Dr. William Happer is a physics professor at Princeton University and was appointed senior director of the National Security Council office for emerging technologies in September 2018. He used this post to try and undermine the federal government’s findings depicting climate change as a national security threat and planned to establish a government panel to question the consensus that climate change is caused by humans. Happer stepped down from that role a year later in 2019 after his plan to question climate science lacked support from the federal government.
Happer on Climate Change
Happer’s climate denial goes beyond the typical denialist view that our current climactic changes are natural, and humans are contributing little if at all to it. Instead, Happer believes that excessive amounts of carbon dioxide are vital to life on Earth because it acts like a fertilizer to help plants grow. He has gone so far to say at a Heartland Institute conference in 2015 that “the demonization of CO2… really differs little from the Nazi persecution of the Jews, the Soviet extermination of class enemies or ISIL slaughter of infidels.” Happer’s belief led him to co-found the nonprofit CO2 Coalition, which touts the ‘necessity’ of carbon dioxide. He has also spoken out against what he perceives as the ‘demonization’ of fossil fuels. At the same 2015 Heartland institute he claimed; “They’re not demons at all. They’re enormous servants to us.” During his time on the National Security Council, Happer also censored testimony from government employees he believed was “a lot of climate-alarm propaganda.”
Happer also expressed dubious views about stratospheric ozone depletion when he was working for the Department of Energy, claiming that the ozone hole wasn’t hurting anyone and that chlorofluorocarbons were not damaging the ozone layer. Expressing these views resulted in him being fired from the Department of Energy in 1993.
Associates
Happer was close to Donald Trump during his time in the Trump administration and tried to strongly influence the federal government’s approach to climate science. His views are also starting to gain traction with other climate denying conservative organizations, such as the Heartland Institute. However, Happer is well regarded as a physicist and a ‘damn good scientist’ by his colleagues, even if his views on climate change are questionable.
Climate of Denial