When corporate grants are bringing research groups into existence more or less from scratch, it's fair to call it more than "ties." At the very least, this is far beyond the norm in fields I keep track of- for instance, pharmaceutical companies helping fund academic biomedical research happens, certainly, but only in limited cases and generally it's considered a significant asterisk next to whatever the study finds. When those same companies are carrying out their own research (say, clinical trials for a new drug) they typically do so under external supervision, with rigorous reporting standards.

For that matter, the choice isn't between oil-industry experts and complete novices. Carbon capture is chemistry; there are plenty of chemical engineers with independently-funded academic positions, or involved in non-oil-industry funded companies. If some of them published a review of the plausibility of carbon capture, I'd listen to it.