Sharon Kelly
DeSmog
Contact Sharon
Discover and connect with journalists and influencers around the world, save time on email research, monitor the news, and more.
| Recent: |
|
| Past: |
|
Past articles by Sharon:
An FTI Consulting Presentation Pulls Back the Veil on Fossil Fuel PR
“We understand how the oil and gas sector works — we’ve worked in it, studied it, defended it and impacted the policy that regulates it,” a 2015 presentation delivered to the Tennessee Oil and Gas Association begins. “We have been instrumental players in the industry’s highest profile business issues, regulatory hearings, legal disputes and arbitration.” […] → Read More
Exclusive: 2020’s Hurricane Zeta Nearly Caused 'Another Deepwater Horizon Catastrophe' in Gulf of Mexico
It was Thursday, October 22, 2020, when the crew aboard the Transocean Deepwater Asgard, an ultra-deepwater rig in the Gulf of Mexico, started monitoring a weather disturbance in the nearby Caribbean Sea that bore the tell-tale signs of a forming hurricane. But the Asgard, which was drilling an oil well in the waters about 225 miles […] → Read More
Whistleblower Claims Dangerous Defects in Pipeline for Shell’s Pennsylvania Plastics Plant
A whistleblower has alleged that the Falcon pipeline — a 98-mile-long fossil fuel pipeline that will soon feed Shell’s massive plastics manufacturing site under construction in western Pennsylvania — was built with defective protection against corrosion. That's according to public records obtained → Read More
These Are Some Climate Stories That Flew Under the Radar in 2020
At the start of December 2020, U.N. Secretary General António Guterres spoke at Columbia University, appearing not before a packed auditorium as in years past, but before a “virtual” audience, making his annual State of the Planet address. “To put it simply,” he said, “the state of the planet is broken.” “Today, we are at 1.2 degrees of warming and already witnessing → Read More
Investigation: How Pesticide Companies Are Marketing Themselves as a Solution to Climate Change
This article was published as part of the launch of DeSmog’s Agribusiness Database , where you can find a record of companies and organisations’ current messaging on climate change, lobbying around climate action, and histories of climate science denial. → Read More
Meet the Climate Science Deniers Who Downplayed COVID-19 Risks
On January 30, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared that the outbreak of novel coronavirus 2019, which causes the disease COVID-19, was officially a “public health emergency of international concern.” At the time, there were cases confirmed in 19 countries and deaths in China had → Read More
Fossil Fuel Investments Cost California and Colorado Pension Funds Over $19 Billion, Report Finds
California and Colorado’s public pension funds together lost out on over $19 billion over the past decade by investing in fossil fuel stocks, according to a report released on Tuesday. → Read More
Oil Industry Set Agenda During Climate Summit Meeting with Big Greens
Last week, as climate activist Greta Thunberg addressed the United Nations Climate Action Summit, invited leaders from major environmental groups spent their day listening to the leaders of fossil fuel companies discuss how they want to respond to the climate crisis. Depending on which room you were in, you would have heard two very different messages. → Read More
Cheap Renewables Could Make 90% of Proposed Gas Power Plants — and Many Pipelines — Obsolete by 2035
There’s one big reason that analysts say America’s electrical power should soon run on clean energy sources like wind and solar rather than fossil fuels like coal and natural gas: your power bill. → Read More
Christopher Leonard's New Book Puts an Ever-Expanding 'Kochland' on the Map
Christopher Leonard’s new book, Kochland: The Secret History of Koch Industries and Corporate Power in America, begins, appropriately enough, with an FBI agent, who is investigating criminal activity by the company, standing in a field with a pair of binoculars, trying to catch a glimpse of the → Read More
As Risky Finances Alienate Investors, Fracking Companies Look to Retirement Funds for Cash
A year ago, Chesapeake Energy, at one time the nation’s largest natural gas producer, announced it was selling off its Ohio Utica shale drilling rights in a $2 billion deal with a little-known private company based in Houston, Texas, Encino Acquisition Partners. → Read More
‘We Can't Sit on the Sidelines and Be Climate Deniers,’ Dominion VP Warns Natural Gas Industry
Donald Raikes arrived at 2019’s DUG East conference, a major shale gas industry gathering in Pittsburgh, with a mixed set of messages for his fellow fossil energy officials. → Read More
CEO of Major Shale Oil Company “Has Second Thoughts” on Fracking Rush, Wall Street Journal Reports
On Monday, the Wall Street Journal featured a profile of Scott Sheffield, CEO of Pioneer Natural Resources, whose company is known among investors for its emphasis on drawing oil and gas from the Permian basin in Texas using horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. → Read More
Former Shale Gas CEO Says Fracking Revolution Has Been 'A Disaster' For Drillers, Investors
Steve Schlotterbeck, who led drilling company EQT as it expanded to become the nation’s largest producer of natural gas in 2017, arrived at a petrochemical industry conference in Pittsburgh Friday morning with a blunt message about shale gas drilling and fracking. → Read More
Plastics Industry on Track to Burn Through 14% of World’s Remaining Carbon Budget: New Report
The plastics industry plays a major — and growing — role in climate change, according to a report published today by the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL). → Read More
EPA Decides Not to Regulate Fracking Wastewater as Pennsylvania Study Reveals Recent Spike
On April 23, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) told two environmental groups that it had decided it was “not necessary” to update the federal standards handling toxic waste from oil and gas wells, including the waste produced by fracking. → Read More
Gas Driller at Center of 2019 Pulitzer-Winning Book on Fracking Still Faces Legal Battles
Eliza Griswold’s book Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America examines the impacts of fracking in western Pennsylvania, and on Monday it was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in General Nonfiction. → Read More
America’s Missed Climate Targets Cost Global Economy $1 Trillion, Dublin-based Think Tank Finds
Since 1992, the United States consistently has missed its targets for reducing globe-warming emissions, and a Dublin-based think tank estimates the resulting damage to the global economy has been $1 trillion. → Read More
As Cleanup Dispute Looms, Peabody-Linked Group Pushes Navajo Nation to Buy West's Largest Coal Plant
In September 2018, two prospective buyers announced they were dropping out of negotiations to purchase the Navajo Generating Station (NGS), the American West’s largest coal-fired power plant. → Read More
Court Throws out Energy Transfer’s ‘Racketeering’ Claims Against Dakota Access Pipeline Opponents
A North Dakota federal judge dismissed Energy Transfer’s racketeering lawsuit against Greenpeace and all its co-defendants in a sharply worded ruling issued today, finding that the pipeline builder’s allegations fell “far short of what is necessary to establish a claim.” → Read More