Scroll through YouTube, Facebook, X, Instagram, or TikTok and you’ll quickly run into confident claims about energy, electric vehicles, or climate. Some of those voices sound independent. A lot of them aren’t.
For decades, parts of the fossil fuel industry and the foundations tied to it have funded organizations that produce and amplify messages questioning climate science, opposing clean energy policies, or framing the energy transition as too costly or unreliable. That work has moved heavily onto social media. The result is a steady stream of content that looks like ordinary opinion or “just asking questions” but often traces back to the same small set of well-funded groups.
A few of the organizations
Here are some of the better-documented players:
Americans for Prosperity (AFP): Founded and heavily funded by Charles and David Koch (Koch Industries is a major oil, refining, and chemicals company). AFP runs large digital ad campaigns, social media efforts, and grassroots-style organizing that frequently target climate and clean-energy policies. Recent reporting shows the broader Koch political network raising and spending hundreds of millions of dollars in election cycles, with AFP as a flagship vehicle.
The Heartland Institute: A longtime producer of climate-contrarian material. It has received funding over the years from fossil-fuel-linked sources (including historical ExxonMobil grants and large sums through donor-advised funds like DonorsTrust). Heartland has actively used social media and influencers to reach younger audiences.
Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) and the Cato Institute: Both have received substantial Koch foundation money. CEI has produced ads and commentary questioning the severity of climate risks or the value of emissions reductions. Cato was co-founded by Charles Koch. Their material is widely shared and reposted across platforms.
Energy Citizens: An American Petroleum Institute (API) project that presents itself as a grassroots voice of ordinary Americans supporting oil and gas. It maintains active pages on Facebook, X, and other platforms and has run ad campaigns opposing climate provisions in legislation.
PragerU: Produces short, highly shareable videos that have included climate-contrarian claims. Major early and ongoing funding has come from fracking billionaires (the Wilks brothers), the Bradley Foundation, and donor-advised funds such as DonorsTrust—vehicles the Koch network has used to move money.
These groups are not fringe. Tax filings, investigative reports from outlets like DeSmog, the Center for Media and Democracy, and Greenpeace’s tracking of Koch foundation grants show consistent funding streams stretching back decades. One older Greenpeace compilation put Koch foundation grants to climate-denial-oriented groups at roughly $145 million between 1997 and 2018.
The Koch network and social media personalities
The Kochs have long preferred funding networks of organizations rather than always putting their name on the content. Money often moves through foundations they control or through “dark money” donor-advised funds such as DonorsTrust, which allows donors to remain anonymous.
A documented example of direct support for a social media personality is Naomi Seibt, a young German YouTuber. In late 2019 and early 2020, the Heartland Institute hired her and paid her roughly $4,000 a month. Heartland marketed her as the “anti-Greta” (a counter to Greta Thunberg) and used her to produce videos aimed at younger viewers questioning climate policies. Undercover reporting by German outlets showed Heartland discussing how to use her content to reach new audiences and raise money from industry-linked donors. Seibt later said she chose not to renew the arrangement after facing regulatory scrutiny in Germany. Heartland itself has received fossil-fuel-linked funding and large grants through the same donor-advised funds the Koch network uses.
More commonly, the influence is indirect but powerful: well-funded groups produce polished videos, graphics, and talking points that smaller accounts and pages then amplify. YouTube’s recommendation algorithms have historically boosted climate-contrarian content from these networks. Platforms have also allowed heavy ad spending by industry groups and their allies—InfluenceMap and others have tracked millions spent on Facebook and Instagram ads pushing fossil-fuel-friendly narratives during climate summits and legislative fights.
Not every skeptical voice online is paid. Some people simply disagree with the dominant view or have had bad experiences with energy policy. The problem is that the well-resourced side can flood the zone, making funded messages look more common and more independent than they are.
How to see through it
A few practical habits help cut through the noise:
Check the organization, not just the person. When a video or post cites a think tank or “citizen” group, look up its funding. IRS Form 990 filings, OpenSecrets, and databases maintained by DeSmog or the Center for Media and Democracy make a lot of this public.
Follow the money trail. Large grants from Koch foundations, DonorsTrust, the Bradley Foundation, Mercer family foundations, or direct industry trade groups (API, etc.) are red flags for coordinated messaging on energy and climate.
Notice the pattern, not just the single post. The same arguments—“the science is unsettled,” “renewables can’t work,” “this policy will destroy the economy”—often recycle across different accounts because they originated from the same research or media operation.
Prefer primary data. Real-world EV ownership costs, grid reliability statistics, battery degradation studies, and actual emissions inventories are more useful than a five-minute video that never links to its sources.
Ask who benefits. If a message consistently protects the status quo of oil, gas, and coal while downplaying measured risks or real-world alternatives, it is worth knowing who has a financial interest in that outcome.
None of this means every pro-fossil-fuel argument is wrong or that every clean-energy claim is automatically correct. It does mean the information environment is not a level playing field. One side has spent decades building the capacity to shape what appears in your feed. Recognizing that capacity is the first step toward evaluating the claims on their actual merits instead of their volume or production value.
The goal isn’t to dismiss every contrary view. It’s to stop treating well-funded messaging operations as if they were just ordinary people sharing what they found on the internet. This type of behavior is far from “fair” or “independent!” It is protectionism of an industry that has only one goal in mind—profit!
