UN calls for technology and media to stop taking advertising money from fossil fuels – but gets nothing in response

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres yesterday called for an end to advertising for fossil fuels, in an ardent call for action following the release of alarming new climate data.

“I urge all countries to ban advertising from fossil fuel companies. And I ask the media and technology companies to stop accepting fossil fuel advertising,” Guterres said during a meeting. speech yesterday in New York City.

Guterres called out technology, media and public relations companies for accepting advertising money from the fossil fuel industry, even though a safe climate depends on replacing coal, oil and gas with cleaner energy. Each of the last 12 months has broken heat records, according to the European Commission Copernicus Climate Change Service confirmed yesterday.

To prevent global temperatures from rising even more dramatically, countries will likely only have about five years to reduce their pollution, according to more data released yesterday by the World Meteorological Organization and researchers from University of Leeds. To meet the more ambitious target set out in the Paris climate agreement of avoiding more than 1.5 degrees Celsius of global warming, carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels must decline sharply every year before reaching net zero emissions per year. 2050.

And yet, planet-warming pollution from fossil fuels has continued to rise since nearly every nation on the planet agreed to the Paris Agreement in 2015. While urging countries to make greater commitments to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, Guterres said the private sector – particularly technology and media – needs to step up action. The fossil fuel industry uses public relations firms to greenwash and delay action on climate change, he said.

“I call on these companies to stop acting as facilitators of planetary destruction. Stop accepting new fossil fuel customers starting today and establish plans to exit existing ones,” he said. “Fossil fuels aren’t just poisoning our planet – they’re toxic to your brand.”

For years, environmental advocates and investigative reporters have worked to expose the relationships that fossil fuel companies have established with technology and media brands that otherwise claim to want to take action on climate change.

Google, Facebook and Instagram rake in tens of millions of dollars every year from fossil fuel advertising, according to estimates from a 2023 report. report from the Stop Funding Heat campaign. The New York Times It is Reuters surpassed one classification from media companies that allowed fossil fuel ad campaigns by climate reporting groups Drilled and DeSmog last year.

The risks have increased further with the emergence of energy-intensive AI. Data centers consume more electricity than ever to train new generative AI models like ChatGPT. Companies that have committed to achieving net zero emissions, like Google, could move further away from their climate goals now that they are obsessed with developing AI tools. Meanwhile, media giants began to cut agreements with OpenAI to get your own slice of the AI ​​pie.

On the edge’Vox Media’s parent company announced a deal with OpenAI last week, but decided in 2021 stop accepting advertising dollars from fossil fuel companies. The New York Timeson the other hand, it filed a lawsuit against OpenAI for copyright infringement.

On the edge contacted Meta, Google, ReutersIt is The New York Times for responses to Guterres’ remarks. Only Google responded officially, but it did not respond to our question about how much it earns from advertising for fossil fuel companies. The company pointed to its climate change denial policy in an email to On the edge. “Generally speaking, this policy (as with most of our policies) does not block specific types of advertisers on our platform, as long as their ads comply with all of our policies,” said Google spokesperson Michael Aciman on and -mail.

Earlier this year, researchers at the nonprofit Center to Combat Digital Hate published a report documenting a new form of climate denial flourishing on YouTube. Instead of just attacking climate science, the content casts undue doubt on solutions like renewable energy. It also discovered that Google served ads on this type of misleading content. Google, in response, said it removed ads for some of the videos mentioned in the report that violated its policy against climate denial.

“Your sector is full of creative minds who are already mobilizing around this cause,” Guterres told advertising and public relations companies during his speech. “They are gravitating towards companies that fight for our planet – not destroy it.”