decision

ASA Ruling on Repsol SA (following a complaint by Adfree Cities) - decision

<p>This entry was provided by the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. Please see the terms of use for citation and licensing of third party data.</p>

Litigation

Sabin

Sabin Litigation

Filing Year For Action

A paid-for online display ad for Repsol, a global energy company, seen on the Financial Times website on July 12, 2023, featured an image of a water droplet with text that stated “Renewable hydrogen, another alternative to reduce emissions. At Repsol, we are committed to renewable hydrogen as an energy source that offers up different uses such as zero net emissions synthetic fuel production”. The ad also featured a series of graphics: the text “H2” encircled by two arrows; a solar panel with a sun; a car with a stylised letter “e” that had a plug at the end; a wind turbine; two arrows that formed a circle; a sapling; and a petrol pump with a leaf on it.
Adfree Cities challenged whether the ad was misleading because it omitted significant information about the overall environmental impact of Repsol’s business activities. 
By ruling of October 18, 2023, the Advertising Standards Authority (“ASA”) upheld that complaint. 
The CAP Code stated that unqualified environmental claims could mislead if they omitted significant information.
The ad appeared on the FT website and in the FT digital energy newsletter. It would therefore have been of interest to investors and those interested in purchasing Repsol’s products. Both audiences would be interested in seeking out businesses, including oil and gas companies, who were making meaningful progress towards transitioning away from higher-carbon products and services, including those developing alternative fuels such as renewable hydrogen. However, consumers and many business readers were unlikely to be aware of the specific details of such technology – for example, that the development of renewable hydrogen was in its infancy and was not yet commercially available.
Both consumers and business readers were likely to understand the ad to mean that renewable hydrogen was an alternative to fossil fuels. The ad gave the impression that renewable energy products, including renewable hydrogen, comprised a significant proportion of the energy products Repsol developed and sold, or were likely to develop or sell in the near future. 
Repsol’s operations in transforming several of their industrial complexes to aid in the production of renewable hydrogen would not commence until 2024, and their development and production of renewable hydrogen was not yet in operation.
Repsol’s carbon emissions stood at 171 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) in 2021 (50% of the emissions of the UK in 2021, 346.7 Mt CO2e), and they produced approximately 600,000 barrels of oil per day. They also had a substantial oil and gas exploration strategy, owning an interest in 40,660 acres (gross) of oil and gas development and exploration across Europe, Latin America, North America, Africa, and Asia and Oceania. Large-scale global oil and gas investment and exploration therefore formed the vast majority of Repsol’s business interests.
Further information about the proportion of Repsol’s overall business model that comprised lower carbon energy was material information that should have been included in the ad. It therefore omitted material information and was likely to mislead.
The ASA ruled that the ad must not appear again in the form complained of. It told Repsol to ensure that their future ads featuring environmental claims did not mislead by omitting significant information about the proportion of their business activities that were comprised of renewable energy, or the role renewable energy and renewable hydrogen played in their business activities.

ASA Ruling on Repsol SA (following a complaint by Adfree Cities)

The Climate Litigation Database

Find climate change litigation data and indicators for {text}.

{text} litigation

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law provides Climate Litigation Database, a comprehensive database of US and Global climate change caselaw

Quickly and easily search through the complete text of thousands of climate change law and policy documents from every country.

Search the Climate Litigation Database

An aim to achieve a quantifiable outcome within a given time-frame, set by an institution such as a national government.

Policy instruments are techniques or tools used by governing authorities to promote certain policies in order to achieve predetermined goals. Put simply, instruments are how a government tries to achieve its goals, with this taxonomy being focused on national policy instruments.

Risk is the potential for adverse consequences resulting from the dynamic interplay between (climate-related) hazards, exposure, and vulnerability of affected human or ecological systems.

Groups  of people who are adversely affected by climate change or the response to it

A set of principles, processes, and practices that build economic and political power to shift from an extractive economy to a regenerative economy.

Renewable energy means all forms of energy produced from renewable sources in a sustainable manner.

Fossil fuel is a generic term for non-renewable energy sources such as coal, fossil gas, and oil (including crude oil, and petroleum products), that can be used for electricity and heat generation. Fossil fuels are hydrocarbons formed from pressurised and heated organic material buried over millions of years.

Molecules in the atmosphere that play a key role in the greenhouse effect by trapping heat radiating from Earth’s surface.

Area of the economy in which actors engage in identical or related activities.

In human systems, the process of adjustment to actual or expected climate change and its effects, in order to moderate harm, increase resilience or exploit beneficial opportunities. In natural systems, the process of adjustment to actual climate change and its effects; human intervention may facilitate adjustment to expected climate change and its effects.

The management and allocation of funds, assets and investments to meet various objectives

A long-lived, colourless gas, chiefly emitted from fossil fuel combustion, deforestation and cement production.

A target to reduce the prevalence of a greenhouse gas over a specific time frame

Coal is a combustible sedimentary rock formed from carbonised plant matter, rich in carbon and hydrocarbons, and occurring in several main types including hard coal and brown coal.

Either money or something of monetary value is transferred between two or more organisations, people or countries.

The activities of industries that transforms raw materials into finished goods through industrial processes.

The activities of industries involved in the production, distribution, and sale of energy, including electricity, gas, and renewables.

This sector creates and distributes information and entertainment through television, radio, print, and digital platforms.

Oil is a combustible liquid fossil fuel composed mainly of hydrocarbons, occurring as crude oil and refined into petroleum products such as petrol, diesel and kerosene.

A potent, short-lived greehouse gas, largely released from livestock, fossil fuel extraction and waste management.

Fossil gas, commonly known as natural gas, is a fossil fuel consisting chiefly of methane with smaller amounts of other hydrocarbons and trace gases, found in underground deposits.

ASA Ruling on Repsol SA (following a complaint by Adfree Cities) - decision

Target

Renewable energy

Fossil fuel

Greenhouse gas

Economic sector

Finance