan could not be impartial.[1][2]
ET’s back-to-back lawsuits against Greenpeace International and the US organisations Greenpeace USA (Greenpeace Inc.) and Greenpeace Fund are clear-cut examples of SLAPPs — lawsuits attempting to bury nonprofits and activists in legal fees, push them towards bankruptcy and ultimately silence dissent.[3] Greenpeace International, which is based in the Netherlands, is pursuing justice in Europe, with a suit against ET under Dutch law and the European Union’s new anti-SLAPP directive, a landmark test of the new legislation which could help set a powerful precedent against corporate bullying.[4]
Kate Smolski, Program Director at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said: “This is part of a worrying trend globally: fossil fuel corporations are increasingly using litigation to attack and silence ordinary people and groups using the law to challenge their polluting operations — and we’re not immune to these tactics here in Australia.
“Rulings like this have a chilling effect on democracy and public interest litigation — we must unite against these silencing tactics as bad for Australians and bad for our democracy. Our movement is stronger than any corporate bully, and grows even stronger when under attack.”
Energy Transfer’s SLAPPs are part of a wave of abusive lawsuits filed by Big Oil companies like Shell, Total, and ENI against Greenpeace entities in recent years.[3] A couple of these cases have been successfully stopped in their tracks. This includes Greenpeace France successfully defeating TotalEnergies’ SLAPP on 28 March 2024, and Greenpeace UK and Greenpeace International forcing Shell to back down from its SLAPP on 10 December 2024.
-ENDS-
Images available in Greenpeace Media Library
Notes:
[1] The judgment entered by North Dakota District Court Judge Gion follows a jury verdict finding Greenpeace entities liable for more than US$660 million on March 19, 2025. Judge Gion subsequently threw out several items from the jury’s verdict, reducing the total damages to approximately US$345 million.
[2] Public statements from the independent Trial Monitoring Committee
[3] Energy Transfer’s first lawsuit was filed in federal court in 2017 under the RICO Act – the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, a US federal statute designed to prosecute mob activity. The case was dismissed in 2019, with the judge stating the evidence fell “far short” of what was needed to establish a RICO enterprise. The federal court did not decide on Energy Transfer’s claims based on state law, so Energy Transfer promptly filed a new case in a North Dakota state court with these and other state law claims.
[4] Greenpeace International sent a Notice of Liability to Energy Transfer on 23 July 2024, informing the pipeline giant of Greenpeace International’s intention to bring an anti-SLAPP lawsuit against the company in a Dutch Court. After Energy Transfer declined to accept liability on multiple occasions (September 2024, December 2024), Greenpeace International initiated the first test of the European Union’s anti-SLAPP Directive on 11 February 2025 by filing a lawsuit in Dutch court against Energy Transfer. The case was officially registered in the docket of the Court of Amsterdam on 2 July, 2025. Greenpeace International seeks to recover all damages and costs it has suffered as a result of Energy Transfers’s back-to-back, abusive lawsuits demanding hundreds of millions of dollars from Greenpeace International and the Greenpeace organisations in the US. The next hearing in the Court of Amsterdam is scheduled for 16 April, 2026.
Media contact:
Kate O’Callaghan on 0406 231 892 or kate.ocallaghan@greenpeace.org
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Greenpeace organisations to appeal USD $345 million court judgment in Energy Transfer’s intimidation lawsuit
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