Background to the Education & Culture Boycott of the Science Museum

Why is sponsorship a problem?

Companies like Adani and BP, whose businesses cause immense harm, rely on securing a ‘social licence to operate’, i.e. legitimacy in the eyes of decision-makers, investors and the public in order for their damaging business practices to continue.

BP’s internal memos show how the company views sponsorship as a means to gain “influencers, supporters or defenders on regulatory, legislative, or other policy matters’, and to ‘secure public support and advocacy’

Both BP and Adani have benefitted from Science Museum sponsorship to advance their business practices

On the day the Adani sponsorship deal was announced, the Science Museum had arranged a meeting between Boris Johnson (then Prime Minister) and Gautam Adani to discuss how to advance Adani’s business interests. This was the host country of COP26 meeting the world’s biggest private producer of coal, two weeks before the climate summit.
In the face of criticism for its Indian coal operations, Adani arranged positive media coverage and advertorials highlighting the Science Museum sponsorship across a range of Indian media platforms, including Adani-owned ones
Science Museum Director Ian Blatchford has made countless comments about the value of fossil fuel companies in the energy transition - despite the TPI concluding that none of them have policies compatible with net zero
When BP was universally condemned for its strategic ‘reset’ on moving away from renewables, the only positive press came from its sponsored museums, calling BP ‘vital’.
The Science Museum defended the Adani sponsorship in the media in the midst of a bribery and fraud scandal.
BP strategically sponsored an exhibition on Russian Cosmonauts to positively frame BP’s stake in Russian state oil company Rosneft and to engage with decision-makers via the museum.

The Adani sponsorship only accounts for less than 0.5% of the museum’s annual income. It is not critical to the museum.

What’s wrong with Adani?

The world’s biggest private producer of coal [1], the fossil fuel which has contributed the most to global heating Adani is doubling down on coal [2] by seeking to expand, acquire and build over 15 coal fired power stations which will produce over 200 million tonnes of CO2 - more than most nations produce annually, producing a massive 200 million tonnes of CO2
Adani’s coal mining has come at the cost of indigenous rights and biodiversity from India to Australia. The Adivasi people defending the ancient Hasdeo forest have been brutally and violently repressed in the name of Adani’s mines.
The same weapons used by paramilitaries to repress dissent in mining regions of India are produced by the Adani-Elbit joint venture in small arms production PLR which stands for Precise, Lethal, Reliable. These are sniper rifles which are also used against children in Gaza and the West Bank in the genocide of the Palestinian people
Adani-Elbit also produce Hermes 900 drones which are marketed as ‘battle tested’ in Gaza, shipments of which have been made from India to Israel during the ongoing genocide.
Adani owns and manages the Israeli military port of Haifa, overseeing the flow of weapons and fuel for the Israeli military’s genocide and decades-long oppression of the Palestinian people.
Gautam Adani is one of the world’s richest men - in 2022 he ranked third richest in the world behind only Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos - and is an ally of the ultra-right authoritarian government in India, of Modi and the BJP, a relationship mired in allegations of corruption and cronyism.
Adani Green Energy’s solar projects have been dubbed ‘corrupt’ by US Authorities, with the FBI investigating bribery of Indian public officials by Adani Green executives which allegedly took place at the same time that the Science Museum deal was being made.

What’s wrong with BP?

In February 2025 BP announced a ‘complete reset’ to mark the end of its net zero goals, building upon various rollbacks in its low carbon agenda over this time period.

BP owns a 40% stake in the BTC pipeline, transporting oil from Azerbaijan to Israel, which in turn fuels the military machinery of Israel’s genocide of Palestinians, prompting Palestinian victims of Israel’s bombing of Gaza taking legal action against BP. BP is also bidding for gas licences off the coast of Gaza.

In 2024 Iraqi father Hussein Jalood began legal action against BP, claiming his son died from the effects of BP’s gas flaring in Iraq, as documented in a damning investigation.

In the aftermath of BP’s Deepwater Horizon disaster, the company was ordered to pay record breaking corporate criminal and environmental fines. With its reputation in tatters, BP embarked on an extensive sponsorship strategy in an attempt to rehabilitate its public profile. In 2022, the environmental impacts of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill continue to be reported.

Instead of taking responsibility for the damage it is causing, BP uses sponsorship as cover for doubling down on deeply harmful fossil fuel production.

What’s wrong with the sponsorship?

Companies like Adani require a ‘social licence to operate’, that is to say, to gain the trust and consent of wider society and the communities in which they operate in order to pursue their business activities. Its museum sponsorship is not a donation, it’s a transaction.

This sponsorship only accounts for less than 0.5% of the museum’s annual income. It is not critical to the museum.

This was a transaction in which Adani benefited from:

The opportunity to greenwash its image by promoting ‘Adani Green Energy’ as the named sponsor of a gallery, despite this being unrepresentative of the activities of the Adani Group as a whole.
A meeting with then UK prime minister Borish Johnson, host of COP28, at the Science Museum - less than two weeks ahead of the climate summit - followed by a second meeting in which Adani stated its weapons’ production ambition to become ‘the BAE of India’.
Positive publicity and promotional spots across the Indian mainstream media ahead of the Indian election (Adani’s ally, the far-right Narendra Modi, won).
A willing defender in the media in the form of Science Museum Director Ian Blatchford, even as U.S. authorities issued an arrest warrant for Adani & Adani Green Energy executives for alleged bribery and fraud

Adani Green / Adani Group

The museum claims that the sponsorship is with Adani Green Energy, and therefore the wrongdoings associated with Adani Group (except for the bribery and fraud allegations) have nothing to do with the museum. However, the two companies have the same chairman, Gautam Adani, the same registered address, and have been described as ‘intricately and distinctly linked’ in a 2023 investigation into corruption. Adani even used Adani Green money as collateral for their Carmichael coal mine in Australia. It is the standard practice to determine a company’s suitability for sponsorship by scrutinising the parent company first and foremost.