Scientists do not step in. They do not do things. They enable the actions of those with actual power, to do what they want.

My experience of studying physics was that the vague Ideal Scientist to fit within the desires of capitalist funding wasn't Einstein (not that they tell you his politics) or even Oppenheimer (not that they tell you that he wanted to use the bomb) - it was the Wehrner Von Braun from the song. Hell, even Von Braun's a bit iffy for being so well-known.

A sagacious detachment from politics/reality and a noble focus on driving the field forwards in whatever ways are funded, for whatever reason.

Environmental scientists are significantly better than this, of course. But even they have the pressures of pretending Carbon Capture and other dead ends are a thing because the moneybags will not accept otherwise.

A slightly random aside: It's one of the more realistic parts of Fallout - a couple years before the bombs dropped, they solved clean energy and resource constraints (fusion and replicators). The government simply didn't share.

Edit: And as others have said they have already solved climate change and told us all the solutions, decades ago.