Exxon Mobil pushes carbon tax

World’s largest publicly owned oil company faces pressure to show concern about climate change.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Exxon Mobil Corp. has been ramping up its lobbying of other energy companies to support a carbo tax. This makes a shift in the oil giant’s approach to climate change as the industry faces growing pressure to act. Top Exxon Mobil officials have been meeting with Capitol Hill officials about related legislation and making the case with its U.S. peers to support a carbon tax. Exxon has long viewed a carbon tax as the best way to address climate change- but until recently has done little to actively advocate for a tax.

In April 2016 pressure on Exxon Mobil increased with the release of a new cache of decades-old industry documents about climate change which suggest the industry had the underlying knowledge about the issue some 60 years ago. According to the New York Times, based on the documents, there is no doubt that from 1957 onward,the company was clearly on notice about rising CO₂ in the atmosphere and the prospect that it was likely to cause global warming.