Myron Ebell

Myron Ebell directs the Global Warming and International Environmental Policy project at the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) and the Cooler Heads Coalition, which was formed on May 6, 1997, "to dispel the myths of global warming by exposing flawed economic, scientific and risk analysis." Ebell formerly worked at the Frontiers of Freedom, on issues including "property rights, the Endangered Species Act, federal-lands policies, and global warming," and as a legislative assistant to Representative John Shadegg. He's also worked for the American Land Rights Association and National Taxpayers Union. Both CEI and Frontiers of Freedom have received funding from ExxonMobil.

"Though he likes to bash scientists for working outside their degreed fields, Ebell, it turns out, isn't a scientist at all," a Vanity Fair article on Ebell stated. "He majored in philosophy at the University of California in San Diego, then studied political theory at the London School of Economics and history at Cambridge." Ebell retorted, "Every interview I do, when I'm asked about scientific issues, I say I'm not a climate scientist. I'm just giving you the informed layman's perspective."

On global warming
Ebell is a speaker at the International Conference on Climate Change (2009) organized by the Heartland Institute think tank.

In September 2003, Greenpeace obtained evidence in the form of a [http://www.greenpeace.org/international/news/investigation-of-exxon-front-g memo] to Philip A. Cooney dated March 2002, outlining their strategy for dealing with the problems caused by scientifically-based "Climate Action Report 2002", which the US government had submitted to the UN. The crucial paragraph of this memo reads:


 * "As I said, we made the decision this morning to do as much as we could to deflect criticism by blaming the EPA for freelancing. It seems to me that the folks at the EPA are the obvious fall guys, and we would only hope that the fall guy (or gal) should be as high up as possible.  I have done several interviews and have stressed that the president needs to get everyone rowing in the same direction.  Perhaps tomorrow we will call for (Christine Todd Whitman) to be fired. I know that that doesn't sound like much help, but it seems to me that our only leverage to push you in the right direction is to drive a wedge between the President and those in the Administration who think they are serving the president's best interests by publishing this rubbish."

On air pollution
In March 2001, the nonprofit Clean Air Trust named Ebell its "clean air villain of the month," citing his "ferocious lobbying charge to persuade President Bush to reverse his campaign pledge to control electric utility emissions of carbon dioxide."

Biography
According to his biographical note on the the CEI website, "Prior to coming to CEI, Mr. Ebell was policy director at Frontiers of Freedom, a public policy advocacy organization founded by former Senator Malcolm Wallop. While at Frontiers of Freedom, he worked on a range of environmental and constitutional issues, including property rights, the Endangered Species Act, federal lands policies, and global warming." 

"He previously served as senior legislative assistant to Rep. John Shadegg, and before that as Washington representative of the American Land Rights Association. .... Mr. Ebell holds a BA from Colorado College and an MSc from the London School of Economics. He did graduate work at the University of California at San Diego and at Peterhouse, Cambridge University," his biographical note states. 

Quotations
"Higher fuel efficiency standards costs lives... in 1993 alone higher [Car Efficiency Standards] cost 1300 to 2600 lives. Multiply that by 20 years and you've got a lot of people who've died because of fuel efficiency standards... because consumers have not had the choice to buy safer cars that they want." 

"[A]s previous studies have concluded, the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets are probably thickening rather than melting." 

"The US consumes about 25% of the energy in the world, and we produce between 25 and 30% of the wealth created in the world, so, in fact, the answer for the world is not to assume that by cutting back on American production and productivity, that you're going to get richer, the answer is the emulate the institutions and the policies that the United States has persued to become as wealthy and as productive as we are." 

"We develop policies and then we try to find funding, some policies we find some funding other policies we find very little"

Contact information
Email: mebell AT cei.org

Related SourceWatch articles

 * Competitive Enterprise Institute
 * Cooler Heads Coalition
 * Global warming
 * Heartland Institute
 * International Conference on Climate Change (2009)

External resources

 * List of Ebell's publications, on the Competitive Enterprise Institute site.
 * Myron Ebell factsheet," ExxonSecrets.org.

External articles

 * "With the Queen in Germany worrying about climate change, will we see any change in George Bush's attitude over the next four years?", Radio 4, BBC, November 4, 2004. (The relevant section on how Bush's climate change policy is not going to change, and all the climate scientists have it wrong starts at 3:44).
 * Joel Achenbach, "The Tempest: As evidence mounts that humans are causing dangerous changes in Earth's climate, a handful of skeptics are providing some serious blowback", The Washington Post Magazine, May 28, 2006.
 * Michael Shnayerson, "A Convenient Untruth: For the obligatory 'opposing view' on climate change, the media often turn to Myron Ebell, policy analyst, sound-bite artist, and oil-industry mouthpiece. While mainstream experts see global warming as a major crisis, the hotter it gets, the better Ebell likes it," Vanity Fair, May 2007.