THE Florida Centre for Investigative Reporting has claimed that the state’s Department of Environmental Protection was banned from using “climate change” or “global warming” in official communications.

The ban applied to the department’s employees, consultants and volunteers and covered emails and reports, according to an investigation by the centre.

“We were told not to use the terms ‘climate change,’ ‘global warming’ or ‘sustainability’,” Christopher Byrd, an attorney with the agency’s Office of General Counsel in Tallahassee from 2008 to 2013, was quoted as saying in the report, which also cited other officials.

The ban at the agency, which deals with environmental studies and risks, started when Governor Rick Scott’s term began in 2011 but was never a written policy, the centre said.

Governor Scott, who won another term last year, is a climate-change denier.

He told the Miami Herald in 2011: “I’ve not been convinced there’s any man-made climate change.”