Willie Soon Fails Conflict of Interest Test in Science Bulletin Article

Dr. Willie Soon, an astrophysicist, is an employee of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (which has little to do with Harvard except it’s location, but that’s another story…)

Dr. Soon raises money for his research, like many scientists, through grants from foundations, government and corporations.  However Soon’s “research”, which has mostly focused on debunking the consensus on climate change over the past decade or so has been supported almost entirely by corporate grants from fossil-fuel interests like the Charles Koch Foundation, ExxonMobil and Southern Company – well over $1.2 million dollars in total according to the Greenpeace Research Department which has investigated Soon’s corporate funding via FOIA requests to the Smithsonian Institute over the past few years.

The larger question is what these corporate funders hoped would be achieved by funding Dr. Soon over the years.  Maybe they hoped he would prove the global science consensus was dead wrong?  Or maybe they knew it wouldn’t but thought his efforts might provide a decent smokescreen, delaying policy action for a bit?

In a new tactical grasp for credibility, Dr. Soon apparently orchestrated the publication of this paper in a relatively new Chinese journal named Science Bulletin:

Why models run hot: results from an irreducibly simple climate model 

Christopher Monckton1, Willie W.-H. Soon2, David R. Legates3, William M. Briggs4

1. Science and Public Policy Institute, Haymarket, VA 20169, USA;

2. Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA;

3. Department of Geography, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716, USA;

4. New York, NY 10021, USA

Lord Christopher Monckton, lead author of the article, described the decision to target the journal to an E&E ClimateWire reporter:

“We didn’t even think of publishing in the West,” said Christopher Monckton, a climate denier who is also the lead author on the study. “We decided the West is now no longer doing science, it is doing propaganda via the learned journals, so we weren’t playing that game anymore.”

“Heartland Institute finds route into U.S. science news conduit through China”, Gayathri Vaidyanathan, ClimateWire, January 23, 2015

Apparently giddy that they actually got a paper in a ‘peer reviewed’ journal (even as they decry the peer review process at every turn), the Heartland Institute broadcast the story to its base and funded the open distribution of the journal article according Heartland affiliate Anthony Watts.

CIC letter to Science China Press

Editorial Office

Science China Press,

16 Donghuangchenggen North Street

Beijing 100717, China

                                                                     January 20, 2015

Dear Editors of Science Bulletin,

I was dismayed to run across a study published in the current edition of your journal Science Bulletin, which is sponsored by the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The study is titled “Why models run hot: results from an irreducibly simple climate model” and attempts to argue that current predictions for future climate change may be wrong.

At the end of the article under the heading “Conflict of interest”, there is this statement: “The authors declare that they have no conflict.”

This simply cannot be true.

The second author of the paper is Willie W.H. Soon with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. In November 2013, the American newspaper, The Boston Globe profiled Dr. Soon in an article titled “Researcher helps sow climate-change doubt: Industry-funded Cambridge astrophysicist adds to partisan divide.”[1]

This article makes clear that Dr. Soon is funded by industry to undermine the science of climate change. In one passage of the story, the Globe notes that Dr. Soon has received “more than a $1.2 million from sources such as ExxonMobil; Southern Company, a foundation run by the Koch brothers, conservative energy moguls; and industry trade group American Petroleum Institute, according to public documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by Greenpeace, the environmental advocacy group.”

ExxonMobil, as you know is one of the largest oil companies in the world.  The Southern Company is a U.S. electric utility company that is an extensive consumer of coal.  The American Petroleum Institute (API) is the trade association representing the oil industry.  Dr. Soon has received $273,611 from API, $335,106 from ExxonMobil Foundation, $349,945 from Southern Company, $230,000 from Charles G. Koch Foundation and $234,799 from Donors Trust (an organization set up to distribute funding from sources who wish to remain anonymous.) Source: Greenpeace Research

While Dr. Soon appears to have not disclosed his outside funding, the policy at your journal on disclosure is quite clear.[2]  Your policy states:

Authors must disclose all relationships or interests that could influence or bias the work. Examples of potential conflicts of interests that are directly or indirectly related to the research may include but not limited to the following:

•   Research grants from funding agencies (please give the research funder and the grant number

•   Honoraria for speaking at symposia

•   Financial support for attending symposia

•   Financial support for educational programs

•   Employment or consultation

•   Support from a project sponsor

•   Position on advisory board or board of directors or other type of management relationships

•   Multiple affiliations

•   Financial relationships, for example equity ownership or investment interest

•   Intellectual property rights (e.g. patents, copyrights and royalties from such rights)

•   Holdings of spouse and/or children that may have financial interest in the work

In addition, interests that go beyond financial interests and compensation (non-financial interests) that may be important to readers should be disclosed. These may include but are not limited to personal relationships or competing interests directly or indirectly tied to this research, or professional interests or personal beliefs that may influence your research.

The corresponding author will include a summary statement in the text of the manuscript in a separate section before the reference list. An examples of disclosures is shown below:

Conflict of interest: Author A has received research grants from Company A. Author B has received a speaker honorarium from Company X and owns stock in Company Y. Author C is a member of committee Z.

If no conflict exists, the authors should state:

Conflict of interest: The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

I am concerned that Dr. Soon has not disclosed his funding sources or his outside consulting fees when submitting this article for publishing in your journal, and I am worried that such failure to disclosure may impact the reputation and credibility of both the journal and the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

In addition, it has been advertised that the Heartland Institute has apparently paid your journal to make the article available for open download.  The Heartland Institute, a U.S. think tank, widely discredited for its work attacking the scientific consensus on climate change, also receives industry.  Was it disclosed to Science Bulletin that Heartland Institute paid these “open access” fees?

In light of Dr. Soon’s apparent failure to disclose his conflicts of interest in taking money from fossil fuel companies, I ask for your immediate attention to this matter to publish a clarification of Dr. Soon’s “conflicts of interest” statement and to consider a retraction of this article at this time.

Thank you for your time,

Kert Davies

Climate Investigations Center

P.O. Box 91

Alexandria, VA 22314

www.climateinvestigations.org