Big Oil to attend U.S. House climate disinformation hearing

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Top executives from Exxon Mobil Corp, BP America, Chevron Corp and Shell Oil will testify on Oct. 28 at a congressional hearing examining whether the fossil fuel industry led an effort to mislead the public and prevent action to curb climate change warming, a House panel said on Friday.

Democratic lawmakers who called for the hearing, which is billed as "Exposing Big Oil's Disinformation Campaign to Prevent Climate Action," have said they intend to model the high-profile event after congressional hearings on big tobacco firms, who misrepresented the health impacts of their products.

The CEOs who will attend are ExxonMobil's Darren Woods, BP America's David Lawler, Chevron's Michael Wirth and Shell President Gretchen Watkins.

American Petroleum Institute President Mike Sommers and Chamber of Commerce President Suzanne Clark will also testify before the U.S. House Oversight Committee.

House Oversight Committee Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney and Ro Khanna, chairman of the Subcommittee on Environment, sent a letter last month to the executives citing a study in the peer-reviewed journal Climatic Change that said 91 think tanks and advocacy organizations that downplayed global warming were funded by Exxon and industry groups.

(Reporting Valerie Volcovici, Timothy Gardner and Doina Chiacu; Editing by Bill Berkrot)