Kiwis succesfully call out greenwashing
Environmental and consumer advocates welcome Z Energy apology
in consumer. 2 Nov 2025
Z Energy has apologised for any confusion caused by aspects of its advertising campaign, which claimed it was moving with the times and in the business of getting out of the petrol business.
In November 2023, Consumer NZ, Lawyers for Climate Action New Zealand, and the Environmental Law Initiative (the plaintiffs) sought High Court declarations that Z Energy had misled New Zealanders with its public messaging in an advertising campaign.
The parties have now mutually agreed to settle the case.
“We maintain Z Energy’s ‘Moving with the Times’ advertising campaign was misleading,” said Jon Duffy, chief executive of Consumer NZ.
“Our goal in taking this case was to hold Z Energy accountable. Today’s public apology by Z Energy, which is featured in newspapers across the country, shows that we have achieved that.”
Although Z Energy’s campaign said the company was in the business of getting out of the petrol business, it wasn’t actually intending to get out of the petrol business. Or at least not any time soon.
“We are pleased to have reached the point where Z Energy has accepted it should apologise for any confusion caused by aspects of its advertising campaign,” said Duffy.
The agreement to settle did not include any payment to the plaintiffs. The plaintiffs acknowledge that Z Energy does not consider its actions to be greenwashing, or to involve misleading and deceptive conduct, and has not admitted any liability.
Even so, Duffy said, “We continue to believe this was one of the worst examples of greenwashing in New Zealand’s history. Our settlement allows for us to agree to disagree with Z Energy on that.”
Consumer defines greenwashing as a sneaky marketing tactic that makes a shopper think something is ‘green’ or more environmentally friendly than it really is.
“In this case, three small not-for-profits joined forces to call out a big corporate entity for greenwashing,” said Jessica Palairet, executive director at Lawyers for Climate Action New Zealand.
“While the government and regulators are currently missing in action, we have shown that we are not afraid to step in to fill that gap. This case sends a clear message to other major businesses: if you cross or sail close to the line on green claims, you run the risk of being very publicly held to account, and spending significant sums of money to defend yourself in legal proceedings.”
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In a statement issued today by all parties, Z Energy has agreed with the plaintiffs that greenwashing is a prevalent problem in New Zealand, and that it has been subject to limited enforcement action. Z Energy and the plaintiffs have acknowledged the importance for businesses to communicate accurately to consumers.
Z Energy has acknowledged that petrol and fossil fuels are a leading contributor to climate change, and that transport emissions, including from the fuel Z Energy sells, are a big part of New Zealand’s emissions.
Z Energy agrees with the plaintiffs that the government has a crucial role in facilitating the energy transition in New Zealand, particularly in relation to the transport sector.
“Having one of New Zealand’s largest emitters join our call for the government to step up and better support climate action is extraordinary. We need a robust plan to transition away from fossil fuels, and Z Energy agrees with our stance that the government needs to step up to make this happen,” said Palairet.
“Collectively we are calling for bipartisan policies and strategies to achieve our climate targets, so businesses and consumers can navigate the transition confidently,” said Dr Matt Hall, director of legal and research at Environmental Law Initiative.
The plaintiffs are pleased by Z Energy’s acknowledgement that consumers currently find it hard to verify green claims, and that businesses must be truthful for markets to be successful.
“We will continue to monitor the claims of major polluters, including Z Energy, to ensure they are meeting this standard,” said Hall.
“The wave of accountability is spreading. Z Energy’s apology follows an apology from Energy Australia in the settlement of a greenwashing case brought by Australian Parents for Climate Action, and comes at the same time as a landmark ruling in France against TotalEnergies’ greenwashing advertising. Outcomes like this show that the pressure is working.
“Ultimately, the only way to prevent consumers from being misled by any aspect of fossil fuel advertising is to completely ban it,” said Hall.
How to spot greenwashing (from consumer.)
Identifying greenwashing is no easy feat. These are the most common misleading green claims to look out for.
It looks eco-friendly
Maybe it’s the brown cardboard or the images of nature on the packaging that gives the impression of being green, but it’s just smoke and mirrors.
Certain logos, like a curling leaf, or an earth symbol can be especially misleading. It may suggest a product has been checked for green credentials by an independent third party, when it hasn’t.
Sustainable but single use
Just because a product has one sustainable feature, such as a singlet made with a percentage of ‘better cotton’, it doesn’t necessarily make the entire garment environmentally friendly.
For instance, a rubbish bag may be constructed from 50% recycled plastic, but it can still only be used once and most likely end up in a landfill.
Meaningless terms
Green, natural, environmentally friendly, eco and sustainable are all terms that create the impression of great environmental performance but usually mean nothing.
For example, the term ‘biodegradable’. Everything biodegrades, eventually. Unless these claims have independent third-party testing to back them up, they’re worthless.
Pointless ‘free-from’ claims
Your dishwasher detergent may boast it’s ‘phosphate-free’, but dishwasher detergents no longer contain phosphates, so the product is claiming to be more virtuous than it is.
Greenwashing in Graphs: an ExxonMobil Story
April 9, 2024 | 12:32 pm
SPENCER PLATT from Union of Concerned Scientists
Earlier this year, ExxonMobil released its annual Advancing Climate Solutions report detailing the company’s current and planned contributions to a net-zero future. Put another way—earlier this year, ExxonMobil released its annual greenwashing report, outlining its purported progress towards addressing climate change, a problem the company helped to create.
I reviewed ExxonMobil’s two most recent reports (2023/2024) to evaluate the scientific rigor of its claims. And as a scientist and data visualization enthusiast, I found the reports misleading at best, dishonest at worst, and nowhere is this more obvious than in the graphs. These reports prey on the audience’s lack of scientific literacy, and rely on slick, colorful, and yet meaningless graphics to do so—a sign that while ExxonMobil’s strategy may have changed, its output of disinformation continues.
The importance of figures
Like so many scientists, I learned to evaluate scientific papers by starting with the figures. Tables, graphs, and maps showcase the evidence and underlying data that scientists use to support their results and conclusions.
By looking at a graph, you can learn important information like how many measurements or observations were made, what units they were made in, the geographic extent of the research, and the type of models used—all which provide information that help to interpret findings. If a paper is working with a sample size of one, for instance, that’s going to determine how broadly applicable their findings may be. Similarly, if a study modeled the impact of rising temperatures in arctic tundra, I won’t be assuming those results translate to ecosystems like tropical savannahs.
Figures also allow scientists to communicate uncertainty, a critical part of any scientific endeavor. Conversationally, uncertainty means something you don’t know—like I’m uncertain what I’m going to have for lunch (just kidding, I’m having beans). But scientifically, uncertainty means how well we know something—more like a confidence range, and usually visualized with confidence intervals or error bars depending on the data (I’m 90-95% confident that I’ll be having beans for lunch).
Measuring and communicating uncertainty is essential to good science, which is why graphs are such a good place to start when reading a scientific paper—on their own, figures can contextualize raw information, communicate uncertainty, and visualize key takeaways.
Graphs I love
To illustrate this, here are two stellar examples:
The Keeling Curve – Dr. Charles Keeling’s magnum opus illustrating 60-plus years of atmospheric measurements
Things I love about this graph:
- clear takeaway—a steady increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations between 1958 and present day
- consistently labeled axes
- obvious explanation of a very small color change
- no uncertainty—but that’s expected since this is visualizing unprocessed data from a single source
Burned area vs VPD (vapor pressure deficit) from UCS’ 2023 Fossil Fuels Behind Forest Fires
Things I love about this graph:
- clear takeaway—tight relationship between burned area and warm season VPD in forests of North America
- color coded points by year
- clear confidence range for modeled relationship indicated by the dashed lines
- clear communication about the base10 log scale on the y axis
- inset map showing distinguishable forested ecoregions
Graphs are powerful tools for communicating dense, complicated information, but, as we’ll see in Exxon’s Advancing Climate Solutions report, they can also impart the appearance of scientific rigor to a deliberately misleading exercise.
Colorful yet meaningless graphs in ExxonMobil’s report
Like any good scientist, I started my analysis of ExxonMobil’s climate claims by evaluating their figures. While this blog can’t address every graph in their report, I focus on two they say are “detailed roadmaps” “backed by a comprehensive approach,’ or rather, the two that lay bare the emptiness in their claims.
Let’s start with the graph formally titled “Potential GHG Abatement options for ExxonMobil operated assets supporting GHG emission-reduction plans”—a figure skillfully crafted to show both something and nothing at all.
Things I like about this graph:
- accessible color palette for individuals with color vision deficiency or colorblindness
Things that could be improved about this graph:
First, there are no numbers on the y axis. Yikes! That’s graph making 101. On top of that, the units are vague. Instead of reporting ExxonMobil’s absolute emissions reductions, the graph shows relative reductions in emissions intensity—a compound unit that expresses emissions relative to another variable. This other variable can be one of many things leading to units like emissions per dollar of GDP, emissions per units produced, or as seen here, emissions per 100 metric tonnes of throughput or production. They take care to bury those units in the footnotes while also leaving the vague denominator undefined.
(A word about emissions intensity: even with an appropriately defined unit, emissions intensity can be misleading by giving the appearance of reduction while absolute emissions continue to increase. For example, a car company might reduce its emissions per vehicle manufactured, but if cars are flying off the shelves, their total emissions may still increase. Read more here.)
Let’s get into the colored bars next, which show the categories through which ExxonMobil will achieve these alleged and unmeasurable reductions. The company’s graphic designers appear to be visualizing uncertainty using color gradients, an untraditional choice which, by design, doesn’t convey any useful quantitative information.
The categories themselves are worthy of interrogation too, particularly since the majority of ExxonMobil’s reductions in emissions intensity (you know, the stuff measured in tonnes of emissions per 100 tonnes of undefined throughput) include undefined acronyms like PPA (power purchase agreement) and REC (renewable energy credit), unscaled technologies like CCS (carbon capture and storage) and hydrogen, and/or future advancements, that latter of which, by definition, do not yet exist.
(A word about CCS : this technology has existed for decades but is only used at a handful of fossil energy facilities. While the IPCC mentions the value of CCS, the 2023 synthesis report also notes, “Currently, global rates of CCS deployment are far below those in modelled pathways limiting global warming to 1.5°C to 2°C,” and, “Implementation of CCS currently faces technological, economic, institutional, ecological-environmental, and socio-cultural barriers.” In addition, environmental justice advocates and frontline communities routinely point to the danger of concentrated carbon dioxide, embedded siting inequities, and the use of CCS to distract from the real work of phasing out fossil fuels.)
Who needs units anyway?
Another visualization they use is a roadmap is paired with an abatement curve, showing the costs of emissions reduction strategies compared to the amount of mitigation benefit they provide. These kinds of curves are fairly standard when comparing strategies to address climate change as you can see in the comparable figure below. Again, there are no numbers on the X or the Y axes. Double yikes! And no units either. Yikes! Yikes! Yikes!
In the abatement curve on the left, the units and scale are interpretable—we can see that cost is in euros and that abatement is measured in gigatons of carbon dioxide equivalent per year. Exxon’s figure shows relative changes in cost (as measured in…?) and mitigation potential (as measured in CO2e, but on an undefined scale). And the oil and gas giant again prominently features CCS, hydrogen, and/or future advancements—this time as a relatively expensive strategy that is currently not operated at the necessary scale but with high potential for abatement. Eek!
Why do Exxon’s greenwashed graphs matter?
While ExxonMobil’s strategies have changed, its output of disinformation continues.
Sure, these figures are pretending to highlight relative reductions from 2016 to 2022 to 2030 and the different categories and costs of activities those reductions will contribute, but devoid of any real numbers or interpretable units, my main takeaway from these figures is that ExxonMobil is putting loads of resources and effort into maintaining the illusion that the company cares about climate change, when in fact, a cursory review of these graphs shows that the company is doing very little, if anything, to meaningfully address the climate crisis.