GREEN
WASHING - ENVIRONMENT
News: Red flags over ‘greenwashing’ at COP27 — what is it?
What's
in the news?
●
In the first official acknowledgment of
‘greenwashing’, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres warned private
corporations to desist from such practices and mend their ways within a year.
● There will be zero tolerance for greenwashing, he said at the ongoing climate meeting in Sharm el-Shaikh, Egypt.
Key
takeaways:
●
The use of unfair practices in climate
action is not new. Corporations, and
sometimes even countries, attempt to exaggerate the actions they are taking to
help the fight against climate change, and also the impacts of these
actions.
●
In the process, they provide misleading
information, make unverifiable claims, and sometimes plainly lie about their
products or processes.
● Developed countries, for example, are often accused of greenwashing their normal business investments in developing countries, or their bilateral aid, by highlighting climate co-benefits of the financial flows, sometimes with very little justification.
Greenwashing:
●
Greenwashing is the practice in which
firms and Governments mark all kinds of
activities as climate-friendly, as something that would lead to emissions
reduction, or avoidance of emissions.
● Many of these claims are unverifiable, misleading, or dubious.
Issues
in Greenwashing:
● Greenwashing presents a false picture of the progress being made on the climate change front, thereby pushing the world towards disaster, while at the same time rewarding entities for irresponsible behaviour.
Go
back to basics:
Carbon
markets:
●
There was a carbon market under the Kyoto Protocol, and a new one is being
created under the Paris Agreement as
well.
●
Countries or firms that reduce emissions
beyond their mandate are granted carbon credits, which can then be bought for
money by entities that need it to achieve their targets.
●
Countries like India or Brazil had
accumulated huge carbon credits under the Kyoto Protocol and wanted these to be
transitioned to the new market being set up under the Paris Agreement.
● But many developed countries resisted this, questioning the integrity of the credits.
Double
Counting:
●
The credits are often certified by unofficial third party companies and sold to others.
Such transactions, particularly in informal, bilateral or voluntary markets,
have been flagged for lack of integrity and double counting.
● Even the official market is not immune to charges of double counting and greenwashing.
Recommendations:
An expert group formed by
the UN Secretary General last year suggested remedial actions as follows.
●
It recommended that corporations pursuing
net zero targets must not be allowed to
make fresh investments in fossil fuels.
●
The corporations have been advised not to use offset mechanisms at the start
of their journey to net-zero status.
●
Short-term
emission reduction goals on the path to achieving net zero.
●
Must bring an end to all activities that
lead to deforestation.
●
The creation
of regulatory structures and standards as soon as possible.