The Narwhal | News on Climate Change, Environmental Issues in Canada

Group of Prominent Canadians Calls for Criminal Investigation of Climate Deniers

ictinus — Thu, 03 Dec 2015 18:14:02 +0000

By Charles Mandel. This article originally appeared on the National Observer.

Ecojustice, on behalf of a group of prominent Canadians, filed a complaint Thursday with the federal Competition Bureau, asking it to investigate false and misleading representations made by climate change denier groups.

In their application to the Commissioner of Competition, the group called for “a thorough rigorous inquiry of the denier groups and their climate science misrepresentations.”

The group is also pressing for the commission to refer their application to the Attorney-General of Canada for criminal charges against the denier groups.

Ecojustice filed the complaint of behalf of Stephen Lewis, the former Canadian Ambassador to the UN and chair of the 1988 World Conference on the Changing Atmosphere; Tzeporah Berman, author and adjunct professor at York University; and Thomas Duck, an atmospheric scientist at Dalhousie University in Halifax.

Other complainants are David Schindler, the Killam Memorial professor of ecology at the University of Alberta, and Danny Harvey, an University of Toronto professor and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change lead author.

The complaint cites The Friends of Science, The International Climate Science Coalition and the Heartland Institute for misleading billboard advertisements, website representations and a poster made available as a free download on a website.

“These groups attempt to discredit the established scientific consensus that global warming and climate change are real and caused by human activity,” Duck said in a statement. “The reality, causes and consequences of climate change are well understood.”

Canada’s Competition Act prohibits the making of materially false or misleading representations for the purpose of promoting any business interest such as fossil fuel development.

Friends of Science billboard in Ottawa, 2014. Photo: Friends of Science

In its application, Ecojustice states that it believes the case should be referred to the Attorney General as a criminal matter. Potential prosecution can take place if it can be demonstrated that there’s clear and compelling evidence that accused knowingly or recklessly made false or misleading representations to the public.

The competition bureau must also be satisfied that criminal prosecution would be in the public interest.

The application notes that two Friends of Science billboards were the subject of 96 complaints to Advertising Standards Canada (ASC) during their display in Montreal in 2014. The council reviewed the billboard ads against the Canadian Code of Advertising Standards and determined they were false and misleading advertising.

The Friends of Science appealed the ruling, but it was upheld. Just months after the decision, the Friends of Science put up a new video billboard making climate science misrepresentations in Montreal and in November 2015 put up more billboards in Edmonton and Calgary.

The application alleges that the Friends of Science’s continued display of climate science misrepresentations after numerous consumer complaints and a former censure by the ASC is clear and compelling evidence that the group knowingly or recklessly made such misrepresentations.

“When combined with the overwhelming public importance of the context in which the climate science misrepresentations are made — including the effect of climate change on the Canadian economy, and the negative effects of climate science misrepresentations on competition in key markets for stimulating the transition to a low carbon economy in Canada — we believe the Commissioner’s inquiry should proceed on the criminal track,” the application states.

Ecojustice and the individuals it represents allege that the climate change denier groups misrepresent climate change science to promote their own business interests and those of their anonymous funders.

“While the denier groups do not publically disclose the identities of their funds, available public information suggests their funding comes at least in part from individuals and corporations with business interests in the production and use of fossil fuels,” the application to the Competition Bureau alleges.

Friends of Science video billboard on display in Montreal in 2015. Photo: Friends of Science

The application states that Talisman Energy Inc., a Calgary-based oil and gas exploration and production company, donated $175,000 to Friends of Science in 2004 to fund the production of a specific video and other activities.

Mike De Souza, an environmental journalist then with the Ottawa Citizen, wrote in 2012 how the energy company, contributed to a pair of trust accounts at the University of Calgary in 2004 to produce a video and engage in public relations, advertising and lobbying activities against the Kyoto Protocol and government measures to restrict fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.

The accounts were formed at the request of Friends of Science, whom de Souza described as “retired oil industry workers and academics who oppose the Kyoto Protocol and reject the validity of peer-reviewed science on the causes of climate change observed in recent decades.”

In an earlier submission to Alberta’s Privacy and Information Commissioner, Talisman said that an university audit turned up nothing to suggest that the school was aware of its own funds “being used for political purposes,” De Souza reported.

A Talisman spokesperson told De Souza that “the donation was a decision made by the company’s former president, who had ‘different views on climate change science.’

“Today, Talisman’s position is quite different and Talisman does believe that [greenhouse gas emissions] pose a significant risk to the industry,” the spokesperson said.

In its application, Ecojustice states that climate science misrepresentations are inherently harmful to the proper functioning of markets in Canada. “The confusion they sow makes low-carbon technologies less competitive and distorts capital investment toward high-carbon industries, risking a carbon bubble.”

The Competition Act gives the commissioner investigatory powers to examine witnesses and order the production of documents, such as lists of donors, to advance an inquiry. If the information gathered by the commissioner shows the act has been violated, the matter may be referred to the Attorney General of Canada for prosecution or civil proceedings before the courts.

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Pretty Little Industrial Liars, Pt. 1

Adam Kingsmith — Tue, 09 Jul 2013 19:10:19 +0000

Big Industry has committed some of the most atrocious crimes against the environment in Canada and around the world with little fear of reprisal. This is Part One of a two–part series highlighting some small and large-scale instances of industrial–environmental greenwashing and misdirection in an attempt to better hold conglomerates accountable to the Canadian public. Read Part 2 here.

Greenwashing the Canadian Consumer The deplorable act of greenwashing — constructing the misleading perception that a company’s policies, practices, products, or services are environmentally responsible and sustainable, is becoming common practice amongst titans of industry in Canada. It should come as little shock to acute Canadians that fossil fuels and the tar sands — more genially referred to as the “oil sands” by energy multinationals and the Harper Government, are being linguistically and rhetorically greenwashed — my colleague Jeff Gailus has an insightful three-part series exploring this very issue.

What may come as more of a shock to a consumer society such as ours attempting to shop its way out of an impending environmental disaster — polls have shown that at least 70 per cent of Canadian consumers say they are willing to spend up to 20 per cent more for environmentally preferable items — is the inordinate amount of greenwashing happening in the everyday marketplace.

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According to a report by the environmental advocacy firm TerraChoice, 98% of the 2,219 primarily household cleaning and paper products examined in North America — all but 25 to be exact, were found to be guilty of at least one of “The Seven Sins of Greenwashing.” Sins that encompass a lack of proof, vagueness, irrelevance, fibbing, “hidden trade-offs,” “the lesser of two evils,” and “fake and false label certifications.” In Canada, most transgressions fall into three categories: vague language, lack of proof, and “hidden trade-offs” — suggesting a product is “green” based on a narrow set of attributes without paying attention to other important environmental issues — i.e. paper from a sustainably harvested forest can still contribute high levels of pollution during the production process. Thus while elusive monikers such as “all-natural,” “eco-friendly,” and “chemical-free” are increasingly slapped on everything in Canadian markets from shampoo bottles and bathroom cleaners to mainstream fashions and pet foods, it all equates to little more than what activist and author Adria Vasil calls “a tsunami of greenwash.” The "Greenwash Guerillas" trying to wade through the tsunami. Image Credit: fotdmike/Flickr This tsunami can be nearly impossible to navigate, as large multinationals think — rightly so much of the time, that consumers aren’t interested in reading too deeply into the environmental characteristics of what they purchase, shoppers just want the instant gratification that comes from buying “green,” “organic,” or “sustainable” products. If the products are actually any of those things seems to be a mute point. The more the average shopper harbours these armchair ecological consumption habits, the more that companies are going to stretch and even falsify the “greener” qualities of their products — resulting in a marketplace that requires an exceedingly methodical and labour intensive effort on the part of the savvy consumer in order to distinguish between corporate greenwashing and legitimate environmentalism. One such savvy consumer is the abovementioned Adria Vasil, who recently partnered with the CBC’s Marketplace to provide specific examples of household products sold in Canada found guilty of committing multiple greenwashing sins. Some of the culpable products include: Dawn antibacterial dish soap — championed as a cleaner of animals post-oil spills, it contains Tricolsan, an agent that is toxic to aquatic life, T-fal Natura frying pans — claiming to be free of non-stick carcinogens that the company has been found to use in the manufacturing process, and Sunlight Green Clean laundry soap — declaring to be mainly plant based, a test of the product revealed 38 per cent petro-chemicals, which leave a major environmental footprint. These examples — and the 7 others fingered in the exposé, represent only a drop in a greenwashed bucket overflowing with thousands of products on the shelf in Canada today. Honest, environmentally conscious goods are an exception to the rule. However, not all of the blame for this wave of greenwashing relentlessly sweeping across the Canadian market can rest upon misleading corporations or apathetic consumers. Despite repeated pleas from scientists and advocacy groups, the Harper government has been hesitant to institute an exclusive regulating body that could serve as the federal greenwashing watchdog by verifying “green” product claims. Instead, the verification of eco-friendly products are left to the Competition Bureau — a loosely regulated government institution with nefarious ties to Big Industry that has gone on record saying it will only act if an official complaint has been filed, the privately-run Canadian Standards Association — loyal to its industrial backers, and the corporations themselves — many of whom have introduced ambiguous and internal “Environmental Management Systems,” which, as is highlighted in the satirical clip below, have been repeatedly caught falsifying official-looking certifications ripe with green jargon such as “eco-preferred.” Of course, there are some genuinely environmentally minded companies sprinkled amidst all the self-certifiers and eco-proliferators. The best way to find them is to look for products that have been endorsed by a third party group known for its strict natural regulations — some of the more established in Canada include: EcoCert, EcoLogo, Cosmos Organic, Certified Natural Products, or Natural Products Association. What’s more, visitors to the Ecolabel Index — tracking 436 ecolabels in 197 countries and 25 industry sectors, it is the largest global directory of green certifications — can rate, review, and discuss all the world’s independently certified labels across 10 classifications including: electronics, food, forest products, retail goods, and textiles. At the end of the day, the best thing the consumer can do to push the market away from greenwashed products is to stop buying them. So familiarise yourself with harmful ingredients, look for independently verified certifications, cross-reference with the Ecolabel Index, but remember, greenwashing is only part of the deception. Moving beyond the role of the individual consumer, Part Two of this series will cut through industrial rhetoric in order to address why we as an environmentally-conscientious citizenry need to push for more regulative policies directly addressing the largest and most under-regulated polluters of all — transnational resource extraction and manufacturing industries. Continue to Part 2. Image Credit: fodtmike/Flickr

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