如果说世界开始觉醒并意识到气候变化是从哪一年开始的，那可能就是1988年。那年6月，美国宇航局（NASA）的气候学家詹姆斯·汉森（James Hansen）在国会作证称，气候正在变暖，只要人类继续向大气中排放化石燃料污染，这种变暖趋势就会持续下去。几个月后，联合国成立了政府间气候变化专门委员会（IPCC）。
If there was a year the world began waking up to climate change, it might have been 1988. That June, the NASA climatologist James Hansen testified to Congress that the climate was warming and would continue to do so as long as humans pumped fossil fuel pollution into the atmosphere. Months later, the United Nations established the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
就在联合国投票前几周，埃克森美孚企业研究部门的弗兰克·斯普罗（Frank Sprow）在一份内部备忘录中警告他的同事：“如果全球达成共识，认为需要采取行动来缓解温室气体效应，埃克森可能会遭受重大的负面影响。”斯普罗的备忘录是今年早些时候悄然发布的一批先前未公开的文件之一，这是马萨诸塞州于2019年对埃克森美孚提起的一起持续诉讼的一部分。
And, just weeks before the U.N. vote, Frank Sprow of Exxon’s corporate research department warned his colleagues in an internal memo, “If a worldwide consensus emerges that action is needed to mitigate against Greenhouse gas effects, substantial negative impacts on Exxon could occur.”Sprow’s memo is part of a batch of previously undisclosed documents released earlier this year without fanfare as part of an ongoing lawsuit Massachusetts filed against ExxonMobil in 2019.
虽然该备忘录在《华尔街日报》2023年的一篇文章中被引用过，但并未全文发表。诉讼文件中包含的几份其他文件也是首次在此报道，其中包括埃克森美孚的科学家最近发表的言论，他们对该公司关于生物燃料和碳捕集与封存工作的气候解决方案的主张提出了质疑。
While the memo was quoted in a 2023 article by The Wall Street Journal, it has not been published in full. Several other documents included in the filings are being reported on here for the first time, including more recent statements from Exxon scientists challenging the company’s climate-solution claims about its work on biofuels and carbon capture and storage.