The climate challenge is urgent, complex and systemic. We believe that creative communications has a powerful and constructive role to play, by driving awareness and discussion of practical, proven, growth-oriented policies.

About us.

Putting a price on pollution is essential to enable the systemic changes needed to meet global climate goals. But carbon pricing needs significantly more global public awareness and understanding to break through.  

The Carbon Costs Coalition is a global communications initiative aimed at making effective carbon pricing part of the mainstream agenda, implemented by an international alliance of world-class communications agencies, using our unique skills in support of this highly consequential cause.

We will work with public and private sector organisations to bring the benefits of carbon pricing into the mainstream public domain so that the pros and cons can be debated, and ultimately create more demand for effective policymaking.

Why put a price on pollution?

Economists have long pointed out obvious market failures where prices fail to reflect real-world costs. Pollution is the textbook example. Carbon pricing ensures the external costs of greenhouse gas emissions are reflected in the prices that businesses and consumers pay for carbon-intensive goods and services.

By pricing in the real costs of greenhouse gas pollution into the costs that everyone pays, carbon pricing unlocks the power of economic forces and market-driven decision making in addressing climate change.

  • Carbon pricing influences consumer demand at scale by giving people clear price incentives to choose cleaner products and services

  • It similarly rewards businesses for their net-zero transitions: less carbon means lower costs and increased competitiveness

  • And it accelerates technological climate solutions by providing greater and faster returns on investment of capital

Putting a price on pollution is not the only solution to climate change, but it is the one thing that accelerates all others by mobilising consumer behaviour, corporate action and capital investment.

Crucially, when coupled with per-capita dividend payments, carbon pricing makes a majority of households better off, with only the richest 20% or so of households (those most able to afford it) slightly worse off.

Peer-reviewed research analysing more than 1,500 real-world climate policies, conducted by the University of Oxford, the Potsdam Institute and Victoria University for the OECD, concluded in 2024 that in developed economies, carbon pricing stands out as an effective policy. There’s broad corporate support for carbon pricing too, across market sectors spanning consumer products, financial services, technology, automotive and health, among others.

“The one solution that accelerates all others”

The need for creative communications

While about a quarter of the world’s carbon emissions are currently subject to some form of carbon price, the World Bank estimates that only 1% of these emissions are priced at or above recommended levels. Prices need to rise, and that takes mainstream public support.

But getting carbon pricing talked about is hard. It sounds complicated and expensive. Because of that it is far too easy for opponents to cast doubts over its effectiveness, despite substantial evidence to the contrary. Never has a good idea been so much in need of professional marketing communications help.

For once, one thing the world needs most depends on what we do best.

Why get involved?

The world’s marketing services industry is increasingly seen as being complicit in the climate crisis. Activists inside and outside the agency world are asking tough questions about working with fossil fuel companies, greenwashing clients’ commercial interests and driving untrammelled consumption of carbon-intensive products and services.

We have an opportunity to regain the narrative by demonstrating that creative communications has a powerful and constructive role to play. And to give our people the chance to do what they do best: truly substantial, game-changing and award-winning work. In in the process, use our unique skills to make a substantial contribution in the fight against climate change.