Canary in the Coal Mine

Green Media's Dark Money

Looking for Trouble | Mirrorpix via Getty Images

All the Muck That’s Fit to Rake

The war over mass media control is as old as the printing press itself. Gutenberg’s revolutionary invention made possible the wide distribution of Martin Luther’s 95 Theses, kicking off the Reformation, and spurring monarchs across Europe to rein in print media through strict licensing requirements. Throughout early modern history, the ability to permit or deny access of information to the public reflected the relative power of a ruler. The English Civil War and the American Revolution were both fueled by a breakdown in the censorship apparatus of the state to suppress the printing and distribution of pamphlets expressing ideas considered by the ruling elite to be heretical.

Newspapers as we recognize them today were first introduced in the 1700s, and for most of the intervening period, mainly reflected the opinions, and political and financial interests of their publishers. It wasn’t until the early twentieth century that publishers began to take an interest in exposing the corruption, fraud, and other misdoings of the government and associated vested interests, bringing “truth to power.” In the U.S., the Fairness Doctrine (1940s -1980s) further encouraged more balanced coverage of news, requiring media outlets to present controversial topics in a pro/con format.

With the advent of cable TV and the 24-hour news cycle, the Fairness Doctrine was ultimately repealed, giving way to our current system dominated by bifurcated and increasingly partisan reporting of both breaking news and conversations around longer-term public and foreign policy issues. Rather than serving as a democratizing force to feature more voices and a more nuanced conversation, the internet has accelerated trends in media conglomeration, heightening political division and the resulting biased coverage to a fever pitch. A recent study at the University of Rochester confirmed this trend, using machine learning algorithms to detect a growing occurrence of subjective and emotionally-tinged language in mainstream media headlines across the political spectrum (e.g., CNN, NBC, NYT, WSJ).

Purchased for a Song

Nowhere is the battle over hearts and minds more fraught than in discussions surrounding climate action and its corollaries in shaping energy policy. Particularly salient is media investigations into influence-peddling. This sheds light onto the inner workings of the corporations and organizations seeking to lobby governments at every level to enact favorable legislation around energy generation, transmission, and end usage. A Google search for “oil industry dark money” returns about 82,800,000 hits, with titles such as “Senate examines role of ‘dark money’ in delaying climate action,” and “How fossil fuel interests can undermine clean energy progress.” Indeed, the oil and gas industry’s use of euphemistically-named PACs and misleading public relations campaigns to funnel money towards their preferred policy outcomes are well documented.

What is not being investigated or documented by mainstream outlets is the veritable ecosystem of “green” media that has popped up like mushrooms over the past few years, rushing to burnish the (increasingly rusty) image of Net Zero and the renewable energy industry (mainly wind and solar). Canary Media is a case in point. Although I have been aware of this publication for some time, my interest in their funding mechanism was piqued more recently. A family member commented on receiving multiple e-mails from Canary per day (despite having never signed up for their newsletters), with slick graphic design and an onslaught of fresh content. Considering that Canary has only been in existence since 2021, and considering the dire straits of independent journalism in general these days, it seemed odd that they would have the funds to send out a blitz of expensive, individually-tailored marketing materials every day. It also seems likely that they are in the business of purchasing tranches of e-mail addresses from third party brokers (which doesn’t come cheap).

Singing For Their Supper

So, what can we determine about Canary? Top-ranked stories on their homepage include “Solar is about to get a lot more affordable for low-income households,” and “Better heat pumps for commercial buildings are coming soon.” Broadly stated, Canary’s focus seems to be highlighting the “energy transition’s” best hits (including a bevy of projects with untested technological and economic feasibility).

According to a press release, they were founded by the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) in 2021, with the following mission statement:

Canary Media is an independent, nonprofit newsroom covering the transition to clean energy and solutions to the climate crisis. We report on how the world is decarbonizing — in electricity, transportation, buildings and industry — with a critical focus on finding out what works and what doesn’t. Through uncompromising reporting, our journalists dig into the ways policymakers, businesses, investors and communities are moving toward a clean and equitable energy future.

Yet, a contradiction in terms immediately arises. Throughout its website copy, Canary heavily pushes the claim of being independent, which, at face value, suggests a lack of policy preference, following facts where they lead. However, its sponsorship charter explicitly states a “a goal to advance the clean energy transition,” and requires sponsors to be a “full member of an action-oriented clean energy or decarbonization association, such as RE100, We Mean Business (or a sub-coalition) or the Clean Energy Buyers Association.” These stipulations in effect put a freeze on fact-based, independently sourced journalism that reports findings contradictory to current policy advancing “clean energy,” which heavily favor wind and solar. In other words, Canary’s business model seems to disincentivize reporters from discussing the failures of intermittent sources to meet demand, and the adverse environmental impacts of these projects. The disproportionate space allocated on Canary’s website to covering intermittent resources vs. baseload nuclear (which also produces zero carbon emissions) quite nicely demonstrates this observation: while the search term “solar” returns 1,308 results, “nuclear” returns only 261.

Getting back to the issue of funding, according to its Form 990, Canary posted a revenue of $1.48 million in 2022, up from around $500,000 in 2021, its inaugural year. Not bad for a fledgling media company. So where did that seed money come from? Canary’s founder, RMI, is well known for its considerable war chest funding “energy transition” propaganda research, and publicly pushing the Net Zero narrative that advanced economies can and will run primarily on non-reliable wind and solar in the near future. RMI’s CEO, Amory Lovins, is something of a cult figure among the energy efficiency cognoscenti, long touting the “soft path” of switching from fossil fuels to “benign” renewables.

Lovins (and RMI generally) is also notably anti-nuclear. Even the most recent COP28 Conference acknowledged that any serious proposed solution set for delimiting fossil fuels must include nuclear fission — it is the only clean-burning and reliably dispatchable energy source we currently have at our disposal. Lovins’ irrational stance towards nuclear energy thus underscores the dubious agenda of the “anti-industry industry,” as journalist Robert Bryce has dubbed RMI and their ilk, who seem more interested in impeding economic growth than in discovering and implementing engineering-based solutions towards sustainability.

Canary’s “sustaining sponsors” also include Kore Power and DP World . Kore Power is a private company specializing in AI-integrated batteries and customized “energy storage solutions,” with a stated mission of “advancing the transition to clean energy worldwide enabled by innovative energy storage and e-mobility systems.” In 2022, Canary touted their sponsor’s successful bid to raise $75 million to build lithium-ion battery cells in Arizona. DP World is a publicly-traded international logistics company based in Dubai. In 2023, DP World posted an annual revenue of over $18 billion. Overtures to the company’s commitments to “community collaboration,” “humanitarian logistics resilience,” and “climate proofing the supply chain,” are prominently featured on DP World’s website. It would seem Canary has friends in high places.

For the Birds

Canary is far from the only media company feasting on the spoils of the Green New Deal. Publications such as Grist and Inside Climate News also have deep ties to philanthropic organizations championing the Net Zero agenda (topics I intend to explore in forthcoming pieces). Unlike the overt political sympathy of publishers of old, today’s media biases (on both the left and right) are laundered through high-minded “causes,” — backed by the usual suspects. Plus ca change.

And as its namesake suggests, Canary is a warning of an increasingly toxic media landscape.

Ah, the circle of life.

Electrically yours,

K.T.