- South Africa’s Directorate of the Advertising Regulatory Board (ARB) was called upon to consider a complaint lodged against advertising for TotalEnergies.
- The complaint refers to an advert promoting ing TotalEnergies’ relationship with SANParks (the state run national parks board) which asked readers to share their favourite summer moments at a national park in South Africa for a chance to win a prize.
- In the advert TotalEnergies claims it is committed to sustainable development and environmental protection.
The Complainant stated: “The ad claims that TotalEnergies is ‘committed to sustainable development and environmental protection’. This is a completely false and misleading claim, which we believe constitutes greenwashing. TotalEnergies is lying to the public about the nature of their business.”
The Complainant then provided a list of citations, under the headline, “The facts about TotalEnergies’ environmental and sustainability impacts”. These included:
- “As the world’s 19th biggest greenhouse gas emitter, TotalEnergies is a leading contributor to dangerous climate change.”
- “According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), climate change disrupts marine, terrestrial, and freshwater ecosystems, leading to extinctions, increased disease, and mass mortality events. The fossil fuel-based nature of TotalEnergies directly contradicts environmental protection efforts by causing irreparable climate damage to ecosystems and biodiversity.”
- “The company continues to explore for new oil and gas reserves across Africa. For example, they have recently been granted a licence to conduct exploratory drilling between Cape Agulhas and Cape Town. This will negatively impact marine species, disrupt ecosystems, and pose risks to coastal communities and fishing livelihoods.”
- “TotalEnergies has a 62% stake in the East African Crude Oil Pipeline project which contradicts its purported commitment to environmental protection. If built, the pipeline will generate more than 34 million tonnes of CO2 emissions every single year, displace tens of thousands of people from their land, open up critical ecosystems for oil development, and will be built through some of the world’s most important elephant, lion and chimpanzee nature reserves.”
The ARB found that TotalEnergies’ claims of ‘sustainable development’ because of its partnership with South African National Parks are misleading and a violation of the Code of Advertising Practice.
Link to the full ARP judgement HERE: Finaldecision-3291-TotalEnergies2
Author: Bryan Groenendaal
