One of the world's top institutes for researching the impact of global warming, the Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy (CCCEP) based jointly at the London School of Economics and the University of Leeds has repeatedly claimed credit for work prepared by competitors - and used it to win $11 million dollars from the UK government.
Nick Stern, a renowned global advocate for drastic action to combat climate change has been the chairman of the CCCEP since 2008.
Some published papers by the CCCEP were not about global warming at all. They were even written long before the organization was even founded. Others were written by researchers with no connection to CCCEP. The (ESRC) never bothered to check the supposed papers saying that they were "taken on trust."
Scholars whose works are stolen responded with fury. "It is serious misconduct to claim credit for a paper you haven't supported, and it's fraud to use that in a bid to renew a grant. I've never come across anything like it before. It stinks," said Professor Richard Tol, a climate change economics expert from Sussex University.
Last night, CCCEP spokesman Bob Ward acknowledged that it had 'made mistakes', both in claiming credit for studies which it had not funded and for papers published by rival academics. "This is regrettable, but mistakes can happen... We will take steps over the next week to amend these mistakes," he said.
However the academic community is not happy about the statement of the CCCEP who are now accused of this global warming scam.
"Our paper had no relationship to the CCCEP. It came out of David Anthoff's masters thesis. At the time, the CCCEP did not exist, and it only came into existence after the paper was published. Fraud means deception for financial gain. That is what this is," said professor Tol.
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