In a press conference and subsequent ceremony held in the framework of the activities parallel to the UN Climate Change COP in Paris, France, Chevron, EDF and BNP-Paribas were announced as the winners of the Pinocchio Awards 2015, each for its own category “Lobbying”, “Greenwashing” and “Local Impacts” respectively).

Hundreds of people participated in the “awards ceremony”. This edition, that particularly focused on climate due to the COP in Paris, was organized by Friends of the Earth France, Friends of the Earth Europe, Corporate Europe Observatory, CRID and Peuples Solidaires – ActionAid France.

BNP-Paribas, one of the sponsors of the COP 21, was denounced for its financial support to the coal sector around the world, mainly coal plants in South Africa and India. Precisely on Thursday morning, when the awardees were not known yet, the French company saw how approximately 300 people, among them members of Friends of the Earth France and Attac France, gathered outside its headquarters in Paris to demonstrate against them.

EDF, another UN COP sponsor, was “recognized” for its advertising campaign that attempts to mask nuclear energy as “clean energy” and for its investments in fossil fuel-based power (it owns 16 coal plants in the world, some of the most polluting of Europe among them).

Meanwhile, Chevron was denounced due to its aggressive and pro fracking lobby in Argentina. The US company is a key partner of the Argentinian government and of state company YPF in their efforts to exploit non conventional gas and oil sources in Patagonia, Argentina, at any cost.

The organizers of the Pinocchio Awards announced that after a month of voting at www.prix-pinocchio.org, about 43,000 votes were received. Real World Radio was present at the press conference and ceremony and interviewed Juliette Renaud, in charge of the campaign on Social and Environmental Corporate Responsibility of Friends of the Earth France.