From 2008 to 2023, nine of the nation’s largest oil, agrichemical and plastics trade groups and corporations posted thousands of times on the social media platform X, and their messaging on environmental issues was strikingly “obstructive” for climate policy and action, a study published in the journal PLOS Climate concludes.

The study found that all of the organizations, including the American Petroleum Institute (API) and the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF), were mentioned by at least four of the other groups — essentially creating an echo chamber for similar messages. The groups also frequently tagged regulators and the media in their posts, with researchers finding the Environmental Protection Agency was tagged 795 times and the Wall Street Journal, the most mentioned media organization, tagged 517 times out of more than 125,000 posts.

“We know that all three of these sectors [studied] are dependent on petrochemicals and we were interested to know, does that mean that they’re all communicating with each other? Does it mean they’re sharing the same communications message, in relation to how petrochemicals are managed?” lead author Alaina Kinol told DeSmog. “It seems like the answer is they are communicating with each other — because they’re all tweeting at each other.”
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Outside academics reached by DeSmog said the study raises questions about whether the three industries might be deliberately coordinating their messaging.

“This paper is interesting because it shows that the fossil fuel industry, plastics industry and agricultural chemicals industry all promote forms of climate denial on social media, and their messages are largely aligned with each other,” said Ben Franta, associate professor of climate litigation at the University of Oxford. “Is that alignment intentional? Are these industries engaging in a joint enterprise to deceive consumers and the public about petrochemical products and climate change?