The Scientific Alliance is a UK-based organization that claims to promote open-minded debate on scientific matters and science policy, including biotechnology, genetically modified food, energy and climate change. Its stated aim is to "bring together both scientists and non-scientists committed to rational discussion and debate on the challenges facing the environment today." In the scientific literature it is regarded as "a UK-based lobby group which challenges the scientific consensus on climate change".
The group was created in 2001 by quarryman Robert Durward, director of the British Aggregates Association, and political consultant Mark Adams of the public relations firm Foresight Communications. The Scotsman newspaper has reported that on contacting the Alliance to ask about Durward's role, 'after some uncertainty, the switchboard it shares with a number of other firms denied any knowledge of Mr Durward’s existence. Matthew Drinkwater, the one person responding to calls to its offices, could also be contacted by ringing the offices of Foresight Communications.' In December 2004 the organization published a joint report with the George C. Marshall Institute in Washington, a thinktank that has received $715,000 in funding from the U.S. oil company, ExxonMobil. The Alliance's director, Martin Livermore, wrote that "The Scientific Alliance has never received money from ExxonMobil" and according to the Alliance, "donations are only accepted without conditions and afford no influence over [the group's] policy".
See also
- Media coverage of climate change
References
External links
- The Scientific Alliance
- Profile at SourceWatch
- The alliance of science, The Guardian
- Hard Rockers, The Guardian