Consumer watchdog refuses to certify government’s Climate Active Carbon Neutral scheme

“Australian customers are fed up with greenwashing lies,” Hanson-Young told reporters. “They’re fed up with walking into the supermarket and seeing an array of different products, and being told lies about how environmentally friendly they are, and whether they are saving dolphins or saving the climate.”

The office of Environment and Water Minister Tanya Plibersek was contacted for comment.

The federal government last year revoked the Climate Active certification given to British American Tobacco after the endorsement was found to be in breach of a World Health Organisation treaty, which Australia is a signatory to.

Regulators, including the ACCC and the Australian Securities and Investment Commission, have been cracking down on greenwashing over the past year. Last week, the ACCC launched Federal Court proceedings against the manufacturer of Glad garbage bags for allegedly falsely claiming certain bags were made partly from recycled ocean plastic.

Meanwhile, AustralianSuper told the inquiry it would join a protest vote against Woodside’s climate plans, but support Woodside chairman Richard Goyder, at the company’s annual general meeting on Wednesday.

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“After a lot of consideration we’ve decided that we still have some ongoing concerns about Woodside’s plans to be net-zero by 2050, so we’ve decided to vote against it and will continue our discussions with the company,” said head of Australian equities Shaun Manuell.

Norway’s largest pension fund, KLP, and Britain’s biggest asset manager, LGIM, have announced they would also vote against Woodside’s climate report, citing concerns over its carbon transition plans.

Woodside chief executive Meg O’Neill last week said the energy giant’s climate plan was “upfront, credible and honest”, and the company was working to address the biggest concern of investors: that it was not moving fast enough to reduce its own emissions nor help its customers reduce their carbon footprint.

Forty-nine per cent of investors voted no to the company’s climate plan in 2022, which, despite being advisory and non-binding, was a huge blow to the environmental credentials of Australia’s largest oil and gas company.

With Peter Milne

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