Judy: The talks at the cop-27
climate talks in Egypt have been
very difficult.
There's even been growing
tension about whether some
countries will remain committed
to prior pledges to try to limit
the rise in average global
temperatures.
Now, as nearly 200 countries
negotiate on reducing emissions,
a new report is calling for
greater regulation and
transparency around prior and
future pledges.
William brangham has more.
William: Judy, this united
nations report targets
governments, corporations and
banks for what's called
greenwashing or making false or
exaggerated claims of progress.
It says any promise to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions needs
to be backed with actual
evidence, and it challenges the
idea that groups can claim to be
moving in the right direction,
while simultaneously investing
in new fossil fuel projects.
For more on this push for
greater clarity about what
progress really means, I'm
joined by Jamie Hannan.
He's director of the nonprofit
fossil free media and co founder
of three fifty.org, one of the
biggest global climate change
activist groups.
Jamie, great to have you on the
newshour.
The U.N. Is decrying this issue
have greenwashing.
Meanwhile, in Egypt, we have all
of these countries and companies
pledging to do better many of
them simultaneously, deploying
ongoing coal plants.
How serious a problem is this?
And from your perspective, who
are the biggest culprits?
Jamie: Well, I think
greenwashing is a serious
problem.
Because greenwashing has become
a new form of climate denial.
Greenwashing is this idea is
when companies or banks or
institutions pretend to they're
doing more with climate than
they actually are.
And we see this around specific
products like pretending a
shampoo is free range organic
climate positive when really
it's the same old chemicals.
But we also see around entire
industries, where the fossil
fuel industry or the financial
sector will pretend that they're
taking bold action to address
the climate crisis, when in fact
they're just continuing business
as usual.
So I think it's really important
to see the united nations
calling this out and taking this
problem head on.
William: So the eu financial
regulators said they're also
going to try to tackle this
issue.
What would a realistic sort of
fact check or enforcement
mechanism to try to crack down
on brainwashing actually look
like?
-- Greenwashing actually look
like?
Jamie: Well, I think we really
need to focus on where we
-- where greenwashing takes
place.
Which is in advertising and
public relations are concrete.
His campaign has tragic billions
of dollars of advertising from
the fossil fuel industry and
allied industries.
And a huge majority of that
advertising is about they're
supposedly climate credentials.
Take one company like Chevron,
over 80% of their advertising
mentions words like sustainable,
environment, clean.
But less than 2% of Chevron's
actual capital expenditures are
going into climate solutions.
So that's not just greenwashing,
that's really lying.
And that's false advertising.
Something we already regulate
and supposedly we already take a
close look at.
Strengthening strengthening the
ability for our regulatory
agencies, like the ftc here in
the United States to really take
a close look at these statements
and hold corporations
accountable if they're not doing
their part is one place to
start.
Jamie: -- William: To hold them
accountable would mean what
regulatory actions lawsuits,
public naming and shaming
campaigns, what would that look
like?
Jamie: I think all of the above
and actually, that's already
beginning to happen.
There are a number of instances
in Europe and here in the united
States where companies have been
forced to take down advertising
that actually was lying about
their product.
That's happened to BP in the uk,
for instance, where they were
saying they were selling a more
environmentally friendly fuel,
when in fact is continuing to
emit the same level of carbon
emissions.
Here in the United States, we
have seen multiple state
attorney general's go after
fossil fuel companies for
deceiving the public about their
record on climate change.
And we've had the house
oversight committee actually
looking into this issue of false
advertising, climate deception.
William: This U.N. Report laid
out a bunch of recommendations
of things that might happen
going forward.
And one of them was to say that
any company that claims it's
trying to achieve net zero
cannot simultaneously be funding
or supporting ongoing oil and
gas projects, fossil fuel
projects.
But on some level, isn't that
the definition of net zero that
if you are emitting carbon on
one side, you're then finding
ways to reduce it or sequester
it on the other.
Explain why that that's a
problem.
Jamie: Let's talk about the
problem as a whole, which is
that since the Paris agreement,
financial institutions around
the world have poured hundreds
of billions of dollars into
fossil fuel projects.
The 60 largest financial
institutions in the world and
-- world have poured over $740
billion in new coal, oil and gas
projects since Paris.
Many of those institutions
including leading us banks like
JP Morgan, bank of America,
Citi, are supposedly committed
to zero pathway.
The problem is that they really
take that debt and stretch it
for all it's worth.
So they argue that they continue
to finance fossil fuels, because
someday they'll plant enough
trees or buy enough carbon
offsets to reduce those
emissions down to zero.
The science does not act bad --
does not back that up.
There is a reason why that
international energy agency has
said that in order to meet the
market, we have to stop all
financing fossil fuels last
year, not sometime in the
distant future.
William: And what about this
issue of deforestation pledges,
we certainly seen companies and
countries say we're going to
stop deforestation.
Perhaps most critically and most
recently in Brazil with the new
president Lula there, saying he
is going to stop deforestation
in the Amazon.
How seriously should we take
those pledges when we see them
being made publicly?
Jamie: They certainly give us a
certain degree of hope.
And it matters who it is coming
from.
Lula has a track record on the
environment.
It's a complicated one in
Brazil, but I think we can
hopefully assume that he wants
to he wants to move things in
the right direction.
But the important thing is
really verifying these pledges.
And deforestation is a
complicated we know that the
one.
Real solution is protecting true
biodiversity and investing often
in the indigenous communities
that live on those lands to be
caretakers of those forests.
What we tend to see instead is
big corporate programs where
often they have already cut down
trees and they're replacing a
vibrant, diverse ecosystem with
something like a palm oil
plantation, which technically is
made up of trees, but it's
certainly not the forest that it
replaced.
So I think a lot of people are
-- these pledges, the devil is
in the details.
And as we get into the era of
actual implementation, versus
bold distant pledges, that
verification is gonna become all
the more important.
William: Thank you so much for
being here.
Jamie: Thank you.