Climate Power, NRDC Action ramp up youth GOTV ads online
Plus, a look at new Facebook ads promoting controversial pipelines
Welcome to Climate Monitor, a weekly digest of the digital tactics and strategies polluters and climate-action groups use to shift public opinion and move legislation. We’ve examined political ad spending on social media platforms, as well as what’s trending on social media. Tell your colleagues to subscribe here!
TL;DR:
Across Meta, Google, and Snapchat, Climate Power, Climate Power Action, NRDC Action Fund, and NRDC Action Votes are spending more each week on ads seeking to push young adults to vote for climate action in the rapidly approaching midterms.
In particular, NRDC Action Votes is attacking Dr. Oz over his climate denialism, and Action for the Climate Emergency is promoting Florida’s registration deadline to young voters in the state.
Saving Arizona, a super PAC aligned with Republican U.S. Senate candidate Blake Masters, launched new ads blaming high gas prices on Mark Kelly’s vote against the Keystone XL Pipeline.
Speaking of pipelines: Minnesotans for Line 3 is up with new Meta ads arguing that the economic benefits of Line 3 justify keeping Line 5 open.
Families for a Future has launched a Meta ad campaign in Denver, Philadelphia, and San Diego promoting how the Inflation Reduction Act can help schools improve their air conditioning systems as temperatures continue to rise with climate change.
National Digital Ad Spending on Climate
Facebook + Instagram
First, here are the top 25 spenders nationwide on climate and energy-related ads on Meta platforms from last week:
Last week, the top spender on climate-related Meta ads among pro-climate groups was Vote NO on Prop 30. The Gavin Newsom-aligned group suddenly dropped more than $370k on digital ads across platforms over the past two weeks opposing a Lyft-backed proposition that would tax high-income earners to invest in electric vehicles. Teddy Schleifer at Puck News has more on this “only-in-California spat,” as he calls it. >>>
We’ve also picked up on new pro-climate Meta ads in states with more competitive elections. NRDC Action Fund and Action for the Climate Emergency, two groups that have been running political ads online practically all cycle, are now investing in new ads to turn out the youth vote. While the former group is running slick video ads connecting protests and voting to clean energy development, targeting young adults in CA, CO, IL, NV, NY, MI, PA, and VA, the latter group is more specifically promoting the Florida voter registration deadline to young voters in the Sunshine State with TikToks. All told, the two groups, in addition to Climate Power’s campaigns, spent roughly $80k on pro-climate youth-focused GOTV Meta ads last week.
We also found that NRDC Action Votes launched Meta ads in Pennsylvania this month attacking Dr. Oz as a climate denier, closing the six-second ad with, “Send Oz home to New Jersey.” The group has spent nearly $60k on these ads so far.
We also identified some of the first Meta ads from pro-fossil fuel outside groups attacking Democratic candidates (other than the usual suspects like One Nation and AFP Action). In Arizona, pro-Blake Masters PAC Saving Arizona spent $51k on ads attacking Mark Kelly for, among other things, voting against the Keystone XL Pipeline, while “Blake Masters supports the pipeline and American Energy Independence.” That particular spot exclusively targets Arizonans aged 35 and up.
Finally, it looks like Minnesotans for Line 3 has launched its first Meta ad campaign since July. They’ve spent roughly $18k over the past two weeks on ads targeting Minnesota and cities in western Wisconsin which essentially argue that the money brought in by Line 3 justifies keeping Line 5 open.
Google + YouTube
Climate Power Action has been steadily increasing their spending across platforms over the past few weeks, with last week being their biggest yet. They spent nearly $100k last week on digital ads promoting the clean energy and clean air benefits of the Inflation Reduction Act to boost Democrats in key U.S. House and Senate race - check out their pro-Raphael Warnock ad below.
Also running new YouTube ads last week were Climate Vote Minnesota, which used its ad dollars to support various Democratic state legislators and Attorney General Keith Ellison, and Earthjustice Action. That group is targeting Arizona, Georgia, and Pennsylvania with YouTube ads arguing that Democratic senators are essential to safeguarding against an anti-environment conservative Supreme Court.
Overall, here’s how much these groups spent on Google political ads last week:
Snapchat
As with other platforms, Climate Power and Climate Power Action grew their spending on Snap ads promoting Democratic Senate candidates in AZ, GA, NV, and PA; they’ve now spent a combined $27k on the platform in recent weeks. But otherwise, we didn’t identify any other new spending on climate-related ads on Snap last week.
Overall, here’s how much has been spent on climate, clean energy, and conservation ads on Snap so far this year:
Climate & Energy Ads in the 2022 Elections
We identified just a few new digital ad campaigns about climate change and energy from battleground midterm campaigns across the country.
CA-27: Republican Mike Garcia is running bilingual ads calling to lower the gas tax in his state: “🇺🇸 ¡Luchemos juntos para reducir el gas tax en California!”
ME-Gov: Democrat Janet Mills put climate action at the center of some of her new fundraising ads: “ Over the past three years, Janet Mills has expanded health care, made historical investments in our schools, and fought climate change. But Paul LePage and his special interest cronies are going to do everything they can to take Maine backwards.”
NV-03: Republican April Becker pushed a misleading argument about President Joe Biden’s oil export policies: “While Americans are paying record high prices at the pump, this administration decides to give our oil away.”
PA-01: Republican Brian Fitzpatrick is launched new ads touting endorsements from Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions and the National Wildlife Federation Action Fund.
Reaching Frontline Communities
Last week, Families for a Future launched a campaign targeting parent-aged adults in Philadelphia, San Diego, and Denver highlighting how the Inflation Reduction Act could help their kids in school. They argue that aging schools across the country lack sufficient air conditioning and that the IRA could provide funds “ for school improvements that will cool classrooms, lower energy costs, and reduce pollution.” They’re using their ads to organize parents in these cities to ensure that their local governments actually take advantage of the law’s funding to ensure a safe, conducive learning environment as temperatures continue to rise.
What’s trending organically?
Last week, the top Facebook post mentioning climate change, energy, or related terms came from Heather Cox Richardson, two of whose daily reports primarily discussed developments in the war on Ukraine and House Republicans’ “Commitment to America” plan, which promises “making America energy independent.” The next most engaged post came from Fox Business, which wrote about Ford breaking ground on a new electric vehicle factory in Tennessee. While Fox Business played the story straight, nearly a third of the post’s 38k interactions were “Haha” reactions, and the thousands of comments were overwhelmingly disparaging of America’s new investment in EVs.
Also last week, the House Financial Services Committee interviewed seven heads of America’s biggest banks, where Rep. Rashida Tlaib asked each one of them whether or not their banks would continue funding fossil fuel developments. Her questioning went viral - among right-wing media. Media Research Center and Townhall both posted clips of Tlaib’s questioning to ridicule her, saying, “Squad member Rashida Tlaib gets TRIGGERED after JP Morgan CEO HUMILIATES her over oil & gas production.” Together, their clips earned 384k views.
Overall, though, we found that posts mentioning climate change and other related terms didn’t get nearly as much engagement on Facebook as the previous week. Last week, the top 10 posts got 283k interactions, while the top 10 posts the previous week got 500k interactions. Here’s how the most engaged content last week on Facebook breaks down:
On Instagram, the top post came from influencer Jeffree Star, who just got an electric Hummer, calling it “the BEST EV vehicle I’ve ever owned.” Other pro-climate posts came from Barack Obama and Leonardo DiCaprio, who both urged Americans to check their and their peers’ voter registration statuses. Additionally, Spotify Pakistan used Instagram to highlight their Times Square ad which attempted to raise awareness of the crisis in Pakistan and the global climate emergency more generally.
Among anti-climate pages on Instagram, Breitbart earned the most engagement with a post discussing yet another Tesla that burst into flames. Instead of using the news to question the circumstances of the blaze, the far-right outlet used it to prop up Teslas as a proxy for electric vehicles, misleadingly saying, “fire departments have begun recognizing that electric vehicle fires pose a significant danger and need further training to handle them appropriately.” We’ll also note that skepticism around Formula One’s recent commitment to reach net zero emissions by 2030 persists on social media, particularly driven last week by ESPN F1.
Overall, here’s how the most engaged content last week on Instagram mentioning climate, energy, and related terms breaks down:
That’s it for Climate Monitor this week. As always, if you have any comments or questions, feel free to drop us a line by shooting an email to nick@fwiwmedia.com.