National Whistleblowers Center: Exposing a Ticking Time Bomb: How Fossil Fuel Industry Fraud is Setting Us Up for a Financial Implosion – and What Whistleblowers Can Do About It

In July 2020, the National Whistleblower Center (NWC) released a report detailing widespread deception by fossil fuel executives regarding the financial risks of climate change. The report describes why deception about companies’ preparedness for climate change risks represents a ticking time bomb that, if not addressed, could contribute to worldwide economic devastation.

The report, written by a team of NWC experts, provides the first-ever analysis of legal strategies for exposing climate risk fraud by the fossil fuel sector. It also represents the first study to use the methods of professional fraud investigators to identify fossil fuel industry financial disclosure practices that are likely to be fraudulent.

The key findings of the report include:

• Deception about the financial risks of climate change is pervasive across the fossil fuel industry.
• The growing role of whistleblowers in the fight against fraud means the handful of pending securities fraud cases challenging these deceptions represent just the tip of the iceberg.
• Whistleblowers in the fossil fuel industry, like their predecessors in the tobacco, banking and healthcare industries, can play a central role in industry reform and help prevent a worldwide financial implosion.

The full report is available here.