“From electric vehicle charging to renewable electricity for your home, Shell is giving customers more low-carbon choices and helping drive the UK’s energy transition,” the company says in one of the ads.
The Advertising Standards Authority said Tuesday that, following an investigation, it had concluded that the ad campaign may lead people to overestimate the firm’s investment in clean energy. The ASA said more information was necessary to fully capture that most of Shell’s business is based on environmentally damaging fossil fuels.
Shell, which targets net-zero emissions by 2050, said it was concerned by what it described as a “short-sighted” decision.
“We strongly disagree with the ASA’s decision, which could slow the UK’s drive towards renewable energy,” a company spokesperson said.
“People are already well aware that Shell produces the oil and gas they depend on today,” they said. “But what many people don’t know is we’re also investing heavily in low- and zero-carbon energy, including building one of the UK’s largest public networks of EV charge points.”
The ASA ruling noted that Shell believed the ads “accurately represented” the range of lower emissions energy products and services it offers and that any mention of the firm’s high-carbon products would have been “counterproductive.”