Green Daily

If you're weary of giant oil companies making green-friendly claims, you're not alone - the UK's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has made a ruling against an ExxonMobil television ad that uses imagery that relates their carbon-emitting power source to wind and solar power and suggests liquefied natural gas (LNG) is super clean.

The ASA, an independent ad-industry watch dog for the UK, has said that the spot should not be shown again in its current form. This decision comes after receiving viewer complaints saying the ad was misleading.

The folks at ExxonMobil have disputing the ruling, saying that they don't explicitly say that LNG is environmentally friendly - just that the greenhouse gas producing energy source will still be needed to meet higher energy demand. They are appealing the ASA's ruling.

I've watched the ad a few times now (you can take a look here). I have to admit, green claims from a company that's most famous for environmentally disastrous oil spills and giving gobs of money to groups that dispute global-warming are hard to swallow. The imagery of wind power and the tag line "Taking on the world's toughest energy challenges" somehow doesn't convince me that the 'challenges' they're talking about are finding renewable fuel sources.