A new report published on Monday has shown that major brands’ climate commitments are not always as green as they seem while some are exaggerating how ambitious their efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions are, thereby misleading consumers, investors and governments.
Published by the Europe-based environmental think tanks NewClimate Institute and Carbon Market Watch, the report examined 24 companies, including KitKat manufacturer Nestle, French retailer Carrefour and automaker Volkswagen and found that only one company — shipping firm Maersk — had climate plans with “reasonable integrity” while the rest were assessed to be moderate to very low.
“For the majority of companies, we found their climate strategies to be lacking,” Thomas Day, a researcher at the NewClimate Institute who co-authored the report was quoted as saying.
The report also found that actual emissions cuts resulting from the companies’ plans, would amount to less than half those needed by 2030 to help meet the Paris climate accord’s goal of capping global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit), a development that made the researchers questioned companies’ pledges to achieve “net zero’′ emissions, arguing that most consumers would understand that to mean largely stopping the release of planet-heating gas into the atmosphere.
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“These net-zero pledges, they actually amount to a commitment to reduce the emissions of those companies by just 36%,” said Day. “Companies either claim the rest will be removed from the atmosphere by artificial or natural means — so-called carbon offsets — or simply remove large chunks of their emissions from the tally,”.
However, Carrefour, one of the companies that were studied, has rejected the report, claiming that its climate efforts had been validated by independent experts, a position also taken by Swiss-based Nestle, whose targets were labelled as having “low integrity” in the report.
“We will continue to pursue a holistic strategy of reducing our emissions and removing carbon from the atmosphere through measures that deliver benefits to the millions of people connected to our company’s operations,” Nestle said in a statement.
Also, Volkswagen, whose targets were also assessed as having “low integrity,” maintained its commitment to meeting the goal of the Paris accord, and said it plans to invest €52 billion ($55.5 billion) in electric vehicles by 2026.
Authors od the report said that their findings highlighted the need for greater transparency and stricter regulation of corporate climate efforts, to prevent companies from greenwashing their environmental impact —- particularly when making ‘net zero’ claims.
“In many ways, carbon-neutral products are similar to cancer-neutral cigarettes,” said co-author Gilles Dufrasne of Carbon Market Watch. “There is no robust scientific basis behind those claims, and most consumers are just completely confused about what those claims would mean.”
Story was adapted from AP.
