TotalEnergies condemned for greenwashing in France
A civil court in Paris judges the group's advertising campaign on climate neutrality and ecological transition to be misleading. Appeal filed by Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and Notre Affaire A Tous
Key points
The giant TotalEnergies was convicted of misleading advertising in France: it is the first ruling applying the national greenwashing law to an energy company.
Deceptive campaign
The campaign launched in 2021, in which the group made extensive use of images of wind and solar farms to ensure it could achieve climate neutrality by 2050, was rejected by the civil court in Paris on 23 October. TotalEnergies was ordered to pay €8,000 in compensation to each of the three NGOs that sued and to pay €15,000 to cover legal costs.
Insignificant sums, for a ruling that leaves its mark. Total will have to cancel the campaign and remove from its website all statements deemed misleading on carbon neutrality and energy transition targets. Within a month, it will have to publish a link to the verdict for 180 days. Failure to do so will result in a fine of up to 20,000 euros per day.
"TotalEnergies," reads the judgment, "is responsible for misleading business practices", for claiming, among other things, to be "one of the main players in the energy transition", messages "that could mislead consumers about the extent of the group's environmental commitments".
Major oil and gas companies are in the crosshairs of anti-greenwashing groups for image campaigns in which they claim to be committed to fighting climate change, which is caused primarily by the production and consumption of fossil fuels.
