In news from the start of the month, ExxonMobil has been suspended from the Climate Leadership Council, of which it is a co-founder, after remarks made in June by a lobbyist that the company’s public support of a carbon tax is only for show. Keith McCoy was duped by Greenpeace UK activists posing as headhunters conducting interviews over Zoom, saying that there “is not an appetite for a carbon tax. It’s a nonstarter… and the cynical side of me says, ‘Yeah, we kind of know that.’ But it gives us a talking point.” He and former ExxonMobil lobbyist Dan Easley also claimed to have worked to remove major climate provisions from US President Joe Biden’s US$2 trillion infrastructure package, with Easley describing them as being able to “accelerate the transition”, and being “difficult to unwind” if implemented. Exxon’s chairman and CEO, Darren Woods, condemned the words of the lobbyists, but it is difficult not to see some truth in them, and it was this that led to the company’s suspension from the Climate Leadership Council. The World Resources Institute, a member of the CLC, said that Exxon was not aligned with the council’s aim of helping a carbon price be established within the USA.