ROME, January 15 (WNM/T&E) - Italian regulators fined Italy’s oil giant Eni over advertisements on TV and in newspapers, digital media and petrol stations that falsely claimed Eni Diesel+ was ‘green’. The watchdog states that the marketing campaign deceives consumers when it claims that the ‘green’ diesel has a positive impact on the environment, saves fuel and reduces greenhouse gas emissions.
Italy’s Competition and Market Authority (all'Autorità Garante per la Concorrenza e il Mercato in Italian) inflicted the highest possible fine (5 million euros) on the state-backed energy giant.
The agency told Eni not to use the advertisement again after a complaint was lodged by Italy’s consumer organisation Movimento Difesa del Citadino, environmental NGO Legambiente and Brussels-based campaign group Transport & Environment (T&E). The oil company has been running ads on TV, print and online platforms since 2016. The energy company withdrew the advertising campaigns months ago.
The watchdog’s decision delivers a blow to attempts by fossil fuel companies to portray biofuels to politicians and the public as environmentally friendly and part of the solution to climate change. The ruling follows three extensions requested by Eni to provide further information and data to prove their case.
The watchdog ruling states that “it’s particularly deceitful to use the denomination “Green Diesel’ and the qualifications ‘green’ and ‘renewable’ to refer to the HVO component of the product”, mainly because of the indirect land-use change emissions associated with palm oil use. It also argues that there's no justification or calculation that justifies the 40% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.
Italy is the second largest palm oil biodiesel producer in the European Union. More than half (54%) of all palm oil and derivatives imported into Italy in 2018 was used to make biodiesel, mainly at Eni’s refinery at Porto Marghera, Venice. The palm oil comes predominantly from Indonesia and, to a lesser extent, from Malaysia, two countries with notable deforestation rates in the past two decades.