Think tank sends 8,000 middle and high-school teachers books that it says shows we are not in a 'climate crisis'

Photo by RJ Sangosti, The Denver Post

It's taken decades of public debate, scientific research and misinformation discussions, but "Nearly three-quarters of Americans now accept that climate change is happening; not only that, more than half understand it is caused by human activity," reports Blanca Begert of Grist, a nonprofit that covers climate issues. "This shift has forced fossil-fuel companies — and the organizations they fund — to alter their tactics to avoid regulation. Where they once denied climate science outright, companies now engage in 'discourses of delay,' publicly accepting the science but working to stall climate policy."

The latest on that front: The Heartland Institute, a free-market think tank that has long debated climate science, says it sent its new book, Climate at a Glance, to 8,000 middle- and high-school teachers across the country, and that the book "provides the data to show the earth is not experiencing a climate crisis."

Glenn Branch, deputy director of the non-profit National Center for Science Education, told Begert that the book uses a good-cop, bad-cop style by admitting some scientific facts and "adding some commentary that’s wildly exaggerated or a completely false interpretation." For example, "A page on sea-level rise says 'levels have been rising at a fairly steady pace since at least the mid-1800s,' but the rate has actually more than doubled in the 2000s when compared to most of the 20th century."

About the institute: "Founded in Chicago in 1984, the Heartland Institute received hundreds of thousands of dollars from fossil fuel companies and industrial billionaires," Begert writes. "Climate misinformation has historically been funded and spread through a network of front groups, and Heartland no longer discloses its major supporters." Branch said, “What Heartland is hoping for is to catch those who haven’t been equipped to understand climate science well enough to realize the highly misleading nature of the materials."