What is the Heartland Institute? The local weather denying suppose tank supported by Farage | EUROtoday

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Nigel Farage and Liz Truss had been noticed attending the launch of the UK department of a Donald Trump-backed suppose tank that has been main the cost in denying local weather change.

James Taylor, president of The Hartland Institute, describes the organisation as a “free-market think tank known globally as the world’s most prominent think tank supporting scepticism about man-made climate change”.

The US-based foyer group – which is among the organisations concerned within the Project 2025 agenda for a second Donald Trump time period – has made excessive statements sceptical of local weather change. The suppose tank launched its UK-EU department in December, aiming to leverage “science-based work pushing back at climate alarmism and schemes such as Net Zero from London”.

Mr Farage, who was the visitor of honour on the launch, was joined by former prime minister Ms Truss and Tory shadow commerce minister Andrew Griffith.

Here, The Independent takes a have a look at the controversial group.

The Heartland Institute and Tobacco Lobbying

The institute was based in 1984 by Chicago investor David H. Padden.

In the Nineteen Nineties, the Heartland Institute labored with the tobacco firm Philip Morris to query the science linking second-hand smoke to well being dangers, and lobbied in opposition to authorities public well being reforms. Philip Morris commissioned Heartland to jot down and distribute stories.

A former president of the group, Joe Bast, as soon as claimed that “moderate” smoking doesn’t elevate lung most cancers dangers, and that there have been “few, if any, adverse health effects” related to smoking.

Climate Change Denial

The Heartland Institute rejects the prevailing scientific consensus on local weather change. The group promotes false claims that local weather change just isn’t probably catastrophic to the world and it may really be ‘beneficial’.

It has additionally incorrectly claimed that heatwaves and temperatures within the US will not be growing on account of local weather change.

Author Naomi Klein wrote in her e book This Changes Everything that workers on the Institute “recognize that climate change is a profound threat to our economic and social systems and therefore deny its scientific reality.”

Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway wrote of their 2010 e book Merchants of Doubt that the institute was recognized “for its persistent questioning of climate science, for its promotion of ‘experts’ who have done little, if any, peer-reviewed climate research, and for its sponsorship of a conference in New York City in 2008 alleging that the scientific community’s work on global warming is fake.”

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Comparing advocates of human-made international warming to terrorists

Heartland started an promoting marketing campaign in 2012 which featured a photograph of the Unabomber, a US terrorist who killed three folks and injured others. The image was accompanied by textual content, which learn: “I still believe in global warming, do you?” The group withdrew the billboards a day later.

The institute deliberate for the marketing campaign to characteristic assassin Charles Manson, communist chief Fidel Castro and the founding father of al-Qaeda Osama bin Laden.

The group justified the billboards on the time, saying: “The most prominent advocates of global warming aren’t scientists. They are murderers, tyrants, and madmen.”

Links to Nigel Farage and Reform UK

Mr Farage was the “guest of honour” on the launch of the Heartland Institute’s UK/European department in December.

In an announcement on the time of the launch, Heartland president James Taylor mentioned: “During recent years, a growing number of policymakers in the UK and continental Europe have requested Heartland establish a satellite office to provide resources to conservative policymakers throughout Europe.

“With our UK and European launch, we aim to fulfill this requested impact throughout Europe.”

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Reform UK has known as for the UK’s 2050 internet zero emissions goal to be scrapped.

Heartland’s European department might be run by Lois Perry, a local weather science denier who has mentioned it’s her “personal belief” that local weather change “is happening” however “is not man-made”. Ms Perry is the previous chief of Ukip – although she stood down after simply 34 days.

Ms Perry additionally previously ran the anti-net zero strain group CAR26, which has claimed that carbon dioxide is “essential to all life” and that its “welcome growth has greened our planet saving countless human and other lives”.

In July final 12 months, Mr Farage mentioned in an interview with Jordan Peterson: “I do find it extraordinary that people call carbon dioxide a pollutant, because as I understand it, plants don’t grow without carbon dioxide.”