The climate crisis is being misreported — and there is no legal way to stop it (yet)

Credit: Photo by Gabriel McCallin on Unsplash

If a journalist writes an inaccurate news story that damages the reputation of an individual, one of their options is to take up a complaint with a press regulator for a suitable remedy. But what happens when a journalist writes an inaccurate story about something more abstract, but no less important, say, climate change?

A new research paper published today (22 April 2025) makes an unusual case. Climate News & Independent Regulation, by UK press regulator IMPRESS and the University of Glasgow, calls for regulatory reforms that would allow individuals and organisations to lodge complaints against publishers for climate mis- and disinformation, similar to how defamation and libel complaints are handled.

To put it another way: the environment itself is "defenceless" in the face of mis- and disinformation: "This gap in the law means that erroneous information on climate change can circulate without the checks that protect other media subjects."

Report authors Hamish Gibson, Tom Goulding (both IMPRESS) and Dr Dominic Hinde (lecturer of sociology, University of Glasgow), argue this hinders public understanding at a time when accurate climate information is increasingly vital for decision-making, and this "erroneous information" is quite likely to arise in the current media context.

There are two potential originators of climate mis- and disinformation: budget-conscious newsrooms tasking non-specialist journalists to quickly produce climate stories (or stories with climate-related aspects), and the emergence of "deliberate climate disinformation promoted by certain organisations in the UK media" often to protect economic or political interests.

The press regulator shared two key case studies:

• A public complaint from The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), a 2020 DeSmog UK article discussing think tanks influencing post-Brexit trade policy. IMPRESS ultimately dismissed the complaint, ruling that DeSmog had taken reasonable steps to ensure accuracy, made prompt corrections, and was not obligated to engage further.
• A complaint against a publisher anonymously referred to as "Green World" regarding a 2024 article about Azerbaijan's "green" reconstruction of territories captured from Armenia. IMPRESS found no breach of accuracy standards, determining that the publisher had provided sufficient support for their version of events.

So what?

This illustrates a potential mechanism to resolve climate reporting disputes for the public good, in the context of journalism's impact on economic and geopolitical issues. But there is another throughline: regulation could benefit the public because, as things stand, one in five Britons (18.4 per cent) access climate news from independently regulated sources.

The report emphasises that this is not a one-size-fits-all solution, nor does robust regulation necessarily mean censorship or limiting freedom of expression.

"We are proposing the beginning of a framework for policymakers, media stakeholders, and the public to consider as we work towards a media environment where audiences can access reliable, constructive, and well-regulated information on the climate crisis," writes Dr Hinde in the report.

IMPRESS plans to launch an ethical content training program to accredit journalists to accountable industry standards and invites climate-related news publishers to join as regulated members.

We used a generative AI tool ClaudeAI to assist with summarising parts of the research before it was edited by a human.

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