S. Fred Singer is one of the few climate deniers with scientific credentials. Armed with a Ph.D in Physics from Princeton University, Singer worked as a U.S. government scientific administrator during the 1970s and 1980s and as a professor at the University of Virginia from 1971-1994.
However, he has long since sold his scientific reputation and credentials to both the tabacco and oil industries. Here are some of his most notable activities:
- 1990 - Creates the Science & Environmental Policy Project (SEPP) an organization which focuses on climate change skepticism. According to research from DeSmogBlog, SEPP has received funding from several major oil companies including Exxon, Shell, and ARCO.
- 1993 - Collaborates with the Public Relations firm Apco Associates to discredit the science behind secondhand smoke. Apco was hired to Philip Morris to develop the The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition to challenge "junk" science around tobacco smoke and other issues such as global warming.
- 1995 - Through SEPP, Singer launches a publicity campaign called the "Top Five Environmental Myths of 1995." This campaign purports the U.S. Environmental Protection's conclusion that secondhand smoke was a human carcinogen is bogus. This project was developed by a PR firm working for British American Tobacco.
- 1995 - Creates the Leipzig Declaration, a petition signed by scientists which claim there is no consensus on the connection between carbon emissions and global warming. Investigative journalists showed that a bulk of the signatories either had not signed the document or were not scientists dealing with climate issues.
- 2005 - George Monbiot of The Guardian newspaper uncovers SEPP as the source of the misinformation stating that "555 of all the 625 glaciers under observation by the World Glacier Monitoring Service have been growing since 1980."
- 2012 - Speaks at the Heartland Institutes's annual International Conference on Climate Change. This conference denies human induced global warming exists. Between 1998 and 2010, the co-sponsors of this conference received more than $21 million in funding from ExxonMobil and the Koch brothers. Internal Heartland Institute documents show they pay Singer $5,000 per month for his cimate denial work.
