A leading scientific institute allowed its evidence to a parliamentary inquiry into climate science to be influenced anonymously by an energy industry consultant who argues that global warming is a religion.
It emerged last night that the Institute of Physics' (IOP) written submission to the Select Committee on Science and Technology had been influenced by Peter Gill, an IOP official who is head of a company in Surrey called Crestport Services. Crestport provides "consultancy and management support services' to energy companies and has worked with Shell and British Gas.
In an article in the newsletter of the IOP south central branch in April 2008, Mr Gill wrote: "If you do not 'believe' in anthropogenic climate change, you risk at best ridicule, but more likely vitriolic comments or even character assassination. For many people the subject has become a religion, so facts and analysis have become largely irrelevant.'
In November, Mr Gill ...