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Confronting Trump's Department of Energy Climate Deceit (action item w/deadline) [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2025-09-02

On July 29, the Trump Department of Energy released a deceitful, truthiness-laden broadsheet at odds with basic climate science with significant distortion of what has and is happening in the real-world. This fossil-foolish screed, written by five-handpicked credential climate-science deceivers and deniers, is clearly designed to facilitate the Trump EPA's July 29th (yes, same day) announced target for reversal of the Endangerment Finding which used scientific work to make clear how carbon dioxide is a pollutant to be covered under the Clean Air Act.

ACTION ITEM: There is much out there to leverage in commenting on Trump DOE's anti-science work and there are only hours left to get in a comment. Here is an easy way to add your voice calling for honesty and truth from the government.

Rather than having a broad, multi-disciplinary team with recent substantive relevant credentials (such as numerous 21st century peer-reviewed articles), fossil-fuel multi- (100+) millionaire Secretary of Energy Chris Wright hand-selected five individuals who have been favored Congressional Republican witnesses attacking climate science and seeking to undermine climate action to write a propagandistic broadsheet that Trump's DOE inappropriately labeled a "Report". With this broadsheet, Trump's DOE gave barely a month's time for public response: until today, midnight (eastern) September 2d.

Even the most cursory read of the broadsheet sent shivers through climate-science aware individuals and experts: scientists seeing distortions of their work; authors seeing their names associated with what appeared to be AI-generated publications that didn't exists; experts identifying data manipulation and misrepresentations; and ... It didn't take long (days, if not hours) for a coalesced understanding of a new for a crowd-sourced review of Trump DOE's propaganda involving over 85 multi-disciplinary, credentialed experts from around the world. In barely a month, this volunteer effort has produced a book-length response shining light on more than 100 of the broadsheet's truthiness and misdirection with forthright and truthful discussions of climate science and reality.

These are scientists at work. Thus, recognize that they primarily use the caution and restraint found in the scientific community in taking on DOE's propaganda. With that in mind, read some of the scientists' perspectives about the DOE broadsheet:

“The DOE Climate Working Group report is an intentionally skewed survey of mainstream climate science. In multiple contexts, the report privileges the outdated views of individual dissenters rather than the consensus of scientists. For example, the report argues that the economic impacts of carbon emissions are “negligible,” despite widespread evidence that climate change is likely to substantially affect human health, worker productivity, agriculture, and many other sectors. Work contrary to the conclusions of the DOE CWG report is dismissed or simply ignored, making it clear that the report is intended to support a specific policy decision and is not an unbiased synthesis of climate science.” Christopher Callahan

"Intentionally skewed ... privileging dissenters rather than scientific consensus ... to support a policy decision". In my experience, it takes much (outrage at unprofessional and biased work) to get a scientist to use language like this about others' work.

Reading through the scientists'/experts' reactions, words like "sloppy", "biased", and so on jump out. Here are some thoughts from someone with decades of experience writing and dealing with review processes for U.S. government scientific reports:

"This document might appear to be a scientific report, but it is anything but. It is “science-y,” presenting an appearance of science but lacking meaningful scientific substance. I always like to find a silver lining; in this case the silver lining is that this document is a wonderful example of junk science that can be used as an example for years to come." Andy Miller

Going through the report, it is hard to understate just how big and deceptive the distortions. Let us take a brief look at just one arena with, at the end of this post, a rather amusing twist to consider: sea level rise (SLR) and long-term sea level rise (LTSLR). Now, the primary responder on SLR is one of the world's leading SLR/LTSLR science expert's: Prof Stefan Rahmsdorf, University of Potsdam. What are some of some key SLR/LTSLR issues with the DOE broadsheet:

Truth : With a warming planet, sea level rise is accelerating . And, acceleration will continue unless/until there is significant climate action. DOE deceit: falsehood that data is not showing SLR/LTSLR acceleration and that we need to wait decade(+) to see if it is occurring.

Truth : US East Coast tidal gauges are showing SLR acceleration with SLR above that of global average. DOE falsehood: assertion that US tidal gauges aren't showing accelerated SLR.

Truth : Historical data shows SLR started to increase with early pollution impacts of industrial era . DOE misdirection: a deceitful using "well before most" industrial pollution when discussing early SLR acceleration.



Let's be clear, the review team does not (did not have the time) to dissect every distortion in the DOE's 151-page broadsheet. If they had, the review publication might have been 14,000, rather than 140, pages long. Sticking with SLR, here is another example of the DOE broadsheet authors' deceit.

Truth : There are multiple and complex factors involved across all elements of climate science and change. Almost nothing has a single-point source nor a single impact. Actual honest scientists and scientific work understands and incorporates this truth. And, this is true when it comes to sea level rise. As an example, "global" SLR is an average that can mask dramatic differences regionally (and even quite locally). For example, when it comes to the Chesapeake Bay area on the U.S. East Coast (and, for example, Virginia Beach) there are multiple factors in play: General Sea Level Rise due to melting glaciers and ice caps along with thermal expansion Currents (Gulf Stream slowing leading to more SLR) and being on West Atlantic (water pushed by Earth's rotation meaning more SLR on west side of oceans) Land shifts which, for this area, is subsidence due to water withdrawals (human action) and millenial-long post-ice age land sinking Let us be clear, all of the above are in play but general Sea Level Rise is roughly responsible for 70-80 percent of the region's SLR with land shifts perhaps 20-30%

DOE Deceit: A truthiness misdirection pointing at subsidence, suggesting it is the most significant factor. Here is how the first paragraph of the SLR section ends: "The largest sea level increases along U.S. coasts are Galveston, New Orleans, and the Chesapeake Bay regions - each of these locations is associated with substantial local land sinking (subsidence) unrelated to climate change" Consider the points above and you will recognize that the DOE's broadsheet's sentence is both a true (even factual) statement but absolutely not truthful.



Above, I promised to comment on something that might cause some amusement (even if just painful chuckling). The climate distorting DOE broadsheet recognizes that there is sea-level rise going on and links this to climate change, even if downplaying the extent of SLR and deceiving as to climate impacts. We can contrast this with Donald Trump's scientific genius and conclusions as to sea level rise:

Simple truth: 2024 SLR exceeded what he asserts will occur over four centuries. Even the DOE propaganda broadsheet's authors couldn't go as far as Trump in rejecting basic science and reality. The question to wonder: will, if he ever becomes aware of it, Trump blisteringly attack these five for rejecting his Truth?

ACTION ITEM: There is much out there to leverage in commenting on Trump DOE's anti-science work and there are only hours left to get in a comment. Here is an easy way to add your voice calling for honesty and truth from the government.

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