Dirty Coal: If our students cite blogs and websites, we take points off, 'those aren't academic sources.' Yet this is what Peabody takes to court to fight climate science: Via, The Guardian: Peabody coal's contrarian scientist witnesses lose their court case | John Abraham

Updated 9/19/18:  Washington University is still taking money from Peabody, despite the fact that Peabody fights tooth and nail against climate science, public health, and effective policy change like the Clean Power Act.  

Updated 5/11/16: More details on Peabody's science-denial tactics in court (see here, and below).  Once again, the main question: Should an industry with the ethics of the tobacco industry and the arguments of – well, I'd hate to insult two-year olds, but you get the point – be a partner with Washington University, which claims to be a leader in public health, medicine, and science?

Reading John Abraham's story about testifying on climate science in a Minnesota court case brought by Peabody....their scientific experts cited blogs to try to contest the real science of global warming. 

I would laugh, but this is serious criminality.  Even worse, Peabody is still a major partner of Washington University.  

In the late 1990s the Weidenbaum Center here at WUSTL greenwashed for the oil industry and obstructed climate science while they were on the payroll of Exxon.  Now in the late 2010s, we are still greenwashing for the coal and oil industry and obstructing science alongside our partners in the coal industry, especially the utility monopoly Ameren, and their main coal supplier, Peabody.  Greg Boyce, ex-CEO of Peabody, sits on the WUSTL board of trustees.  Peabody is one of the donors of a few million dollars for so-called 'clean coal' research.  And, like Exxon, Peabody has deliberately misrepresented scientific knowledge in a bid to stay alive, and has paid the university money to participate in this strategy.  This seems pretty criminal to me. It certainly erodes the integrity of science and public trust in the university.

A side note on clean coal funding, today's version of #ExxonKnew: That 'clean coal' money mostly went to pay and contractually oblige the university to use the phrase 'clean coal.'  Peabody spent a lot more money during those same years for lobbying against climate science in DC, while Washington University was staging major events to let coal industry representatives lie to the public about 'clean' and 'green' coal.  No major discovery has come of 'clean coal' research, and no major discovery ever will. There will never be clean coal, but there is a really nice green brochure proclaiming its possibility (right):  

I'm not sure if WUSTL was contractually obliged to paint the clean coal website all in green or not. But it is greenwashing to the point of comedic parody.  The US government in fact pays for most of the actual research, none of which approximates 'clean coal' research.  Washington University also often fails to speak clearly about climate change, and some units here provide platforms for climate science obstructionism.  While we proclaim to be a national leader of sustainability, we invest (or appear to have invested) via hedge fund vehicles - not sure if we are laundering capital through for others or not – in fracking Southern Illinois and drilling for tight oil and gas elsewhere, both very dirty processes. We say absolutely nothing, perhaps under orders of the dinosaurs on the Board of Trustees, about Ameren's plan to keep burning up to 60% coal by 2034.  And despite the fact that Ameren also gave WUSTL money to use the phrase clean coal, I overheard an Ameren exec at a recent sustainability conference saying, "we're not even considering that [clean coal] technology."  Of course they aren't because it does not exist and never will.  I am not sure if these people have children, or if they love them, but all of this is deeply troubling, ethically, environmentally, and in terms of human health and well-being.

In addition to that dirty coal money, Peabody in 2013 paid $372,000 to WUSTL for some sort of tuition for somebody.  Irony or parody in an institution of higher learning?  Embrace science on one end, fight science on the other?  Who knows? There is not enough transparency about the exchange of money.  The erosion of public trust proceeds apace.  The board of trustees and those who do their bidding are at the helm of something quite disturbing.  St Louis is a company town, and most folks are too scared (or dependent) to say anything.  Even our NPR station is on the Ameren and Monsanto payroll.

WUSTL 2013 990 Form. Easy to find on the web.  That same year WUSTL paid Ameren $22,000,000 for the electricity produced by burning mostly dirty coal provided by Peabody Energy.  Our campus is 100% Ameren grid dependent, and Ameren burns about 70-80% coal. WUSTL trustees also sit on Ameren's board –- it's a circus of cronyism tied to dirty industries.

Now Peabody once again demonstrates what it truly is - a destructive behemoth that fights science and public health.  Should any self-respecting university that calls itself a bastion of science and public health be partnered with such a thing? The students do not think so.  In 2014, a hardy band of WUSTL students staged a sit-in to bring these issues to light and call the board of trustees to account for its complicity in community destruction.

So on it goes, read for yourself, you decide: Peabody coal's contrarian scientist witnesses lose their court case | John Abraham:

"We also showed that the experts for Peabody relied extensively on non-peer-reviewed reports, blog sites, and think tanks to support their conclusions (paragraph 359 in the report). The peer-reviewed scientific literature is the best source for accurate climate science information. In other areas, the Peabody experts used scientific papers that we showed were incorrect (paragraph 360 in the report, for example). Perhaps the key findings are best articulated in the judicial conclusions, which begin on page 114. Among the conclusions are: 

22. The Administrative Law Judge concludes that Peabody failed to demonstrate that an equilibrium climate sensitivity of 1 or 1.5°C is correct.

23. The Administrative Law Judge concludes that the climate sensitivity is reasonably considered to be in the 2-4.5°C range.

47. The Administrative Law Judge concludes that Peabody failed to demonstrate that the relied upon process is neither peer-reviewed nor transparent.

Read the rest of the story: Peabody coal's contrarian scientist witnesses lose their court case | John Abraham

And, updated 5/11/16, here's what Peabody's 'experts' tried to argue, all False (via Dana Nuccitelli, The Guardian):

 The losing case from the coal company witnesses (rebutted by John Abraham here and here) can be summarized as follows:

• Warming has been less than models predicted [False]
• This means the climate’s sensitivity to the increased greenhouse effect is low [False]
• Carbon pollution is great anyway and should be subsidized, not taxed [False]

In between these primary arguments, Peabody coal’s witnesses made a variety of false and/or conspiratorial statements, dredging up numerous long-debunked climate myths.