Greenwashing Index evaluates environmental claims

People attach a value to products billed organic, all-natural or Earth-friendly and are willing to pay a premium for that. Sometimes, however, companies exaggerate their environmental claims. Marketers and media scholars dub this practice "greenwashing."

The social marketing firm EnviroMedia, which has recently expanded from Texas to Portland, worked in conjunction with University of Oregon professors to create a Greenwashing Index, where people can evaluate real advertisements based on their environmental claims.

People score the ads based on five criteria: misleading words; misleading images; vague or unprovable claims; exaggerated representations of how green a company or product really is; and the omission of relevant information that would temper green claims. The higher the score, the more deceptive the ad, according to the index.