About the Project
Universities across the country are the targets of interventions by fossil fuel interests, who seek to influence campus discourse and student beliefs. (For example, The Charles Koch Foundation, funded by natural gas and pipeline corporations, has funded over 300 universities in the U.S..) While some universities, financial institutions and corporations have taken the lead by ending their investments in fossil fuels, relatively few universities have addressed the impact of public misinformation campaigns on the interests of higher education, leaving a space in need of leadership.
This website provides a database of donor organizations that have supported climate disinformation organizations. Universities can use the data provided here to scan their organizations in question. Metrics for searching through organizations, such as each organization total grant amount or percentage given to denial organization, can be applied. The database page contains all recorded grant information between 2003 and 2018, but prioritizes data from 2018.
Our extensive methodology for identifying climate disinformation supporters can be found in our most recent report.
86 Denial Organizations
Supported by 3237 Donor Organizations
Top 10 Donor Organizations
| Donors Trust | $27,568,461 |
| Charles Koch Foundation | $15,796,900 |
| Sarah Scaife Foundation | $11,070,000 |
| National Christian Charitable Foundation | $6,557,410 |
| Searle Freedom Trust | $6,331,800 |
| Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation | $5,471,600 |
| Kern Family Foundation | $4,964,050 |
| John Templeton Foundation | $4,507,871 |
| Orange Crimson Foundation | $4,000,000 |
| Thomas W Smith Foundation | $3,761,974 |
Context
The fossil fuel industry is actively trying to co-opt universities and other research institutions to disseminate harmful ideas that perpetuate the industry’s power and therefore worsen climate change. A handful of corporations have deliberately engaged universities to support their discourses due to the central role universities play in facilitating social change. The Koch Family, one of the key players pushing this agenda, has explicitly mentioned their intention to shift public opinion and social change toward agendas that favor their business model.
This movement disseminating climate change has been documented by various scholars and has been given many names: most often referred to as the denial movement or the climate change countermovement. It includes a large array of actors such as corporations, think tanks, PR firms, foundations, individuals, political coalitions, trade associations, and more. Grant-giving foundations play a central role as they frequently provide the funding to sustain key actors rooting the climate denial discourse: universities and think tanks.
This website provides a database containing these core foundations of the denial movement. This can be utilized as a tool by universities and non-profits seeking to dissociate from these foundations to avoid their influence and prevent greenwashing.