Arriving in the park’sparking lot, the stomach turns with that green “H” and racing stripe “hybrid” on the massive Yukon looming over me. Yes, 
greenwashing is probably too polite a term for plastering Hybrid all over that 20 miles per gallon monstrocity. Greenwashing monstrous vehicles is clearly an industry norm, with Toyota using its street creds from the Prius remain clean while pushing the Tundra.
The later addition to the greenwashing crowd (at least for me): Mercedes-Benz and the BlueTEC SUVs. According to advertising in the Washington POst
Mercedes-Benz BlueTEC SUVs offer incredible driving range and a remarkable 20-30% better fuel economy than comparable gasoline models. …
Wow. 20-30%! Hold it, what is the baseline? Evidently around 21, since the claimed fuel economy (not EPA) is 27.5 or 27.8 miles per gallon. Sigh, while that is good compared to the Yukon tank, this isn’t efficiency preformance that will help solve the serious problems we face.
What is the banner?
Drive farther. Save Fuel. Help Environment.
Check, check, and check.
While the “drive farther” clearly related to the enormity of the fuel tank, consider the words. Doesn’t this imply an encouragement of driving farther? Doesn’t this suggest, implicity, that “drive farther” is achieved even while saving fuel? In short, “drive farther” won’t save fuel and won’t help the environment.
3 responses so far ↓
1 Stacey Derbinshire // Oct 24, 2008 at 9:45 pm
Just wanted to say HI. I found your blog a few days ago on Technorati and have been reading it over the past few days.
2 Andy B // Oct 25, 2008 at 9:56 am
Adam. I agree that this flat out sucks. You can just tell when someone or an org “gets it.” You can also tell, immediately, when greenwashing is going on. Maybe the Mercedes marketeers believe lots of prospective buyers will go for it … and maybe they’re right. I often find the aphorism “the perfect is the enemy of the good” applies when folks demand too much progress too soon in any given endeavor. But in this case and many like it in the auto industry, cynical marketing is the enemy of the good. And good, really good, and perfect are retreating over the horizon.
3 From the “what were they thinking?” catalog: greenwashing the Chevy Tahoe // Nov 26, 2008 at 10:15 pm
[…] are many greenwashing efforts for gas guzzling McSUVs, seeking to put a green shine on polluting behemoths. Normally, these come from well-paid hacks and […]