In 2022, France became the first European country to restrict fossil fuel ads nationwide, prohibiting ads for petrol products, coal mining energy, and hydrogen-containing carbons like fuels and plastics.
Several cities in the UK and Italy have similar bans, from Florence's ban on ads for flights, cruises, fossil energy contracts, and cars, to Portsmouth, where ads for fossil fuels, single-use plastics, and junk food are banned.
Spain may be next, as the government recently voted in favour of a draft bill against advertising of fossil fuels, short flights, and fossil fuel-powered vehicles.
Banning advertisements of certain products has direct consequences for the products normalised in public space and promoted to you as a consumer.
Take gambling: a 2023 study on the impact of ads on gambling-related harm shows that “greater advertising exposure increases participation which leads to a greater risk of harm”.
Advertising “is not a neutral announcement that a certain product exists,” according to Reint-Jan Renes, lecturer in sustainable behavioural psychology at the Hogeschool van Amsterdam. “Ads continually communicate to us what is seen as normal, preferable, and a given.”
Consumer habits and lifestyle adjustments could deliver a 40-70% reduction in global emissions by 2050, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Research on the ban in the Netherlands concluded that “fossil advertising normalises and promotes unsustainable behaviour and discourages sustainable behaviour, actively undermining current climate policy,” and that the public space and money used on it could be used for sustainable alternatives instead.
A 2025 paper in Nature Climate Changeargues that bans could challenge current fossil-heavy consumption and set an example for other legislators. The authors also found that only 25% of survey respondents in 13 EU countries were opposed to a fossil fuel advertising ban.
Most bans are relatively new, so their effects will need to be studied in the years to come. But there's reason to believe they could truly help decrease fossil fuel consumption.