Greenwashing: Corporate social responsibility that rubs right off
NEW YORK: Until recently, Volkswagen was waging a relentless campaign to portray itself as an environmental steward. The company promoted diesel as a low-emissions alternative to gasoline and spent $77 million this year in the US market to advertise its diesel cars.
As everyone now knows, at the same time VW was using software to trick emissions tests on 11 million of its vehicles.
No matter how hard VW works to resolve this crisis, the episode is likely to live on in infamy as the latest and perhaps most egregious example of greenwashing.
Greenwashing, when a company tries to portray itself as more environmentally minded than it actually is, has intensified in recent decades as consumers have warmed to sustainable products. Brands, trying to capitalise on that trend, often try to outdo one another with eco-credentials. But in the rush, companies often exaggerate claims or simply make things up.
“Social and environmental responsibility should not be a competitive sport,” said Daniel Korschun, a professor of marketing at Drexel University. Don’t tell companies that. These days, greenwashing is spreading like a weed.
TerraChoice, a consulting firm that studied the phenomenon, found that 95% of the products marketed as eco-friendly had committed at least one of what it called the “seven sins” of greenwashing. Those sins range from relatively benign offenses like using weak data to more deliberate deceptions like inventing bogus certifications.
Regulators, however, have found greenwashing nearly impossible to stop. In 2012, the Federal Trade Commission issued guidelines—called “Green Guides”—“designed to help marketers ensure that the claims they make are truthful and nondeceptive.”
But despite the efforts of the FTC, a review of published reports in recent years turns up numerous instances of companies called out for their environmental exaggerations.
One common form of greenwashing is to simply make a dubious claim without having any proof to back it up.
Then there is labelling. Companies looked to take advantage of the EnergyStar seal, the government’s stamp of approval for energy-saving products. Refrigerators made by LG and Samsung, among others, were revealed to consume far more energy than claimed.
Another tried-and-true method of greenwashing is to promote a small act of environmental stewardship and hope people forget about a company’s broader environmental impact.
VW is hardly the first. Last year, Kia and Hyundai paid $300 million for overstating the gas mileage for 1.2 million vehicles.
But VW’s efforts to deceive regulators and customers make it an exemplar of the least frequent — and most serious — form of greenwashing: outright lying.
“That’s what makes this case quite incredible,” Delmas, the UCLA professor, said in an interview. “Germany is perceived to be a very green country, with its people being very responsible,” Delmas said. “If you can’t trust the Germans, who can you trust?” NEW YORK TIMES