Fox News Corporation To Go Green
by Justin Thomas, Virginia on 05.14.07
In a move that has surprised many people, Rupert Murdoch, owner of News Corporation, has announced that he is becoming a green campaigner. He is making the whole of his worldwide operations carbon neutral and setting out to "educate and engage" his readers and viewers about global warming. The announcement was made on "Your World with Neil Cavuto" (see video clip above). Murdoch, a former skeptic who confesses to having been "somewhat wary of the warming debate", he laid on his first global webcast for all his employees on Wednesday to tell them that he was "changing the DNA of our business".
News Corporation has a carbon footprint of at 641,150 tons a year and will now aim to be carbon neutral by 2010. Murdoch cited as his motivation evidence of dangerous climate changes, employee input and the positive experience at News Corp.-controlled U.K. satellite TV provider BSkyB, which already is carbon neutral.
"When all of News Corp. becomes carbon neutral, it will have the same impact as turning off the electricity in the city of London for five full days," the CEO said.
By reducing energy usage, using such renewable energy sources as wind and solar power and putting in place other measures, News Corp. plans to nearly eliminate its emissions from a 2006 footprint of 641,150 tons of carbon dioxide equivalents across its operations in 52 countries. But it also wants to engage its 47,000 employees and its global audiences.
"We must avoid preaching," Murdoch emphasized, saying his company will instead try to make the issue "exciting (and) tell the story in a new way."
He moved on to highlight that News Corp.'s worldwide audiences have a carbon footprint that is about 10,000 times bigger than the company's. If that was reduced by just 1%, "that would be like turning the state of California off for almost two months," Murdoch said.
To raise awareness, News Corp.'s TV stations are planning a campaign to give viewers ideas about what they can do to fight climate change; Fox plans to use Major League Baseball's All-Star Game in the summer to educate viewers; and the National Geographic Channel is launching Preserve Our Planet, an initiative to offer programming related to the issue, he said.
Among other company initiatives, the Fox lot in Los Angeles has started experimenting with solar-powered golf carts and found that by changing the bulbs in exit signs, the firm can cut emissions by 200 tons of carbon -- equivalent to 200 flights from New York to Los Angeles, he said.
The new Fox studios building, on which the company has broken ground, will be News Corp.'s first U.S. building certified as achieving excellence in environmental design, Murdoch added.
Also, the Fox hit "24" is committing to using biodiesel generators and employing renewable energy sources, according to the CEO. Plus, the Fox network is providing financial incentives to employees who buy hybrid cars and will allow advertisers to partner with it on efforts to engage audiences on climate change, Murdoch added.
:: Via The Independent
April Fool's Day was over a month ago.
Wow! I hope they are sincere. If so, this has potential to make an enormous amount of change. Fox's market is largely made up of the remaining skeptics and naysayers. If Fox can change their minds this will be a great advancement for society and the environment.
I wanna see Bill O'Reilly driving a Prius! Better yet, I wanna see him commuting by subway.
In Rupe's defense, Faux News Network ran a pretty good global warming documentary over a year ago. And he brought us Simpsons, Family Guy, X-Files, and the Bundys, all roundly excoriated by the Right.
It's all fine and well, so long as they don't get unwarranted credit for being a green-minded business. And by virtue of Murdoch's Fox News drones cheerleading the war and anything the far right does, they contradict these virtues. Having a bunch of executives drive hybrids while hyping a troop surge or invasion of Iran is anything but green. Fox News is oil porn.
Arguably it's a big positive that awareness on these issues will reach a whole new demographic of people, but it will be in the tradition mold of "soft-hitting" news, how those CFLs and carbon credits completely purify their lifestyles. No real change, I'll believe it IF and when I see it.
Wow. Do you know how long and how hard environmentalists have worked to bring about the day when the most absurdly right wing corporations vow to become "Green"? First Wal-Mart, then Home Depo, now FRIGGIN' NEWS CORP?! What is next? Electric Cars? (Ha ha, yeah right. These corp aren't that serious.)
Is it just me or does the newsman seem to have a "I can't believe the company I work for is up to such preposterous things" look on his face.
Part of the plan is to power News Corp with methane from all the BS Fox News creates!
Badump bump!
sorry that was too easy to resist.
Seriously though, if this can help lead to a change in those resistant to global warming and non-eco-friendly habits than it could be great. I think one of the positive signs is that Fox would reward employees for making environmentally concious decisions outside of work as well.
I wonder if they will put solar on the roof of the tower in NYC
I think it is absolutely disgusting that people would be skeptical about the change News Corp. can make. I have no doubt that News Corp. will be able to follow through with their plan; they do have to account to the public and their shareholders what they have done. The fact that Rupert Murdoch wants to do this will make a greater difference in the war against global warming than any critic will.
The other item Cavuto is reading about is the possible Fox aquisition of Dow Jones. Cavuto seems to be choking back tears because...
a) his global warming denial cocoon has been invaded
or
b) he's now going to have to work under the supervision of REAL business journalists
But where will my conservative grandfather get all his anti-global warming "science" news?
How many newspapers does Murdoch own? The number of trees cut dowm is immense. They can be using renweables and still decimating forests.This carbon trading carbon neutral biz makes it more difficult to tell what's going on. A load of coporations jumping on the band wagon is not necessarily a good sign. For earthday 1990 US car makers pretended to green ness,That's when they started the big push advertising SUV,They had'em pictured in beautiful natural places. I wish this report actually had some details about the impacts Murdochs holding currently have and how this carbon neutrality will be achieved.ANother thing that'smisleading is carbon neutrality doesn't decrease greenhouse gasses,it slows the growth of them. I want better reporting than this pollyannanish blurb,
Is this greenwashing by simply throwing money at a carbon-neutral fund? If that is the case, they may just pay the money until the public is aware and then cut it off.
With the amount of paper his businesses use on a daily basis I would be interested in what his plans are to make that aspect sustainable.
Solar panels would be a nice first step - to power all of their broadcasting. Lord knows they have the credit line.
I actually work on the 20th Century Fox lot and we had a HUGE Earth Day celebration that included the announcment of giving up to 4k to employees who purchase hybrid cars.
We also held a meeting at the divison I work in to suggest all of our ideas to help contribute about a month before earth day.
While I work in one of the more "indie" divisons on the lot, I'm still not always happy that the parent company of my parent company reports to Mr. Rupert, I have been pleasently shocked by these changes and annoucements.
To be fair, how many other major News Organizations have any other similar plans in place OR have announced plans such as this?
Off hand, I can't thank of any.