The term Greenrinsing refers to a company’s practice of regularly changing its ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) targets before they are achieved.
This tactic showcases how greenwashing has evolved and become increasingly sophisticated.
It stems from companies that set ambitious goals but fail to meet them; their rhetoric does not align with sustainability outcomes.
In recent years, we’ve seen a surge in sustainability metrics, claims, and goals, but many are not backed by tangible actions or appear unlikely to be met.
Greenlabelling is a practice where marketers label a product or service as “green” or sustainable.
However, closer scrutiny might reveal that such claims are misleading or only partially true.
This form of greenwashing is widespread, making it challenging for consumers and businesses to differentiate among the myriad of environmental labels and initiatives in the market.
Many terms, such as “bio”, “natural”, “green”, and “eco-friendly”, are often ambiguously used, complicating the understanding of their genuine meaning and value.
Greenshifting involves companies implying that consumers are at fault, shifting the blame onto them.
This strategy emerges when firms emphasize what consumers can or should do to reduce emissions or positively impact the environment, despite being aware of the significant impact of their products or services.
Advertising agencies are expected to be more cautious about adopting this approach in the future, as it’s one of the more easily identifiable greenwashing tactics.
Greenlighting occurs when company communications, including advertisements, highlight particular green aspects of their operations or products, no matter how small, in order to divert attention from environmentally harmful activities conducted elsewhere.
This practice aims to showcase the company in a positive light by emphasizing only certain aspects, while other less sustainable operations might be overlooked.
It’s a strategy that can mislead consumers, focusing their attention on environmentally positive initiatives while neglecting less sustainable activities.
Greencrowding is based on the idea of hiding within a crowd to avoid detection, relying on safety in numbers.
While some groups may appear as strong advocates for sustainability, the reality can be different.
Despite large numbers and media commitment, actual actions might be minimal.
Caution is advised when evaluating such initiatives, checking the real progress against stated objectives.
Greenbickering refers to a strategy adopted by a company to identify and counter deceptive or unfair “green” communication practices by competitors.
The term is a neologism combining two English words, “green,” which refers to environmentally sustainable practices and policies, and “bickering,” which indicates a conflict or dispute.
Greenbickering action by a company can manifest itself in various ways, including legal appeals.
In energy, Grid Parity means the “parity” between the cost of production of energy from renewable sources and the cost of purchasing energy produced from conventional sources (mainly fossil).
GRI (Global Reporting Initiative) is an international non-profit organization, which has developed a standard, known as the GRI Standard, to provide guidance to organizations wishing to communicate their sustainable performance transparently and comprehensively, through the publication of sustainability reports.
Reports based on GRI Standards assess the economic, environmental and social impacts of companies, allowing organizations to identify and evaluate their sustainable impact in a comprehensive and transparent way, in order to improve their sustainable performance
The term Green Hushing refers to false or misleading claims of corporate sustainability, and is used when a company has announced a climate goal, but does not intend to clearly advertise its commitment to achieving it.
It is the so-called “green silence”.
This can complicate the assessment of corporate climate goals, limit knowledge sharing on decarbonisation, lead to less ambitious goals and miss opportunities for cross-sectoral collaboration.
The Green Deal is a comprehensive plan proposed by the European Union (EU) to tackle climate change and achieve carbon neutrality by 2050.
The main goal of the Green Deal is to transform the EU’s economy to a sustainable, low-carbon, and circular economy that will benefit both the environment and society.
The Green Deal focuses on several key areas, including:
The Green Deal is a significant and ambitious initiative that requires a collective effort from all EU Member States, businesses, and citizens to achieve its goals.
Green washing is a term that indicates the practice of using marketing or communication techniques to promote products or services as ecological or sustainable, when in reality they are not or have a very limited environmental impact.
In other words, it is a way of making a company appear to be committed to the environment without any real action to support that commitment.
Green washing is considered ethically questionable, as it can be misleading for consumers and hinder real progress in sustainability
The green economy is a model of economic development that aims to achieve sustainable economic growth and environmental protection simultaneously.
The objective of the green economy is to create production and consumption systems that are able to preserve natural resources and promote social and economic welfare.
This model is based on the idea that sustainable development is only possible if innovative solutions are found to meet environmental and economic challenges.
In essence, the green economy aims to create a fairer and more sustainable economic system that can meet the needs of current generations without compromising the resources and opportunities of future generations.
According to a specific idea known as “green chemistry”, chemical and chemical engineering studies are based on the creation of goods and procedures that reduce or completely eliminate the use and production of hazardous substances.
It refers to the entire life cycle of a chemical, including its creation, use and disposal.
It is, by definition, the design of chemical products and processes that minimize or completely avoid the use or generation of compounds that could endanger people or the environment.
Since it is preferable to avoid waste rather than treat it or dispose of it after its production, synthetic arrangements for the use and production of chemicals with the least possible amount of toxicity should be established.
