Digital ad spending data for the week of September 12 - 18
Top spenders last week include Exxon, Climate Pledge, LCV, Wilderness Society, Action Fund
Last week, we saw spending on Facebook political ads by climate groups continue to grow as legislative efforts to pass President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better Agenda come down to the wire, but fossil fuel groups - namely ExxonMobil - aren’t letting up either.
Facebook + Instagram
Before we dig into it, here are the top 25 spenders on climate and energy-related ads on Facebook from last week:
Growth in Facebook political ad spending by climate groups over the past week was primarily driven by the League of Conservation Voters, which nearly doubled their spending on the platform from the previous week. Most recently, their ads have been continuing to promote Biden’s economic pitch on clean energy (“When I think climate change, I think jobs.”) in email acquisition ads targeting various states, and they’re also running ads supporting a handful of Democratic lawmakers in Congress. They’re currently using their ads to support Reps. Debbie Dingell, Don McEachin, and Cindy Axne, and they’re also running a Spanish-language ad targeting mostly younger men and older women in Arizona supporting Sens. Mark Kelly and Kyrsten Sinema.
New to spending on Facebook political ads is the American Wind Energy Association, which dropped $41,697 on the platform last week. They started running video ads on September 15th targeting Arizona, Iowa, Kansas, Nevada, New Hampshire, Virginia, West Virginia, and Washington, DC calling for Congress to invest in clean energy infrastructure in the upcoming public works bills. Their ads focus on the economic benefits of investing in clean energy:
When you flip the switch, American clean energy helps produce that power. And clean energy companies across Nevada are making it happen. Soaking up the sun to power thousands of homes, and jobs. Now, Congress has the power to pass comprehensive infrastructure plans that level the playing field for clean power, smart incentives that encourage companies to boost investment, creating more jobs and more energy, right here in Nevada.
On the other side, it looks like both Exxon and BP America are slowly increasing their spending on the platform after a brief earlier in the month. Exxon doesn’t seem to be running any particularly new ads - they’re continuing to push “unnecessary regulations slow our economy down” and “American businesses can’t afford a tax increase.” Meanwhile, BP is running new video ads about methane regulation, in which characters explain that methane has a “higher warming potential” than fossil fuels, “but the thing is, natural gas is cleaner than fossil fuels, and can power things that can’t run on batteries yet, like trucking and heavy industry, so cleaning up its production so we can have gas in the energy mix - it’s a big deal.” These ads mostly target older women nationwide.
Overall, here’s how much climate groups, polluters, and other pages spent on Facebook ads last week.
Additionally, after months of collecting weekly Facebook data, we’re proud to introduce to our Climate Monitor readers a new way of looking at spending on the platform by climate groups and polluters. We’ve been tracking spending by dozens of groups, and with enough data under our belts we can now present a week-over-week visualization, which presents a pretty clear view of how climate groups have been escalating their Facebook political ad platform since early August:
Google and YouTube
When it comes to YouTube ads, LCV and Climate Power are continuing to drop huge sums on the platform every week - they spent $188,800 and $75,900 on the platform last week, respectively. Neither are running many new ads, though, except for this one from Climate Power, which appears to target Washington, DC, northern Virginia, western Maryland, and a county in south central Pennsylvania.
Third Way is also running new YouTube ads supporting Reps. Marc Veasey and Sharice Davids, focusing on the benefits that “tax cuts” may have for fighting climate change. They spent $6,200 on these ads last week:
The stakes for jobs, the economy, and the climate have never been higher. That’s why Congresswoman Sharice Davids is fighting for tax cuts that will create more clean energy jobs in Kansas, like those at the new Aspiria development in Overland Park, powered 100 percent by wind energy, providing direct and indirect jobs throughout Kansas and neighboring states. Thank you for creating new jobs, securing infrastructure investments, and tackling climate change. We’ve got your back.
Lastly, we’d like to note that climate groups have really been the only ones advertising on Google and YouTube (that we know of), but the Nevada Petroleum Marketers and Convenience Store Association has broken that seal with a series of YouTube ads claiming that Biden is breaking his no-new-tax-on-working-families promise by “raising taxes on consumer goods.” They spent $800 last week targeting these ads at Nevadans in the state’s 1st, 2nd, and 3rd congressional districts, all currently represented by Democrats:
Snapchat
There weren’t any new Snapchat ads by climate groups in the past week, but we did find a new development in the fight over the hydroelectric power project in Northern Maine. Vote No to Protect Maine has spent $503 so far on six-second ads urging Mainers to, well, vote No on Question 1 in November, which would allow New England Clean Energy Connect to complete its project.
Overall, here are the top spenders on climate ads on Snapchat so far this year: