Scientists Link Hundreds of Severe Heat Waves To Fossil Fuel Producers' Pollution

A new study published in Nature links more than 200 severe heat waves directly to greenhouse gas pollution from major fossil fuel producers like ExxonMobil, Chevron, and BP. Researchers found that up to a quarter of these heat waves would have been virtually impossible without emissions from oil, coal, and cement companies. NPR reports: The new study, published Wednesday in the journal Nature, found that 213 heat waves were substantially more likely and intense because of the activity of major fossil fuel producers, also called carbon majors. They include oil, coal and cement companies, as well as some countries. The scientists found as much as a quarter of the heat waves would be 'virtually impossible' without the climate pollution from major fossil fuel producers. Some individual fossil fuel companies, such as ExxonMobil, Chevron and BP, had emissions high enough to cause some of the more extreme heat waves, the research found.

For the new study, the scientists looked at something called the disaster database, a global list of disasters maintained by university researchers, to identify heat waves 'with significant casualties, economic losses and calls for international assistance. The scientists then used historical reconstructions and statistical models to see how human-caused global warming made each heat wave more likely and more intense. Then, to examine the link to major fossil fuel producers, the researchers relied on the Carbon Majors Database to understand the emissions of major oil, gas, coal and cement producers.

'We ran a climate model to reconstruct the historical period, and then we ran it again but without the emissions of a specific carbon major, thus deducing its contribution to global warming,' Yann Quilcaille, climate scientist at ETH Zurich and lead author of the study, says in an email. While some of the contributions to heat waves came from larger well-known fossil fuel companies, the study found that some smaller, lesser-known fossil fuel companies are producing enough greenhouse gas emissions to cause heat waves too, Quilcaille says.

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