Environment

Brazil Extracts Billions from Mining Giants

When multinational mining companies are implicated in disasters in the Global South they often get away with paying minimal amounts in compensation to the communities or workers involved. Brazil recently broke that pattern by negotiating a settlement worth over US$30 billion.

That amount will be paid out by mining giants BHP and Vale in connection with the 2015 Mariana disaster in which a tailings dam at the iron ore mine operated by their joint venture Samarco collapsed and unleashed a torrent of waste that killed 19 people and contaminated 400 miles of the Doce River.

Under the agreement, BHP and Vale, which have already been compelled to pay out about US$8 billion, will provide another US$23 billion over the next 20 years to affected communities and public authorities. The amounts cover water clean-up costs, health programs infrastructure repairs and improvements, and a flood response fund. Also included are funds for education, the needs of women, fishing, food security, and income support for vulnerable populations. The companies are, in effect, being compelled to finance a parallel social welfare system.

BHP and Vale both have histories of harmful impacts that extend well beyond the Mariana disaster. BHP, headquartered in Australia, took its current form as a result of the 2001 merger of the company previously known as Broken Hill Proprietary and Billiton, originally a Dutch company. It has been at the center of environmental controversies concerning its operations in countries such as Chile, Guatemala, India, and the United States. For example, in 2022 it was fined the equivalent of US$8 million by environmental authorities in Chile for damage caused by excessive water extraction in the Salar de Atacama salt flat.

Vale, headquartered in Brazil, was implicated in another even worse mining disaster in its home country. Three years after the Mariana incident, a tailings dam near Brumadinho in the state of Minas Gerais collapsed, releasing a mudflow that engulfed houses, farms and roads and killed more than 250 people, most of whom were company employees. The toxic deluge also destroyed 300 acres of native forest and polluted 200 miles of the Paraopeba River.

In 2021 Vale agreed to pay US$7 billion in compensation to the state government. It probably got off easy, given that evidence emerged suggesting that Vale executives had been warned about safety risks with the dam. In the wake of those revelations, Brazilian authorities brought homicide charges against the chief executive of the company, Fabio Schvartsman. Those charges were dismissed earlier this year, but relatives of the victims are seeking to have them reinstated.

Apart from the environmental penalties, Vale got in trouble with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for making false and misleading statements to investors about the safety of its dams. In 2023 the company had to pay US$55 million to settle the matter.

The substantial penalties being paid in Brazil by BHP and Vale will provide needed relief to the affected communities, yet it is unclear whether the amounts are enough to get corporations with annual revenues in the $40-50 billion range to fundamentally change their ways.

Challenging Corporate Greenwashing

Large corporations like to tout their environmental initiatives. The problem is that their claims are often exaggerated, misleading or completely unfounded. And rarely are they called to account for their deception.

Recently, there have been two exceptions to the rule, involving the petroleum industry, which has long been one of the most brazen practitioners of greenwashing. California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced the filing of a lawsuit against Exxon Mobil, alleging that it engaged in what the AG called “a decades-long campaign of deception that caused and exacerbated the global plastics pollution crisis.”

Bonta accused Exxon Mobil, a leading producer of the polymers used to produce single-use plastics, of employing “misleading public statements and slick marketing” to promote the idea that recycling is an adequate way to deal with the plastics pollution crisis.

The lawsuit, which seeks to get Exxon Mobil to cease making misleading statements and pay damages, bears a resemblance to previous actions against the corporation for its long history of denying the reality of the climate crisis and the major role the oil industry has played in exacerbating global warming.

Over in South Africa, another oil giant, France’s TotalEnergies, was recently found to have made misleading statements about its commitment to sustainable development. The Advertising Regulatory Board, acting on a complaint brought by the environmental group Fossil Free South Africa, based its ruling on the simple fact that the petroleum company’s core business is antithetical to sustainability.

The advertising board could also have looked at the environmental record of TotalEnergies. As shown in Violation Tracker, the company has paid more than $60 million in environmental penalties in the United States. It also paid $15 million to resolve allegations that it violated the False Claims Act by knowingly underpaying royalties owed on natural gas produced from federal and Indian leases. And it paid nearly $400 million to settle foreign bribery allegations.

As will soon be shown in Violation Tracker Global, TotalEnergies has also had regulatory challenges in other countries. For example, in 2010 a French appeals court upheld a 200 million euro judgment against the company in connection with a large oil spill by the tanker Erika off the coast of Brittany.

Of course, Exxon Mobil also has a checkered compliance record. Violation Tracker records more than $2 billion in environmental penalties in the U.S since 2000. That total would have been considerably larger if the Supreme Court had not slashed a multi-billion-dollar damage award stemming from the giant oil spill by the company’s Valdez supertanker off the coast of Alaska. Violation Tracker Global will contain $3 million in environmental penalties in other countries, especially Canada.

Supreme Court rulings such as the Citizens United case emboldened corporations to assert their free speech rights. Yet when that speech denies scientific reality and contributes to environmental devastation, society needs to respond. California’s lawsuit will not solve the plastics crisis, but it will help to make the case that Exxon Mobil is part of the problem rather than the solution.

Note: Violation Tracker Global will be launched in October

Prosecuting the Boss

A courtroom in Germany is currently the scene of a rare occurrence in the business world: the trial of a high-level executive for corporate crimes. Martin Winterkorn, the former top executive of Volkswagen, is facing charges of commercial fraud, market manipulation and making false statements.

Arguably, he should be facing even more serious allegations. Winterkorn is being belatedly tried in connection with the vast conspiracy in which Volkswagen executives conspired to deceive regulators and the public about the environmental impact of its diesel cars. By rigging the vehicles so their emissions appeared to be within legal limits when they were actually much higher, VW was responsible for releasing vast amounts of extra pollution into the air. The health effects are incalculable.

Winterkorn’s trial, delayed for health reasons, comes nine years after the emissions scandal erupted. During that time, the company has faced perhaps the most wide-ranging regulatory barrage in business history.

In the United States, VW paid a series of enormous penalties. These included a $14.7 billion settlement with the federal government and the state of California announced in 2016. The deal included $10 billion to be used for buying back vehicles with the illegal defeat devices and $4 billion to mitigate pollution from the cars and invest in green vehicle technology.

The following year, VW paid another $4 billion to settle a case brought by the Federal Trade Commission concerning another group of vehicles. The company pled guilty to three felony counts and paid a criminal penalty of $2.8 billion.

VW also faced regulatory actions and lawsuits around the world. Here are some of the most notable.

In its home country of Germany, VW was fined the equivalent of $1.2 billion in a case brought by government prosecutors and another $900 million in a lawsuit brought by the Federation of German Consumer Organizations.

In a case brought by Environment and Climate Change Canada, VW paid a fine equal to $150 million. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission fined VW the equivalent of $86 million for deceiving customers about compliance with Australian diesel emissions standards.

India’s National Green Tribunal fined VW 5 billion rupees (US$71 million) for installing the cheating devices. South Korea’s Fair Trade Commission fined VW the equivalent of $31 million for false advertising on vehicle emissions. Among the other countries that penalized VW are Poland ($31 million), Brazil ($13 million), and the Netherlands ($536,000).

As important as these cases have been in highlighting VW’s egregious misconduct and extracting financial penalties, the individual prosecution of Winterkorn could have a greater long-term impact. Even though he is no longer employed by the company (he resigned under pressure in 2015), his trial is a demonstration of how a high-level executive can be held personally accountable for misdeeds under his watch. This is especially true in a case such as Winterkorn’s in which the executive is accused of committing some of those misdeeds himself.

If convicted, Winterkorn, 77, is unlikely to spend time behind bars. But a guilty verdict would send a strong signal to other unscrupulous executives.

Note: the enforcement actions discussed above (and much more) will be included in the forthcoming Violation Tracker Global.

Greenpeace Slaps Back

Asked to define the phrase Energy Transfer, most people would say it sounds like something they dimly recall from high school physics. Actually, it is the name of a giant corporation that owns the country’s largest petroleum transportation system, including the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL), which was the focus of intense protests in 2016.

Energy Transfer and DAPL are back in the news because a trial is set to begin in the latest phase of the company’s legal assault against opponents of the pipeline. Despite the protests led by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and other indigenous groups, the pipeline was completed and went into operation in 2017. That was in large part due to the intervention of the Trump Administration in one of its first acts. Energy Transfer CEO Kelcy Warren was a big contributor to Trump during the 2016 presidential race. This year he gave $5 million to a pro-Trump Super PAC.

Although it won the battle to build DAPL, Energy Transfer has been on a crusade against its adversaries. Initially, it targeted Standing Rock Sioux chairman Dave Archambault and other tribal leaders at the center of the protests. When that failed, it went after Greenpeace and has not relented. In doing so, it has mounted one of the most aggressive examples of what are known as SLAPP suits (strategic lawsuits against public participation)—legal actions meant to intimidate anti-corporate protests.

In 2017 Energy Transfer filed a federal racketeering suit against Greenpeace that made extravagant allegations that tried to depict the group’s legitimate criticisms of the company and DAPL as a violent criminal conspiracy. The complaint accused Greenpeace of “manufacturing a media spectacle based upon phony but emotionally charged hot-button issues, sensational lies, and intentionally incited physical violence, property destruction, and other criminal conduct.”

Greenpeace vehemently denied advocating or engaging in any violent acts, while also insisting it did not organize the protests but was simply supporting a campaign led by tribal groups. A federal judge threw out the racketeering case, but Energy Transfer has continued to pursue the matter at the state level and is seeking $300 million in damages.

The North Dakota complaint filed in 2019 employs much of the same overheated rhetoric as the unsuccessful federal action. It accuses Greenpeace and several co-defendants of pursuing an “extremist agenda — to attack and disrupt Energy Transfer’s business and its construction of DAPL — through means far outside the bounds of democratic political action, protest, and peaceful, legally protected expression of dissent.”

Yet the company focuses a great deal on such expressions of dissent, alleging that the defendants “engaged in large-scale, intentional dissemination of misinformation and outright falsehoods regarding Energy Transfer, DAPL’s environmental impact, and Energy Transfer’s extensive efforts to address the concerns of local North Dakota communities.”

It is language such as this that prompts Greenpeace to argue that the case represents a serious threat to First Amendment rights. If Energy Transfer is successful in pushing the idea that those criticizing its actions are guilty of defamation, that would indeed have a chilling effect on corporate accountability activism.

As Greenpeace points out, there is a lot to criticize about Energy Transfer even apart from DAPL. In Violation Tracker we document 383 instances since 2000 in which the company and its subsidiaries were fined or reached settlements in cases involving environmental, safety or other infractions. The associated penalties amount to $611 million.

Five of these cases were brought as criminal matters. These include a 2022 case brought by then-Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro in which two Energy Transfer subsidiaries pleaded no contest to criminal water pollution charges relating to the release of large quantities of drilling fluids containing potentially hazardous substances in places where it could contaminate drinking water supplies. AG Shapiro stated that in bringing the case his office was “holding Energy Transfer accountable for their crimes against our natural resources.”

It is unclear whether Energy Transfer really believes the lawsuit will silence its critics. For its part, Greenpeace shows no sign of being intimidated and is defending itself forcefully, which is in keeping with its long track record of standing up to the powerful. Energy Transfer may have SLAPPed, but Greenpeace is slapping back.

For more details on the lawsuit, see this website just launched by Greenpeace.

PFAS Payouts

BP and its drilling partners were hit with over $60 billion in fines and settlements in connection with the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. That remains the largest payout in any environmental case, but the legal costs associated with another issue are starting to catch up.

That issue is the widespread contamination of drinking water supplies with synthetic chemicals called per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). These substances, which are considered possible carcinogens, do not break down in the body or the environment and thus have been dubbed forever chemicals. Detectible level of PFAS can be found in just about everyone alive.

PFAS cases first gained attention in relation to the effort in West Virginia, dramatized in the film Dark Waters, to hold DuPont accountable for contaminating water with chemicals used as coatings for non-stick cookware. In 2017 DuPont and its spinoff Chemours each paid $335 million to settle litigation over the issue.

Now the settlement amounts have grown larger. Last year, 3M agreed to pay over $10 billion to public water suppliers around the country. The case is awaiting final court approval.

Final approval was recently given to a $1.85 billion settlement reached by DuPont, Chemours and DuPont’s other spinoff Corteva with a group of municipal water suppliers relating to contamination caused by PFAS in firefighting foam.

There have also been numerous settlements below $1 billion but still substantial. Last year the Belgian chemical company Solvay agreed to pay $393 million to the state of New Jersey for PFAS contamination at a plant in Gloucester County. The footwear company Wolverine World Wide paid a total of $96 million in two lawsuits connected to contamination in Michigan.

Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics, Honeywell International and 3M agreed to pay a total of $65 million in another firefighting foam case in upstate New York. DuPont is also a defendant in the case but has refused to settle.

It is encouraging to see these companies held responsible for their role in the proliferation of PFAS, but it is unclear whether the payouts will be sufficient to pay for the long-term cost of exposure to the chemicals. That is because we still don’t know the full extent of contamination, and there is growing evidence that the problem is massive. For example, NRDC has just come out with a report estimating that in California alone, water systems serving some 25 million residents—over 60 percent of the state’s population—are contaminated. The levels are likely higher in other parts of the country that have been less aggressive in limiting PFAS use.

Under pressure from lawsuits, regulators and activists, many companies have been phasing out their use of the chemicals. 3M has promised to cease its use of PFAS by the end of 2025. Yet many products containing the chemicals are still being imported from countries with less restrictive practices.

The Deepwater Horizon disaster caused widespread harm in the Gulf of Mexico and the communities along its shores, but the scope of PFAS contamination appears to be much wider and could end up standing with global warming as the two leading environmental crises of our era.

A New Emissions Cheating Scandal

Cummins Inc. waited until just before the Christmas holiday to announce that it had “reached an agreement in principle to resolve U.S. regulatory claims regarding its emissions certification and compliance process for certain engines primarily used in pick-up truck applications.” After insisting it cooperated fully with regulators, the company went on to claim it “has seen no evidence that anyone acted in bad faith and does not admit wrongdoing.”

That vague and tortuous statement was clarified when the U.S. Justice Department put out its own release saying that Cummins was close to signing an agreement with DOJ and the State of California under which it would pay $1.7 billion to settle allegations it violated the Clean Air Act by installing defeat devices on hundreds of thousands of engines.

Cummins, which produces engines for trucks and heavy equipment, has thus joined the roster of large companies accused of installing technology meant to yield deceptive results on emissions tests and thus conceal the true amount of pollution being generated. DOJ stated that the devices installed by Cummins allowed the engines to produce thousands of tons of excess emissions of nitrogen oxides, which are linked to respiratory conditions such as asthma.

The defeat device revelations began, of course, with Volkswagen. The German automaker has paid out over $20 billion in fines and settlements around the world since the accusations of emissions cheating first emerged in 2015.

Yet there are a number of other large companies that have faced similar allegations. In 2019 Fiat Chrysler (now Stellantis) reached an agreement with federal and California regulators under which it paid over $300 million in fines and spent about $200 million to recall vehicles and make them compliant.

In 2020 Daimler AG (now the Mercedes-Benz Group) reached a similar settlement under which it agreed to pay $945 million in penalties and spend $534 million on vehicle modifications.

Automotive suppliers have also gotten caught up in the controversy. Robert Bosch has paid several hundred million dollars in settlements for its role in producing the defeat devices for Volkswagen. In 2018 IAV GmbH, a German company that designs automotive systems, pled guilty to one criminal felony count and paid a $35 million criminal fine as a result of its work for VW.

After-market companies have also been targeted. The EPA has fined dozens of small firms around the country for illegally installing defeat devices, while the DOJ has gone after some medium-sized suppliers. For example, in 2022, Allied Exhaust Systems, which sells to individuals nationwide, agreed to pay a $1.1 million penalty.

Such cases suggest a remarkable willingness of companies large and small to violate environmental regulations. These are not situations in which firms accidentally exceeded emissions limits. From Volkswagen and Cummins down to the small automotive shops, the defendants were accused of deliberately thwarting emission controls.

The use of defeat devices does not simply involve infringement of abstract standards. They cause vast amounts of extra pollution to be spewed into the air and thus represent a corporate crime against the public’s health.

Corporations Are Not Saving the Planet After All

It used to be that you had to go to the websites of groups such as Greenpeace to learn how large corporations are failing to live up to their promises to help solve the climate crisis. Now that fact can be found on the front page of the Wall Street Journal.

The business-friendly newspaper just published an article detailing the ways in which the decarbonization efforts of the world’s largest companies are fizzling out. A big part of the problem is that most companies never developed meaningful climate transition plans and instead relied on dubious carbon offsets instead. The Journal quotes the environmental non-profit CDP as saying that of the nearly 19,000 companies using its disclosure platform, fewer than 100 have credible plans.

Some companies don’t bother to develop any plans—or they keep them to themselves. The Journal cites data showing the percentages of larger publicly traded companies that do not disclose specific plans to meet long-term climate targets. Among those in the coal, oilfield services, and midstream oil sectors the portion is 100 percent. Among integrated oil companies, 93 percent fail to do so.

Big Oil’s detrimental role in dealing with the climate was highlighted in another recent Journal article. It’s well known that Exxon Mobil worked for years to downplay the harmful effects of greenhouse gas emissions. In 2006 the company finally acknowledged those dangers, but the Journal found that within the company the policy did not really change. The newspaper was given access to internal company documents that had been collected by the New York Attorney General but never made public.

These documents, the Journal says, show that Rex Tillerson, who had just taken over as CEO at the time, continued to work behind the scenes to play down the severity of climate change. Exxon executives and scientists were apparently encouraged to go on questioning the mainstream consensus on climate harm.

In other words, it appeared that Exxon, rather than fully abandoning its overt climate denialism, replaced it with a more low-key version while simultaneously reaping the benefits of greenwashing.

Apart from its malignant impact on the climate problem, the fossil fuel industry also continues to be a major source of conventional pollution. We are reminded of this fact by a new report from the Center for American Progress which looks at the long-standing boondoggle surrounding the system by which the industry is allowed to drill on public lands and offshore.

Making extensive use of data from Violation Tracker, the report shows that the top 20 leasing companies are responsible for more than 2,000 environmental violations in their overall operations over the past two decades. Exxon Mobil leads the list with 442 such penalties, while BP has paid out the most—over $30 billion—largely due to its role in the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

CAP’s report recommends that proposed new standards issued by the federal Bureau of Land Management for companies seeking leases be strengthened to include language specifying what defines a bad actor, adding: “Such bad actors should not be eligible for new leases or permits until they have resolved all outstanding issues and demonstrated that they are capable of changing their practices. Further, leases of companies found not to be a qualified or responsible lessee should be subject to cancellation.”

Tougher standards such as these will help to get the message through to the fossil fuel giants that they need to change their ways once and for all.

3M’s Sticky Legal Situation

For the past decade, Johnson & Johnson has symbolized the deterioration of a well-regarded consumer products corporation into the target of multiple lawsuits over alleged disregard for product safety. Now another familiar company is following the same path.

3M, best known as the producer of Scotch Brand adhesive tape and Post-it sticky notes, has been embroiled in two major lawsuits that will probably result in the payment of billions of dollars in settlements. The litigation does not involve office supplies but rather two of the thousands of other products produced by a company originally known as Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company.

In one of the cases, 3M has been sued by some 250,000 military veterans who accuse the company of producing foam earplugs that failed to protect them from service-related hearing loss. This stems from a 2018 False Claims Act case brought by the U.S. Justice Department in which the company paid a penalty of $9.1 million. Last year, in what is called a bellwether case, a jury awarded a single plaintiff $50 million in damages.

In an attempt to limit its wider liability, 3M filed for bankruptcy for the subsidiary, Aearo Technologies, that produced the earplugs. Lawyers for the plaintiffs cried foul, and earlier this month a federal bankruptcy judge dismissed the filing, calling it premature. 3M is appealing the dismissal, but the Wall Street Journal reports that the company is in settlement talks.

3M is also said to be deeply involved in negotiating a settlement of its other major legal woe: lawsuits accusing the company of being responsible for the contamination of water supplies with per- and polyfluoroalkyl (or PFAS) chemicals used in the production of its firefighting foam. These substances, which have been linked to numerous adverse health effects, have become known as forever chemicals because they do not break down in the human body or the environment.

A federal judge in South Carolina, where the PFAS cases have been consolidated, recently halted a bellwether trial after the parties in the wider litigation reported that a settlement seemed imminent. This was just after DuPont and its spinoff companies Chemours and Corteva announced they had agreed to pay more than $1 billion to settle their own PFAS cases.

3M’s record apart from these two cases has not been entirely unblemished. In 2018 the company paid $850 million to the Minnesota Attorney General’s office to settle allegations that its disposal of perflourochemicals, or PFCs, over many years had damaged drinking water and natural resources in the Twin Cities area.

It has also been accused of antitrust violations. In 2006 the company paid over $28 million to settle litigation alleging it monopolized the market for adhesive tape. In 2011 3M paid $3 million to settle an age discrimination case brought by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Violation Tracker contains more than 100 other penalties the company has paid in environmental, workplace safety, and employment cases.

With the earplug and PFAS cases, it appears that the company’s aggregate penalty total will soon reach a much higher level. 3M is going to have to sell a lot more Post-its.

Update: Plaintiffs’ attorneys reported that 3M has agreed to pay over $12 billion to public water systems to resolve the PFAS litigation.

Two-Faced Corporations

The new issue of Corporate Knights, a magazine which usually focuses on celebrating environmental initiatives in the business word, has a cover story with a different angle. Headlined “The Climate Blockers,” the piece highlights major companies with split personalities: They talk a good game when it comes to matters such as sustainability while directly and indirectly promoting policies that impede decarbonization.

Among the corporations deemed to be most guilty of this hypocrisy are U.S. petroleum giants Chevron, ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips and U.S. utilities Sempra Energy, American Electric and Southern Company. Others on the ten-worst list are BASF, Nippon Steel, Gazprom and Toyota.

This assessment is based on the work of InfluenceMap, a UK-based non-profit which seeks to hold large corporations accountable for their climate practices. Its Climate Policy Footprint report identifies the “most negative and influential” companies globally, based on lobbying and other influence activities—whether carried out by the corporation itself or by its trade associations.

InfluenceMap also identifies the trade associations with the worst track record on climate policy. The biggest culprits are said to be the American Petroleum Institute, American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and BusinessEurope.

Some of the companies on the ten-worst list are not only members of these associations but also part of their leadership. Chevron CEO Mike Wirth is also the chairman of the American Petroleum Institute. Chevron and ExxonMobil have representatives on the board of American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers. Chevron, ConocoPhillips and Sempra have representatives on the board of the U.S. Chamber.

InfluenceMap provides a vital service at a time when growing numbers of large companies are professing adherence to ESG principles—especially the environmental component—while quietly working to discourage legislators and policymakers from moving ahead on aggressive climate initiatives.

Strangely, it is also a time when rightwing public officials in the U.S. are trying to gin up public opposition to what are being labeled “woke corporations.” This effort exaggerates the significance of ESG in the business world and ignores the divergence between sustainability p.r. and regressive influence efforts.

There are actually two types of environmental hypocrisy rampant in Corporate America. Not only are purportedly enlightened companies pushing bad policies—they are failing to comply with existing environmental safeguards. This includes not only climate practices, which are not heavily regulated, but also conventional pollution.

This is part of what we document in Violation Tracker. Take, for example, the companies in the InfluenceMap ten-worst. Over the past two decades, Chevron has racked up over $1 billion in fines and settlements. These include a fine of more than $1 million in red Texas last year. ExxonMobil’s total since 2000 is more than $2 billion, including a $9.5 million settlement last year with New Jersey over PCB contamination. They are surpassed by American Electric Power, whose penalty total is nearly $5 billion.

No company that repeatedly breaks environmental laws—nor any company that uses its influence to block or slow down climate-friendly initiatives—should be able to depict itself as an environmental white knight.

The UN Calls Out Greenwashing

Thirty years ago, the United Nations shut down its Centre on Transnational Corporations. Over the prior two decades, the UNCTC had sought to shine a light on the growing influence and power of giant companies around the world, but especially in what was then called the third world.

After the UNCTC was gone, the United Nations said relatively little about corporations overall and even less of a critical nature. A new report from the international body begins to rectify that. As part of the COP27 climate conference, a group of experts convened by the Secretary-General has issued a critique of the commitments by non-state actors to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions in their operations.

Noting that many corporations with net zero pledges are still investing heavily in fossil fuels, the report calls for an end to what it does not hesitate to label as greenwashing—a term that was once used only by environmental activists. The title of the document, Integrity Matters, is a rebuff to companies that purchase dubious carbon offsets rather than making serious reductions in their own greenhouse gas emissions.

At the heart of the report are ten recommendations designed to make net zero commitments more meaningful. These include items such as setting short-term targets along with longer-term goals, engaging in better disclosure, and investing in just transitions.

But to my mind, the most important recommendation is the call for moving from voluntary pledges to enforceable rules. “Regulation is therefore needed,” the report states, “to level the playing field and transform the groundswell of voluntary commitments into ground rules for the economy overall.”

Even more promising is that the report urges cooperation among regulators in different countries to promote and enforce global standards. In fact, the document calls for the creation of a task force to convene a community of international regulators.

It is encouraging to see the United Nations take this posture. It will not be easy to get big business to move from self-serving and essentially meaningless promises to serious obligations.

Keep in mind that the phenomenon of greenwashing has been around for a long time. It was back in 1992 that the problem was first highlighted in a publication titled The Greenpeace Book of Greenwash written by environmental activist Kenny Bruno.

That report showed how corporations such as Shell were already pretending to be leaders in the effort to address global warming. Yet the deception was also taking place with regard to a slew of other environmental issues. Among the leading greenwashers cited by Bruno were General Motors, Westinghouse, Sandoz and DuPont.

Perhaps the most brazen of these was DuPont, which sought to divert attention from the extensive harm its chlorofluorocarbon products did to the ozone layer by running a series of television ads in which animals were made to look like they were applauding the company’s environmental initiatives while Beethoven’s Ode to Joy played in the background.

The lesson then, as today, is that large corporations will go to great lengths to give the impression that they are a key part of the solution when it comes to the environment, when in fact they are major contributors to the problem and will continue to do so until they are forced to change.