Your Daily August, 07th

Green Offenders

Six highly suspect environmental claims

By Kate Torgovnick
Published: Dec 01, 2007

Yeah, yeah, going green is fantastic. But some companies seem to be patting themselves on the back just a little too hard for their environmental efforts. Here are six corporate claims that raised our eyebrows.

The company: Time Warner Cable
The claim: “Go green with Movies on Demand. Think of all you save when you simply click your remote to order a movie. Energy: No video store to maintain. Paper: No envelope, no stamp. Plastic: No DVD packaging. Gasoline: No need to drive.”
Our beef: Really, Time Warner? You want us to think we’re saints for watching Ocean’s Thirteen on pay-per-view? We can practically hear the marketing execs brainstorming ways this cash cow could be spun as saving the world.

The company: BP
The claim: “In 2006, we continued to develop our Alternative Energy business. We increased the production of solar cells, developed our wind power business, and opened a new gas-fired power station.” A feature on their website says, “Find out how your lifestyle choices affect your household’s carbon emissions.”
Our beef: How green can a gas company really be? And isn’t this the same BP that spilled 200,000 gallons of oil in Prudhoe Bay in March 2006? Not to mention that pipeline rupture in the same year?

The company: America’s Next Top Model
The claim: “This cycle, Tyra wanted to pay extra attention to the environment, so Top Model is going green.” The women are escorted to photo shoots in a hybrid bus, decorated in a bizarre jungle theme. The wannabes are limited to 10 minute showers and aren’t allowed to smoke.
Our beef: Does Tyra really think that short showers can undo the environmental damage created by all the hairspray the women use on the show? This reeks of Tyra trying to up her do-gooder credibility.

The company: Home Depot
The claim: “Eco Options makes it easy for you to identify products that make a difference. Every product with the Eco Options label has less of an impact on the environment than competing products.” More than 60,000 products are part of the program.
Our beef: The New York Times busted the lid off this, reporting that plastic paint brushes were included because they didn’t require cutting down trees. So were wood paint brushes, because they aren’t plastic. Paint thinners got the label thanks to recyclable cardboard packaging. Even a chainsaw and a bug zapper made the cut.

The company: Coca Cola
The claim: “Coca-Cola is investing $60 million to build the world's largest plastic-bottle-to-bottle recycling plant.” They’re also launching new 20 ounce bottles this year that use 5 percent less plastic, and they shaved 75 ounces from the weight of glass bottles.
Our beef: It’s cool that Coca Cola is giving us our Diet Coke fix in marginally better bottles. But $60 million sure sounds like a lot more before you hear that Coca Cola made $6.47 billion in just three months last year.

The company: Subaru
The claim: “When you carry out your trash at home on the next collection day, you'll be sending more trash to landfills than the entire Subaru manufacturing plant in Lafayette, Indiana (SIA). The Subaru plant was the first auto assembly plant to achieve zero landfill status—nothing from its manufacturing efforts goes into a landfill. It's all reused and recycled.”
Our beef: That’s awesome, Subaru. But how about making some hybrid cars?

Kate Torgovnick is Dame's editor-at-large. Prior to that, she was a writer/editor at Jane Magazine and her articles have also appeared in the New York Times, Newsweek and Page Six Magazine. Her first book, Cheer!, will hit bookstore shelves in March 2008.

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