Message From the Editor

As a DeSmog reader, you're no stranger to the myriad ways in which fossil fuel companies, industry associations, and big polluters attempt to twist information and discourse to delay much-needed climate action.

So it won't come as a surprise that Pathways Alliance, a marketing and lobbying organization that represents Canada's largest oil sands producers, is up to its old tricks of using Google ads to deflect attention from a long record of misleading climate claims.

Google ad records viewed by DeSmog [[link removed]] show that the group has been paying to advertise on the search term "Pathways Alliance greenwashing," meaning that when people type that phrase into Google, one of the first results that appears is the Pathways Alliance website.

If this sounds familiar, it's because Pathways Alliance has done this before [[link removed]]. In 2023 it paid Google to link its website to hundreds of search terms related to climate change — things like "what is global warming," "net-zero," "carbon emissions," "climate change in canada," "why is climate change important," "whats a carbon footprint," and "government of canada climate change."

That same year, Greenpeace filed a complaint with the Competition Bureau of Canada alleging that one of the oil sands group's ad campaigns makes false or misleading representations. That ongoing complaint hasn't stopped Pathways Alliance from continuing to use Google ads as "part of their systemic attempt to influence the climate policy discussion," as one source told DeSmog journalist Geoff Dembicki.

Read Geoff's latest piece [[link removed]] to learn more about these ads — and what Google had to say about them when we reached out.

Have a story tip or feedback? Get in touch: [[email protected]]. Want to know what our UK team is up to? Sign up for our UK newsletter [[link removed]].

Thanks,

Brendan DeMelle

Executive Director

P.S. Geoff and the rest of our team can lift the veil on greenwashing thanks to support from readers like you. Can you donate $10 or $20 right now to support more of this essential work? [[link removed]]

Image credit: Arkan Perdana / Unsplash

Revealed: How Development Banks Underwrote Fast Food’s Global Takeover [[link removed]]— By Alex Park (12 min. read) —

With its unparalleled purchasing power and exacting demands, fast food has long shaped agricultural systems in the United States, Europe, and China. But as major American fast food brands, like KFC, expand into so-called “frontier markets,” taxpayer-funded development banks have made their global expansion possible by underwriting the factory farms that supply them with chicken, a DeSmog investigation has found.

READ MORE [[link removed]] Pathways Alliance Paid Google to Advertise on ‘Greenwashing’ Searches [[link removed]]— By Geoff Dembicki (3 min) —

A major Canadian oil sands group has been running advertisements on Google that target people seeking information about oil industry “greenwashing,” the practice by which companies make false and misleading environmental promises.

The Pathways Alliance is a marketing and lobbying organization representing the country’s six largest oil sands producers: Imperial Oil, Suncor, ConocoPhillips, Cenovus, CNRL and MEG.

READ MORE [[link removed]] Liz Truss Book Calls for Climate Laws to be Abolished and Boasts of Effort to Cancel UK COP Summit [[link removed]]— By Adam Barnett (5 min. read) —

The new book by former Prime Minister Liz Truss urges the UK, U.S. and EU to drop their landmark climate change laws, spreads falsehoods about green policies, and fondly recalls an attempt to cancel a major climate conference.

Truss, who is the Conservative MP for South West Norfolk, resigned as prime minister in October 2022 after just 49 days in office.

READ MORE [[link removed]] MPs Challenged to Cut Ties with Polluters [[link removed]]— By Phoebe Cooke (4 min. read) —

A new campaign is calling on MPs to break the fossil fuel sector’s “chokehold” on politics in a critical election year.

Lawmakers returning to work today (Monday) were greeted with smoke flares and a demand to “Stop Polluting Politics” from a banner hung off London’s Westminster Bridge.

READ MORE [[link removed]] EPA’s New Rule Aims to Cut Toxic Emissions, but Cancer Alley Air Pollution Could Worsen [[link removed]]— By Julie Dermansky (6 min. read) —

Leaders in the fight for clean air from Louisiana’s Cancer Alley joined the Environmental Protection Agency’s Administrator Michael Regan on April 9 in Washington, D.C., for the announcement of a new rule governing air toxics-spewing chemical plants. The rule is intended to prevent cancer in surrounding low-income and minority communities.

The announcement represents a milestone for environmental justice in communities historically overburdened by air-toxics pollution. But a growing number of proposed industrial projects threaten to further pollute the mostly low-income Black neighborhoods along the Mississippi River between Baton Rouge and New Orleans — already home to a large number of petrochemical plants and refineries.

READ MORE [[link removed]] From the Advertising & Public Relations Database: Pathways Alliance [[link removed]]

The Pathways Alliance [[link removed]] is an initiative of Canada’s six largest oil sands producers responsible for about 95% of Canada’s oil sands production including Canadian Natural, Cenovus Energy, ConocoPhillips Canada, Imperial, MEG Energy and Suncor Energy. The Pathways Alliance was launched with the official goal of net-zero emissions from members’ operations by 2050. However, the net-zero goal refers exclusively to emissions associated with the extraction of fossil fuels, and not the majority of emissions that occur when the fuel is burned.

Read the full profile [[link removed]] and browse other individuals and organizations in our Ad & PR Database [[link removed]], Climate Disinformation Database [[link removed]], and Koch Network Database [[link removed]].

DeSmog

1455 NW Leary Way, Suite 400

Seattle, Washington, 98107

Unsubscribe [link removed]