For as long as there have been fights over greenwashing — its around four decades since the term was coined — there have been arguments over what the practice looks like. The lack of an agreed definition is actually one reason the debate continues. How can we avoid something we can’t define?
Over the past few years, however, a growing number of academics have coalesced around a common approach to identifying greenwashing. The questions-based framework, published in 2022 and now cited by more than 260 studies, has been used to study greenwashing in aviation, fisheries and other industries.
Yet the emergence of this approach may not be a unifying force. While researchers find the framework useful, in two recent prominent papers it has produced rates of greenwashing that many corporate sustainability professionals would consider unrealistically high. So high, in fact, that some observers fear that allegations of greenwashing based on the tool could accelerate the more recent rise of greenhushing.
At the heart of the 2022 paper, published by Noémi Nemes at the University of Vienna and colleagues, is a greenwashing framework based on 28 questions that cover everything from lifecycle assessments and carbon credits to marketing budgets and the use of jargon. Researchers who use the framework often select a subset of questions that are appropriate to the companies they assess.
Failure rates
Last month, Jennifer Jacquet at the University of Miami and colleagues used a modified set of the Nemes questions to examine more than 1,200 statements made by 33 of the world’s largest meat and dairy companies. She found that 98 percent could be “categorized as greenwashing.” The result follows a March study that built on the Nemes approach and found that 96 percent of climate commitments made by 3,500 companies failed on at least one of seven greenwashing indicators.
The high rates are due in part to the wide range of statements considered by the researchers. These include claims that some corporate sustainability professionals would likely take issue with — such as pledges to reach net-zero by 2050 made in the absence of emission-reduction plans — alongside others that many would consider innocuous.
Statements that lack proof are flagged as potential greenwashing, for instance, even though most companies consider detailed footnotes unnecessary in sustainability reports. Companies can also be dinged for mentioning their involvement in initiatives that researchers classify as “irrelevant.” These include attempts to reduce food waste, which may have meaningful, if hard to quantify, impacts.
“It’s hard to draw equivalencies across these claims,” acknowledged Jacquet. “They’re not equal.” But, she added, sector-wide surveys like hers provide a snapshot of communication practices at a particular moment in time and can then be used to benchmark future changes.
It’s also important to highlight statements about smaller projects, she said. Companies often cite pilot studies and make “hand-wavy claims,” Jacquet noted. “Part of this is to make consumers, shareholders, people in the supply chain, more aware of these tactics,” she said. “We all need to become more savvy and ask more questions like, What does that mean for your overall operations? Or for your overall emissions?”
Honest disclosure
The flipside of the approach is that it leaves companies facing a catch-22 situation, said Katie Anderson, senior director for business, food and forests at the Environmental Defense Fund. Climate progress is almost always incremental, for example, but the frameworks see incremental statements as potential greenwashing. “We need to make sure that honest disclosure of progress is protected, not penalized,” she said.
Media reporting on the studies adds to the challenge. Researchers are often careful to describe the framework as producing “indicators” of greenwashing, or evidence of “greenwashing risk.” Journalists can be less circumspect: “98 per cent of meat and dairy sustainability pledges are greenwashing,” read the headline on a New Scientist story about Jacquet’s paper.