It's been a couple of years, but Alicia thank you so much for writing this. It's an expose worthy of a large publication. I concluded a while ago that they were illegitimate, with the help of some other articles, but nothing as comprehensive and as well-researched as this. I've actually shown this to my teen boys in a coaching moment to help them assess reality from a well-polished marketing pitch.

I find too that we as a culture are almost eager to blindly latch on to an effort that salves our guilt over a misdeed we know we contribute to, such as plastics in the ocean, without troubling ourselves to look closely as to whether it is actually fixing the problem. This is a perfect example of such feel-good emptiness.

Last, you are generous (and technically accurate yes) to acknowledge that your doubts cannot "be proven with certainty". But in my decades of experience in big business that uncertainty and wiggle room is exactly where unethical business practices from corporations live, and you can bet these millions are being pocketed by unscrupulous folks all along this process. As you said, a company making these bold claims is on the hook to show more than vague ad slicks.

Thank you again, many claps.