New carbon guidelines a welcome move

Would you like it if you purchased something and later found out that it didn’t do what it said it would?

Most people would return the purchase and quite reasonably request a full refund, claiming misleading advertising.

Why would it be ok then for companies to mislead consumers about the environmental benefit of their goods or services?

It’s not okay, but it is happening, and many of us are now familiar with the term 'greenwashing’.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has recently made a significant and welcome announcement that it will clamp down on any organisations making false or inaccurate claims about their environmental credentials.

Before they face potential legal consequences, these organisations will be given a chance to rectify themselves, as indicated in draft guidance from the ACCC. This means withdrawing misleading claims, being more transparent about their activities, and having facts to backup claims.

Of course, we should be doing this already. But the challenge has been that environmental claims aren’t always well understood. And in the past, statements around a company’s sustainability pursuits have often not been considered with any seriousness.

That is changing though. The COVID-19 pandemic has helped reacquaint society with the importance of science. The positive knock-on effect is that companies’ carbon emissions are now more closely scrutinised.

Their environmental claims are under the microscope as we can’t afford to lose any more time in our race to net zero and the pursuit of a circulareconomy.

The real estate sector, which contributes to 40% of global carbon emissions, needs to lean into what has worked in other industries to simplify what is good and what is better, specifically through third-party certifications.

In Australia, we have many locally-policed certifications, such as Climate Active, GECA, Green Star, NABERS and ISC. But we also have access to global certifications, such as Global Green Tag, Declare and LEED. It is up to these bodies to decipher environmental impacts and convert them into an easy to interpret label. We have seen these on new fridges and other white goods for years in Australia.

Government and policy can then focus on regulating and auditing these third-party certifications to ensure they are accurately and consistently verifying environmental benefits.

We can’t afford to carbon-offset our way to net zero. Claiming carbon credits, or doing anything other than literally reducing our carbon emissions, won’t cut it. There is technology available now to move away from fossil fuels in the built environment, transport, and other sectors. The challenge is making the shift.

For some companies, the technology they need is not commercially viable right now, and if offsetting carbon is the only way forward in the short term, then this is better than doing nothing. But the customer needs to understand this. And this is where third-party certifications continue to play a vital role.

JLL is among many other organisations that have signed up to the Science Based Target Initiative (SBTI) which limits the amount of carbon offsets to 10% of an organisation’s footprint which can be used to claim net zero.