Introduction
The case study entitled It Ain’t Easy Being Green (Madureira et al., 2023) provides examples of companies which support the environment and ones which seem to be greenwashing. Essentially, the term greenwashing describes companies which are not entirely ethical or honest in the way they are carrying out their environmental duties. This essay will further elaborate on this definition and describe ethical conflicts companies face when dealing with protecting the environment and achieving corporate objectives. It will then suggest principles for companies to improve their environmental ethical stance. Lastly it will offer how Windex could apply these principles in their specific ad campaign.
Greenwashing and Conflict in Ethical Values
Pizzetti et al. (2021) frame the problem of how companies address environmental responsibility demands issued by governments. In response to these demands, some companies earnestly change and become more responsible. However, others do not change their practices and only change superficially in order to appear more environmentally friendly. In brief, companies who greenwash only talk the talk and do not walk the walk. Another form of greenwashing is when “companies use their suppliers as scapegoats for their own shortcomings” (Pizzetti et al., 2021, p. 22). The fundamental problem of greenwashing is the degree of honesty and transparency a company demonstrates. While the public may expect some ambiguity in advertising, those companies which take excessive liberty in their communications are taking more credit for positive practices than they should.
Perhaps the main ethical conflict in values companies face is balancing the goals of maximizing profits for shareholders, pensioners and other dependents with the demands and costs of implementing practices to improve the environment. With every effort to improve their environmental stance, costs eat into revenue which impacts the livelihoods of those who depend on company profits. In sum, the main ethical conflict is determining the right approach to meet the demands for both shareholders and government mandates to protect the environment.
While some companies genuinely improve the environment, most customers won’t be able to objectively discern if the company is truly helping or hurting the environment. To that end, companies should use agreed upon standards to measure their net impact on the environment and steward to that number in an effort to be more transparent for consumers.
Carbon Footprint
The most widely accepted standard for measuring the environmental impact of a business or even consumer is the carbon footprint. The Encyclopædia Britannica (Selin, 2013) defines it as direct emissions from activities like fossil-fuel combustion in manufacturing, heating, and transportation, along with the emissions generated to produce the electricity used for goods and services consumed. Similar to the concept of utilitarianism, the assumption is if each consumer (either a person or a business) reduces its carbon footprint, then the collective environmental impact of the world is lowered.
As the carbon footprint standard is more widely adopted, studies (Schleich & Alsheimer, 2024) have shown that some consumers are willing to directly pay for carbon offsets as well as provide patronage to those businesses who are improving the environment. Consequently, more consumers will begin demanding businesses calculate and disclose their carbon footprint. As more businesses comply, consumers will be better positioned to make informed buying choices.
Reporting and Disclosure
In the past, carbon footprint accounting may have been difficult to calculate and report. There was no widely accepted consensus on metrics nor methodologies. However, after years of trial and error and alignment between countries, the collective work of governments has produced standards, and now new third-party solutions can be deployed on a broad scale. As recently as November 2024, the market is producing ways for businesses to track and report their carbon footprint (CarbonChain has received third-party validation for its latest Corporate Carbon Footprint Accounting and Reporting Methodology and Product Carbon Footprint Accounting and Reporting Methodology, 2024). In this specific example, CarbonChain is a pioneer in the arena by offering a platform which supports businesses and manufacturers by enabling them to calculate and report on their carbon footprint.
Pivots for Windex
In the case study (Madureira et al., 2023), Windex was accused of greenwashing because they claimed their bottles were made of 100% recycled plastic from the ocean, when in fact a good portion of the recycled plastic was not retrieved from the ocean. In an effort to avoid being perceived as greenwashing, perhaps Windex could leverage tools like CarbonChain to report Windex’s carbon footprint number. Therefore, rather than focusing on a specific area of the environment (e.g. removing plastics from the ocean), they could simply report on the net impact of their product on the environment and whether it is decreasing or increasing.
Conclusion
In sum, greenwashing occurs when companies’ words do not align with their environmental actions, especially when they claim they are taking action to support the environment but in fact are not. Standards and tools exist, such as measuring a carbon footprint with technology like CarbonChain, which, if deployed, could help companies become more honest and transparent in their efforts to avoid being perceived as a company which greenwashes.
References
CarbonChain has received third-party validation for its latest Corporate Carbon Footprint Accounting and Reporting Methodology and Product Carbon Footprint Accounting and Reporting Methodology. (2024, Nov 11). PR Newswire http://ezproxy.apus.edu/login?qurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.proquest.com%2Fwire-feeds%2Fcarbonchain-has-received-third-party-validation%2Fdocview%2F3126705741%2Fse-2%3Faccountid%3D8289 (2024). In Canada NewsWire. PR Newswire Association LLC.
Madureira, K., Williams, K., & Stroud, S. R. (2023, December 7). It ain’t Easy Being Green - Center for Media Engagement - Center for Media Engagement. Mediaengagement.org. https://mediaengagement.org/research/it-aint-easy-being-green/
Pizzetti, M., Gatti, L., & Seele, P. (2021). Firms Talk, Suppliers Walk: Analyzing the Locus of Greenwashing in the Blame Game and Introducing ‘Vicarious Greenwashing.’ Journal of Business Ethics, 170(1), 21–38. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-019-04406-2
Schleich, J., & Alsheimer, S. (2024). The relationship between willingness to pay and carbon footprint knowledge: Are individuals willing to pay more to offset their carbon footprint if they learn about its size and distance to the 1.5 °C target? Ecological Economics, 219, 108151-. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108151
Selin, N. E. (2013). Carbon Footprint. In Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/science/carbon-footprint
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