Archives: Green Washing

Guidance on Avoiding Greenwashing while Providing Input Down Under

While American businesses continue to wait for the update to the 2012 FTC Green Guides this draft Guidance from Down Under is the best checklist, we are aware of, for mitigating the risk of greenwashing claims.… Continue Reading

H&M Wins Dismissal of Greenwashing Lawsuit

By Stuart Kaplow on May 28, 2023 Posted in Codes and Regulations, ESG, Green Washing, greenwashing

How courts will likely analyze the growing numbers of greenwashing claims, providing guardrails for companies and mitigating their risk.… Continue Reading

Executional Greenwashing is a Thing

By Stuart Kaplow on April 2, 2023 Posted in Environmental, ESG, Green Washing, greenwashing

Executional greenwashing is a neologism characterizing the way in which a business promotes or executes an environmental initiative, rather than the actual environmental impact of the initiative.… Continue Reading

Scope 4 GHG Emissions

By Stuart Kaplow on November 6, 2022 Posted in Climate Change, ESG, GHG, Green Building, Green Washing

Scope 4 greenhouse gas emissions are not new. They date to 2013 when the Greenhouse Gas Protocol identified “avoided emissions” as emission reductions that occur outside of a product’s lifecycle or value chain, but as a result of the use of that product. It was actually a decade ago that the GHG Protocol released “a survey to … Continue Reading

FTC Says Updated Green Guides are Coming

By Stuart Kaplow on September 18, 2022 Posted in ESG, Federal, Green Washing, greenwashing

With allegations of greenwashing all but de rigueur, businesses should be on the alert for the soon to be released Federal Trade Commission’s updated Green Guides. This year companies are being publicly challenged and having their reputations tarnished for greenwashing, in some instances for deceptive misrepresentations, others for unintentionally misleading, and more often than not, … Continue Reading

ESG Accelerates Greenwashing

By Stuart Kaplow on December 19, 2021 Posted in ESG, Green Washing, Sustainability

A growing number of American businesses and consumers are looking to invest in and purchase ESG friendly companies and their products and services. Companies have responded with ESG disclosures touting the environmental and social benefits of what they’re selling. Sidestepping for a moment those companies that set out to intentionally deceive other about their ESG bonafides, … Continue Reading

LEED can Mitigate Legal Risks in ESG Disclosures

By Stuart Kaplow on September 12, 2021 Posted in ESG, Green Washing, LEED

ESG has become such a large component of my law practice that I am now collaborating with a fabulous group attorneys in ESG Legal Solutions, LLC, a new non-law consulting firm. Nancy Hudes and I are now publishing a new blog at www.ESGLegalSolutions.com (.. yes, this blog will continue). This post originally appeared in that blog. If … Continue Reading

A Call for Comprehensive and Clearer ESG Disclosures

By Stuart Kaplow on May 30, 2021 Posted in Environmental, ESG, Green Washing, LEED, Sustainability

Last Wednesday, with a Dutch court finding Royal Dutch Shell partially responsible for climate change and ordering it to reduce emissions and two environmental activists being voted to Exxon Mobil board at the annual meeting, made clear how dramatically the landscape is shifting for all businesses in the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) space, as … Continue Reading

FTC Finds Truly Organic is Not

By Stuart Kaplow on October 27, 2019 Posted in Environmental, Federal, Green Washing

By way of a federal court order that became final last month, Truly Organic Inc. and its founder will pay $1.76 million to settle a Federal Trade Commission greenwashing complaint alleging that their nationally marketed bath and beauty products are neither “certified organic” nor “vegan” as falsely claimed. According to the FTC’s complaint, in this … Continue Reading

FTC Warning about Green Certification Seals

By Stuart Kaplow on October 5, 2015 Posted in Environmental, Green Washing, LEED

Image Federal Trade Commission

Three weeks ago the Federal Trade Commission sent warning letters to 5 providers of environmental certification seals and 32 businesses using those green seals, alerting them to the Agency’s concerns that the seals could be considered deceptive in violation of federal law. The FTC enforces the Federal Trade Commission Act, 15 U.S.C. § 45, which … Continue Reading

Green Building Law Update

Environmental Law and Sustainability for Business