EARTH CREDIT CARD FROM GE

This is a textbook example of corporate power being leveraged in the name of a good and trendy cause. What profits more, the environment or the corporation? Or is it the credit card shopper, who pays the corporation for late fees but feels better by applying the credits earned to a noble purpose? Interesting moral conundrum that everybody thinks they know the true answer to. But it is inevitably troubling when a purportedly good cause comes to public attention through self-serving corporate marketing.

GE ‘Earth’ card aims to cut greenhouse gas emissions
Rachel Layne (w/Joseph DiStefano), July 25, 2007 (Bloomberg News via Chicago Tribune)

WHO
General Electric Co. (GE), Lorraine Bolsinger, vp, GE ecomagination

WHAT
Reward points earned from the use of GE’s new Earth Rewards Platinum MasterCard can be applied to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions offsets.
Ecomagination: A big business and a good cause. (click to enlarge)

WHEN
AES/GE joint venture announced May 24. Goal: Reduce emissions by 10 million metric tons by 2010.

WHERE
GE is the 2nd biggest company in the world or, in effect, this solar system. It is based in Fairfield, Conn.

WHY
- Carsdholders can choose 1% rewards to the program or 0.5% to the program and 0.5% cash.
- Conveniently, GE Energy Finance (in conjunction with AES Corp., one of the US’s biggest electricity producers) has renewable energy projects to which the credit card rewards will be applied each Earth Day. GE’s renewables projects generated $12 billion last year. Examples of GE projects: wind turbines, methane-collection systems.
Also conveniently, the GE renewables projects can sell credits generated by the “rewards”-financed programs.
- Most conveniently, the many GE and AES energy projects that generate tons and tons of GHG emissions, from coal-fired power plants to jet airplanes, can buy the credits to justify production.
- To their credit, GE is the biggest US wind turbine manufacturer and is active in solar energy as well as “better-than-coal-or-nuclear” natural gas and methane plants.
- According to a GE spokesperson, the concept was originated by AES.
- Bank of America Corp. and Citigroup Inc. have similar programs.
An environmental cause, an advertising campaign, a business model. (click to enlarge)

QUOTES
Bolsinger: “Consumers want this…We have this wonderful, very unique situation where we can create verifiable, credible offsets, and GE Money in the upfront piece can deliver."