Clorox Australia Pty Ltd. is being ordered to pay a multimillion-dollar fine in Australia for making "false or misleading" claims regarding a line trash bags that claimed to include ocean plastics.
Federal Court in Australia order the A$8.2 million (US$5.2) penalty after Clorox Australia admitted the company broke the Australian Consumer Law, the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission said.
Clorox Australia admitted that from 2021 to 2023 the company's Glad to Be Green bags claimed to contain at least 50 percent recycled plastic recovered from the ocean or sea when that was not the case, the commission said.
The products actually contained about 50 percent recycled plastic that was collected in Indonesia from locations up to 50 kilometers, or about 30 miles, from a shoreline.
The definition of ocean plastics, the term originally used, and ocean-bound plastics, a newer term, has been refined over the years. It is widely accepted in the plastics recycling sector to call littered plastics collected on land but within 50 kilometers of shoreline can be considered ocean-bound plastics. The belief is that these plastics, without collection, would eventually end up in water. This ocean-bound definition aims to create a separate definition from plastics actually recovered from waterways.
"We consider this penalty is appropriate in this case where Clorox gave insufficient consideration to what 'ocean plastic' meant to an ordinary consumer, particularly in light of the blue color and wave imaging on the packaging," Commission Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb said in a statement.
"This is also a significant matter because consumers have limited or no ability to independently verify the accuracy of the claims made on packaging and it also disadvantages competitors who are accurately communicating their environmental credentials," she said.
Clorox Australia, a subsidiary of Clorox Co. of Oakland, Calif., cooperated with the investigation and legal proceeds. The company discontinued the product in July 2023 when it learned the commission started an investigation, the agency said.
The court also ordered Clorox Australia establish an Australian Consumer Law compliance program, publish a notice on the company's website and pay the commission's legal fees.
Clorox Australia did change wording on packaging before discontinuing the line to include "Ocean Bound Plastic" instead of "Ocean Plastic," but the commission said "the changes were insufficient to dispel the false or misleading ocean plastic representation."