Coke and Pepsi among corporations being sued for lying about plastic pollution

Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Nestle, and Procter and Gamble are some of the corporations targeted by a new environmental lawsuit.

It’s likely that at some point in 2019 you saw the cloying ads by the Coca-Cola company littering buses and tube stations which declare the beverage conglomerate is ‘investing in new technologies to recycle in unrecyclable’.

Like many companies today, Coca-Cola is trying to get on top of the outcry against climate change and plastic pollution by proving their woke credentials. Single-use plastic items, like soft drink bottles, are one of the most polluting materials in the world today, choking global landfills and wreaking havoc on aquatic ecosystems, and Coke are eager to demonstrate they’re doing something about this. It’s a shame it’s all bullocks.

A 2018 report found that globally, Coke, Pepsi, and Nestle account for 14% of all plastic pollution. Moreover, recent studies suggest that of the plastic produced since the 1950s, 91% of it hasn’t been recycled, and many of the plastic bottles that claim they’re recyclable end up in landfill anyway. It’s impossible that these companies aren’t aware of these stats, yet they continue with these misleading marketing campaigns. And The Bay Area environmental organisation Earth Island Institute is calling them out on it.

Earth Island has filed a first-of-its-kind lawsuit against ten companies, alleging that they pollute waterways, coasts, and oceans with millions of tons of plastic packaging a year. They hope that, if the lawsuit goes through, the court will order these organisations to pay to clean up polluted areas, and to stop labelling products that can’t be process in most recycling plants as ‘recyclable’. Earlier this month Greenpeace found that US recycling facilities can only process a fraction of the types of plastic that get sent there.

‘The Coca-Cola Company and our other defendants churn out millions of tons of plastic packaging each year and want us to believe that it is all being recycled,’ said Earth Island’s General Counsel Sumona Majumdar in a statement. ‘It’s a misinformation campaign, similar to those used by Big Tobacco, Big Oil, and Big Pharma. Now is the time to hold Big Plastic similarly accountable.’

In the lawsuit, Earth Island cite a 2016 report noting that if current pollution trends continue, plastic will outweigh fish in the oceans by 2050. And given that fish aren’t able to campaign against this, it’s the duty of environmental organisations like Earth Island, and future Gen Z lawmakers, to call out these large polluting bodies. We wish this lawsuit best of luck, and will update you as it progresses.