Climate Power pushes for clean energy to undermine Putin in latest digital ads
Plus, more greenwashing ads from BP, The Williams Cos., and the natural gas industry
Welcome to Climate Monitor, your weekly digest of the digital tactics and strategies that polluters and climate-action groups are deploying online to shift public opinion and move legislation. We’ve examined political ad spending on platforms like Facebook, Snapchat, and Google by several dozen groups and corporations from the past week, as well as their activities on social media. Tell your colleagues to subscribe here!
What we found:
Republican candidates for U.S. Senate are parroting Big Oil talking points about increasing domestic oil production in their digital ads to attack the Biden administration and their Democratic opponents.
Climate Power launched a new Meta ad campaign calling on Congress to rapidly invest in renewable energy in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Similarly, EDF Action launched a campaign promoting President Biden’s call for renewables at the State of the Union.
BP launched yet another digital ad campaign touting the climate action being taken by Washington state. At the same time, both Natural Allies for a Clean Future and The Williams Companies are both running campaigns arguing that natural gas is a clean energy source that is necessary for the transition.
On social media, memes and right-wing propaganda about rising gas prices are drowning out most other content about climate change and renewable energy.
National Digital Ad Spending on Climate
First, here are the top 25 spenders nationwide on climate and energy-related ads on Meta platforms from last week:
Spending on Meta political ads by climate, clean energy, and conservation groups remained steady last week compared to the previous week, but we identified new campaigns from three national groups that caught our eye.
First, it appears that Climate Power kicked off the month of March with a series of anti-war Facebook ads connecting the West’s dependence on fossil fuels to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Most of their new ads boost news articles making the aforementioned point or arguing that now is the time to mobilize for a clean energy revolution, while one is a more traditional video ad calling on Congress to “can help us break free from fossil fuel dependence by investing in American-made clean energy,” pointing to their campaign’s microsite.
Relatedly, EDF Action launched two new Facebook and Instagram ad campaigns earlier this month. One lauds President Joe Biden’s remarks on climate action during his State of the Union address, while the other thanks Reps. Sean Patrick Maloney, David Scott, Ann Kirkpatrick, and Cindy Axne for supporting the Growing Climate Solutions Act.
Finally, we wanted to call out an interesting campaign from Earthjustice, which ran a brief Instagram ad campaign primarily targeted at young women in California that probably fit right into their audience’s feeds. At a time when artsy slideshow posts are trending, these rather creative ads are a smart way to engage their intended audience in a familiar visual language - i.e., reaching them where they are.
Spending on Meta political ads by fossil fuel groups grew by over 30 percent, largely thanks to a new greenwashing campaign from BP, which dumped nearly $48k last week on a new campaign lauding Washington state’s Climate Commitment Act, claiming they “want to work with policymakers to create more progress” like the bill. This campaign is targeted mostly at men aged 25 to 44 nationwide.
Additionally, we found that The Williams Companies dropped a little over $16k last week on a Facebook and Instagram ad campaign that touts their work - and natural gas more broadly - as “enabling the next generation of clean energy.” At the same time, Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future is running its own boosted news campaign that seeks to make natural gas seem cleaner than it actually is, featuring a POLITICO op-ed they sponsored penned by former Democratic Sens. Heidi Heitkamp and Mary Landrieu claiming natural gas “can hasten our reduction of carbon emissions while keeping energy affordable.”
Overall, here’s a look at how weekly spending on Meta political ads by climate groups and polluters compare week-over-week so far this year:
Google + YouTube
The only new or ongoing ad campaign related to energy, climate change, or conservation we identified in the Google Transparency Report was Clearpath Action Fund’s campaign supporting Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Rep. Dan Newhouse, which the group spent another $5,200 on last week.
Snapchat
The only climate-related political ads on Snapchat last week came from the NRDC Action Fund’s ongoing acquisition campaign, which runs until April 1st. Overall, here are the top spenders on Snapchat ads related to climate change, clean energy, and conservation so far this year:
Climate, clean energy, and conservation ads in this year’s key states
Out of the biggest races in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, we picked up a couple of new and ongoing Facebook ad campaigns from top candidates:
AZ-SEN: Mark Kelly spent under $1k on a nationwide Facebook and Instagram ad invoking our national parks: “Our national parks in Arizona — and across the country — need to stay protected. YOU can help. Sign the petition saying you believe we should protect our public lands.”
FL-SEN: Marco Rubio has spent under $400 on a video ad targeting seniors nationwide on Facebook and Instagram featuring a supercut of news sound bites: “The pain at the pump is real for many families. Record-breaking prices at the pump nationwide. Supply has not been keeping up, even before the conflict in Ukraine. We’ve waged a war under the Biden administration against oil and natural gas in the United States...Joe Biden canceled the Keystone Pipeline, no more leases on federal lands. When Joe Biden became president, we were energy independent. Why did he abandon that?” The final caption of the video reads, “Val Demings isn’t supporting American oil production. Democrats are a pain in the gas!”
GA-SEN: Raphael Warnock is currently running two relevant Facebook ads. One boosts a local news report of his efforts to support the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor: “I'm committed to ensuring these communities are supported for years to come.” He’s also running vertical video ads “calling for an immediate suspension of the federal gas tax so we can save hardworking Georgians money at the pump.”
GA-SEN: At the same time, Herschel Walker is running multiple Facebook ads blaming rising gas prices on Biden and Warnock: “President Trump was RIGHT... ‘If Biden got in, you’d be paying $7, $8, $9.’ The only question now is, how high will President Biden and Senator Warnock let them go?
NC-SEN: Ted Budd is also using his Facebook ads to attack the Biden administration over gas prices: “Gas prices have been skyrocketing since August. Joe Biden is doubling down on policies that are hurting the American people and refuses to change course!”
OH-SEN: Mike Gibbons is using a similar approach to Walker: “President Trump was right! Under Biden’s leadership, gas prices are skyrocketing with no end in sight. Once new leadership is elected this November, those prices will fall dramatically when we make America energy independent again.”
Reaching Frontline Communities
Earlier this week, Rural Arizona Action, a progressive advocacy organization focused on organizing rural Arizonans, spent around $500 on a Facebook and Instagram ad campaign. Through the campaign, they tried to recruit volunteers to speak at a public comment event considering a new natural gas processing plant in Pinal County.
Tracking Climate Disinfo Online
Triplecheck identified approximately 690 tweets with more than 10 retweets and 260 Facebook posts with more than 10 engagements that contained misinformation or toxic narratives related to the environment from March 09, 2022, through March 15, 2022.
Approximately 70 percent of the people exposed to misinformation or toxic narratives related to the environment on Twitter were exposed to one of the following themes:
President Biden was criticized for refusing to issue new drilling permits;
Biden is in the pocket of radical environmentalists;
Russia funds American environmental organizations.
These narratives were also the focus of approximately 65 percent of the Facebook engagements identified in our tracking. You can find Triplecheck’s full report here.
Measuring the National Organic Conversation
Overall, the top three Facebook posts mentioning climate change and related terms last week came from President Joe Biden (276.9k interactions), Josh Mandel (185.3k interactions), and Occupy Democrats (111.4k interactions).
Occupy Democrats and The Other 98% made a series of highly engaged Facebook posts last week that largely seemed to rebut the wave of pro-fossil fuel content. One post tried to demystify how much control the President of the United States has over gas prices, some highlighted corporate greed, while one post highlighted how “restarting” the Keystone XL pipeline would have little to do with increasing domestic oil production.
While Facebook engagements about climate change and energy peaked last week on March 8th, when Biden announced his ban on Russian oil and gas imports, right-wing Facebook content calling for increased domestic fossil fuel production remained pervasive thanks to a large variety of pages pushing it. We identified several pages that had made posts along those lines that had gotten over 50k interactions, such as from Franklin Graham, Fox News featuring former VP Mike Pence, Brigitte Gabriel, Donald Trump Jr., Jim Jordan, Tim Scott, DJT Jr. again, Fox News again featuring Rick Scott, and Ben Shapiro.
Over on Instagram, the top three posts mentioning climate change, energy, and related terms came from Snoop Dogg, Snoop Dogg, and dudettewithsign. Clearly, memes about very high gas prices are very much in vogue on Instagram right now, severely overshadowing any content on the platform about clean energy or climate change. Right-wing pages seem to be taking advantage of this trend, as indicated by the_typical_liberal reposting a nearly identical meme from a huge meme page. Right-wing pages like the_typical_liberal and dc_draino are also using their Instagram pages to push the idea that the invasion of Ukraine and the resulting rise in gas prices are Biden’s fault because they did not happen while Donald Trump was president.
That’s it for Climate Monitor this week. As always, head to climatemonitor.substack.com to see these updates in real-time as we publish them throughout the week!
And if you have any comments or questions, feel free to drop us a line by shooting an email to nick@fwiwmedia.com.