The Importance of Battling Greenwashing - A Case in Point

“Who’s scrutinizing the scrutinizers?” Jay Westervelt asks rhetorically, as reported by John Sullivan in an article from the Times Herald Record. If you don’t know who Jay Westervelt is, Google the term “greenwash” and you’ll see article after article citing him as the coiner of this phrase over 20 years ago. The concept of greenwashing came about when Jay brought to light the hotel industry’s claim to be eco-friendly by asking guests to reuse their towels, when in fact their motive was not the good of the planet, but to save money on laundering.

As defined by Corpwatch, the San Francisco-based corporate watchdog, greenwashing is “Disinformation disseminated by an organization so as to present an environmentally responsible public image.” Its prevalence in the current marketplace is undeniable. Greenwashing has become a prominent word in the vernacular when talking about the green industry. Greenpeace even started a website solely devoted to outing, investigating and tracking greenwashers, with the tag line, “Clean up your act, NOT your image.”

Greenwashing is dangerous because it not only threatens the credibility of the type of product being greenwashed but the environmental movement as a whole. As defined by the communications agency Futerra’s Greenwash Guide, “Greenwash is having an insidious, measurable, and potentially catastrophic impact. It's actually quite simple: greenwash threatens the whole business rationale for becoming more environmentally friendly. Greenwash is slowly eating away at the best part of the green business case...greenwash destroys the very market it hopes to exploit.” It causes confusion and distrust among consumers trying to make sense of the overwhelming amount of information in the marketplace relating to eco-friendly products and environmentally conscious living. According to the London Business School, a survey conducted by the independent research company Forrester revealed that only 15% of US adult consumers believe company advertisements about their green products, and only 13% agree that companies are doing everything that they can to make their products greener.

Oil companies are often accused of greenwashing. BP is a prime example as they’ve created a marketing campaign around the impression that they are eco-friendly with the rebranding of their name as “Beyond Petroleum” rather than British Petroleum. As reported from Corpwatch, “BP's claim to be ‘the largest producer of solar energy in the world’ is a little more serious. But being #1 for BP is so easy. It was achieved by spending $45 million to buy the Solarex solar energy corporation. That's a tiny fraction of the $26.5 billion it spent to buy ARCO in order to increase BP's production capacity for...oil. BP will spend $5 billion over five years for oil exploration in Alaska alone. And, according to one group of BP shareholders, BP spent more on their new eco-friendly logo last year than on renewable energy.”

The scrutinizers Jay was referring to in John Sullivan’s article were “ corporate marketing teams” that saw financial opportunity in selling green products to match a lifestyle trend and creating green standard labeling systems to rate how green a product is, while being paid by the companies they were testing to give them the sought-after rating. On the flip side of that argument, rating systems like LEED and Green Seal provide structure to a rapidly growing industry. While we do need methods to keep the suppliers of our standards in check, standards are necessary to measure our progress. They are not intended to set the bar for how high we can go, but to create the foundation from where we jump off and continue on to newer and bigger challenges and accomplishments. As Bill Reid, President of Integrative Design Collaborative, said at West Coast Green this year, “LEED was never meant to be the definition of Green Design...LEED is the training wheels of sustainability.”

These standards enable us to hold ourselves collectively to a higher standard of accountability when addressing greenwashing. At West Coast Green in San Francisco this year, an incident relating to greenwashing accountability occurred during a panel discussion. At the Next Gen Design: Out of the Cradle, Now What? Session, Gadi Amit, Principal and Founder of New Deal Design and blogger for Fast Company, was one of the panelists and his presentation focused on the question, “How do you make people love ‘green’?” He presented pictures of green companies and products he was working with and one of those was the Dell’s Studio Hybrid PC with a Bamboo sleeve. On the slide, “LEED certified,” was written next to the computer. If you’re familiar with LEED, you’re aware that it is “an internationally recognized green building certification system.” LEED certifies buildings, not products.

Certain products and materials can assist with gaining LEED points, but reference to these products as LEED certified is incorrect. While it may not have been an intentional misrepresentation, this incorrect claim was an attempt to add credibility in the marketing the product as LEED certified. During the Q & A, Amit was asked about this discrepancy and the audience member attempted to discuss the issue within the larger context of greenwashing. Rather than acknowledge the error and engage in a productive conversation about the bigger picture this slide had brought to light, Amit said it’s, “people like you who are the problem.” One can only assume he was referring to the audience member’s adherence to LEED’s standards regarding certified building versus products. This interaction left members of the audience confused. Why attempt to use LEED to market the product if you’re not a proponent of the system?

The audience member approached Amit again after the session to clarify that her intentions were not to put him on the spot, but to explore the issue at hand as an opportunity as they both were members of the same community working towards a collective goal - getting people to fall in love with green. He interpreted the question regarding the accuracy of his claim as an attack. It was obvious he wasn’t aware that LEED doesn’t apply to products and his own intentions weren’t to misrepresent Dell’s green computer as LEED-certified, but, as a speaker on a panel educating others, he should be held accountable for accuracy in the information he provides. He hardly acknowledged the error and basically asked if it helps to get people to know about green products what’s the harm? That’s greenwashing. Dell was contacted directly and makes no claims to have LEED-certified computers.

As more green products, services and companies enter the marketplace, now more than ever, the green professionals, the passionate environmentalists, the leaders, the writers, the bloggers, the teachers of the green movement, are the scrutinizers of the scrutinizers. Intentional or not, it’s imperative to make all efforts to present the truth and to correct untruths when they are brought to our attention. Having integrity, embracing accountability and holding ourselves to a higher standard is the effective way to eradicate greenwashing and maintain industry credibility.