The Climate Impact of Misinformation, Disinformation, and Greenwashing in Advertising

Scientists have known about the urgency of the climate crisis for several decades. Additionally, companies who burn the most fossil fuels have known about the dangers of greenhouse gas emissions for nearly as long. The rise of social media has made it easier for businesses to spread climate misinformation via targeted advertisements. This chapter explores delay, deflection, and distraction advertising campaigns that shift the responsibility of climate action to the individual in ways that are problematic for effective climate progress. We analyze these ad campaigns to probe the central question of this chapter: What are the ethical dilemmas of environmental misinformation and disinformation in advertising? For this analysis, we look first at why addressing deceptive climate advertising matters. Next, we examine how climate misinformation and disinformation are used in advertisements. In the final section, we propose ways to spot mis- and disinformation in advertising and offer ideas about what can be done about it. We conclude with recommendations: (1) combatting false climate advertising via debunking and prebunking ad campaigns, (2) pushing for corporations to lead by modeling sustainability, and (3) pushing for regulations to eliminate the loopholes that allow for misleading climate advertising.