Despite company policy, climate misinfo is alive and well on TikTok
A roundup of the climate conversation across social media this week
Welcome to Climate Monitor, a weekly, data-driven report on the digital strategies polluters and pro-Climate groups are using to shift public opinion and move legislation. Here’s what we found:
Toplines:
Two weeks ago, TikTok announced that it would begin removing all climate misinformation on the platform. However, cursory searches for “climate change” content surface numerous climate skeptic videos
Oil giant BP launched new Facebook ads last week touting “investing in America” and job creation
The TX Campaign for the Environment also launched new Facebook + IG ads last week, calling out financial institutions for backing LNG projects
Right-wing pages on Facebook continued a drumbeat of anti-EV posts
Digital Advertising Roundup
Facebook + Instagram 👍
For starters, here were the top 25 climate and energy-related advertisers on Facebook and Instagram last week:
International oil giant BP launched a new wave of Facebook and Instagram ads last week, spending around $28,000 on creative that focuses on “investing in America” and job creation:
Most of BP’s latest ads target users located in the state of Indiana or Washington, DC. BP’s oil refinery in Indiana is one of the worst water polluters in the nation.
The Texas Campaign for the Environment is up with new Facebook ads via a page called Gulf Coast Guard. The group’s ads take on big financial institutions like Wells Fargo, Citibank, Bank of America, and Goldman Sachs for bankrolling LNG projects that pollute the gulf coast. They target Facebook users in several major cities with high income levels, likely aiming to reach employees or people adjacent to the banking industry.
Another new advertiser that we wanted to flag is Nuclear Now, a documentary by Oliver Stone about the potential for nuclear energy. As part of the film’s debut, they’re running Facebook ads promoting the trailer and screenings across the country.
Google & YouTube 🎞️
The climate or energy-related political advertisers on Google that were archived last week included: Clean Air Task Force Action ($21,000), League of Conservation Voters ($6,800), Growth Energy ($4,600), Nevada Conservation League Education Fund ($1,300)
The NV Conservation League’s ads thank the Biden admin + the states’ Congressional delegation for protecting the Avi Kwa Ame mountain as a national monument earlier this Spring.
Snapchat 🤳
There were no new or notable climate-related ad campaigns on Snapchat last week.
What’s Trending on Social Media
How are climate and energy issues being discussed by Americans on social media? Every week, we conduct a robust keyword search using CrowdTangle for general terms like “climate change,” “global warming,” “fossil fuels,” and over 40 more specific topics (like “electric vehicles,” “gas stoves” and “pipelines”). Here were the 15 top-performing public posts (by # of interactions) related to climate and energy on Facebook last week:
Last week, over 14,000 public posts on Facebook mentioned climate or energy issues, and they earned a cumulative 978,000 interactions.
Posts from an engagement-bait page called “News2Share” received a large amount of engagement last week. The page generally shares videos of activists, and last week it published three videos of climate activists stopping traffic or defacing art.
The right-wing war on EV’s continues: One of Breitbart’s top posts last week told a familiar story of an electric vehicle running out of charge and getting stranded in the middle of nowhere. Another post from MRCTV claims that the Biden admin is going to require the military to replace its entire vehicle fleet with EV’s.
Meanwhile, here were the top-performing feed posts (excluding Reels and Stories) related to climate and energy on Instagram last week:
Last week, over 6,600 public feed posts on Instagram mentioned climate or energy issues, and they earned a cumulative 5.3 million interactions.
The most engaged post in these categories last week came from @donaldtrumpjr, who shared a meme generally trolling President Biden on a number of issues.
Another post from @environment laid out why “climate doomism can be just as dangerous as denying climate change.”
…and lastly, we were very excited to report last week that TikTok was taking a tougher stance against climate denialism, announcing a ban on anti-climate content on Earth Day.
Like most tech companies, however, actual policy enforcement is lacking. We found a number of viral videos spreading climate misinformation remain on the platform. For example, one of the most-liked TikToks about climate change last week was an old rant by a climate denier on CNN. The video has been watched over 570,000 times in several days.
Weekly Reading
Want to go deeper? Here’s a quick roundup of news from the past week at the intersection of climate, digital strategy, and advocacy.
P.S. Are you signed up for Climate Nexus’ daily newsletter, Hot News? It’s a one-stop shop for everything you need to know in the climate and environmental policy space. Subscribe here>>
Google Promised to Defund Climate Lies, but the Ads Keep Coming (NYT, 5/2)
Tucker Carlson's toxic environmental legacy (Heated, 4/27)
Inside big beef’s climate messaging machine: confuse, defend and downplay (The Guardian, 5/3)
That’s it for this week! If you enjoyed reading this week’s issue, feel free to forward it to a friend or colleague.
Climate Monitor is a product of the Digital Climate Coalition + FWIW Media. Tips/comments/questions? Email kyle@fwiwmedia.com