Founded for oil money by a nuclear opponent
In the 1960s, there was a struggle in the Sierra Club over whether or not to support nuclear power. On the anti-faction was a man named David Brower [1], who was one of the growing environmentalists who bought into Malthus the idea that access to unlimited clean energy would be a threat, so they had to fight nuclear power.
In 1969, Brower was dismissed from the Sierra Club board [2] but had an established reputation as a leading anti-nuclear environmental activist, and he needed money to continue his efforts.
The source was Robert O. Anderson (April 13, 1917 – December 2, 2007) – an American oilman and founder of the Atlantic Richfield Company (ARCO) and also served for many years as president of the Aspen Institute, a group that has made no secret of the fact that it organizes forums for leaders to gather to develop action campaigns [3]
In 1969, Anderson Brower made a founding donation of $80,000, equivalent to $500,000 in 2019, dollars to create the environmental organization Friends of the Earth FOE [4].
One of its first major campaigns was the anti-nuclear protest, especially in California, where Anderson’s business was also based, which will benefit greatly from the exclusion of nuclear power.
The grant from Anderson was not widely used at the time but began to raise eyebrows later. Tom Turner, Brower’s own very sympathetic biographer, wondered, “What was David Brower doing by accepting money from an oilman?” [5].
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