FIJI Water Carbon Negative Class Action

A Southern California woman is suing FIJI Water Company in a class action lawsuit alleging the company falsely advertises that its products are carbon-negative. The FIJI class action claims the misleading advertising sways environmentally conscious consumers into buying the expensive bottled water.

Desiree Worthington claims in the FIJI class action lawsuit that she repeatedly purchased FIJI water over the past four years, including during the period that FIJI launched its carbon-negative marketing campaign.

FIJI Water announced the campaign in November 2007 as part of an overall plan to make the bottling, packaging and transportation of its bottled water more environmentally responsible. By going carbon negative – as opposed to just neutral – FIJI promised to account for its carbon footprint throughout the entire lifecycle of its products through a combination of carbon-reducing land use, renewable energy projects and other reductions to result in a net reduction of carbon in the atmosphere.

According to FIJI’s website, FIJI’s carbon-negative plan will offset 120% of their carbon emissions, which not only mitigates their environmental impact, but also makes up “for a little bit of someone else’s.” But it’s the method FIJI uses to calculate its offsets that is the crux of the FIJI class action lawsuit.

According to the lawsuit:

“[FIJI’s] carbon-negative claim is deceptive and misleading…reasonable consumers of FIJI water understand Defendants’ ‘carbon-negative’ claim as meaning that FIJI water’s current operations remove more carbon from the atmosphere than they release into it. This is simply not the case; in reality, FIJI water’s operations do not remove more carbon from the atmosphere than they release into it. Instead, they use a discredited carbon accounting method called ‘forward crediting.’”

These “forward offset credits,” the lawsuit says, represents carbon reduction that “may or may not take place up to several decades in the future.”

The FIJI carbon class action lawsuit alleges that FIJI’s misleading carbon negative claim has “induced countless consumers to pay a premium for bottled water,” which costs about twice as much as other well-known brands of bottled water. Worthington claims she and other class members “would not have purchased FIJI water at a premium if she knew that Defendants’ current operations did not remove more carbon from the atmosphere than they release into it.”

FIJI Water’s parent company, Roll International Corporation, is also named as defendant in the class action.

The FIJI Water Carbon Negative Class Action Lawsuit is seeking class certification, monetary damages, statutory penalties, attorneys’ fees and other costs.