Exxon Takes Offensive Against Critics, Files Defamation Suit Over Recycling Claims

Exxon Mobil Corp. began 2025 with a counteroffensive against its climate critics, filing a defamation lawsuit Jan. 6 against California and several environmental nonprofits. 

The company accuses state Attorney General Rob Bonta and environmental groups, including the Sierra Club, of making false statements regarding the company’s plastics recycling efforts, according to a U.S. District Court filing. 

Exxon Mobil claims Bonta and the other named organizations engaged in “reverse greenwashing” by mischaracterizing the company’s advanced recycling technology as a “sham” in public statements. The parties made the statements following a lawsuit they filed against the company in September, claiming Exxon Mobil had engaged in a “decades-long deception campaign” over the sustainability of its plastics-recycling efforts. 

The Technology in Question

Exxon calls its advanced recycling technology Exxtend. The company processes the plastic waste at its Baytown, Texas, manufacturing complex, which has the capacity to recycle 40,000 metric tons of plastic waste per year. 

Unlike traditional mechanical recycling that melts down plastics to form new products, Exxon breaks down plastic waste to its molecular level. This pyrolysis process is advantageous because the company can convert the plastics into raw materials that can be used for a wider range of applications, including new plastics or other products. The company co-processes the plastics waste alongside conventional fossil-fuel feedstocks. 

While the resulting molecules from recycled plastic cannot be distinguished from those derived from crude oil, the company tracks the recycled content using a third-party mass balance approach.

Why California and Others are Suing

Bonta filed suit Sept. 23 in San Francisco County Superior Court alleging that Exxon promoted recycling as a “cure-all for plastic waste” even though the company knew pollution would continue harming California’s natural resources. Sierra Club, Surfrider Foundation, Heal the Bay and Baykeeper filed a separate lawsuit against Exxon on the same day.

Bonta further alleges that Exxon has engaged in decades of misleading recycling claims, starting with a 1989 Time magazine advertorial that promoted recycling as a solution for plastic waste. The lawsuit claims the company helped popularize the familiar chasing arrows recycling symbol through its trade association, leading consumers to believe products marked with the symbol would be recycled — despite U.S. plastic recycling rates never exceeding 9%.

Bonta also says the company’s Exxtend program does little to recycle plastics because much of the finished product contains “minimal recycled content while being marketed as “circular.” Using the company’s best-case projections, these recycled products would represent less than 1% of their total plastic production capacity, according to Bonta.

Why Exxon is Suing

Exxon’s defamation lawsuit claims Bonta, the Sierra Club and “a collection of erstwhile recycling enthusiasts” are unjustly attacking the company with false allegations. In a CNBC interview, Exxon CEO Darren Woods said Bonta doesn’t understand the technology and that he’s lying about its efficacy. 

“We’ve seen this growing trend where activists and ideologues, particularly in the climate space and some politicians, particularly state attorney generals, are hijacking and abusing legitimate processes to advance their own agendas,” Woods said in the “Squawk Box” interview. 

Exxon claims the company has lost business deals due to the lawsuits filed by the state of California and the environmental groups. 

“The advantage of this project and this technology is that it’s not subsidized by the government; there’s a demand out there for recycled plastic,” Woods told “Squawk Box” anchor Becky Quick. “We have contracts with 15 countries around the world to provide this. The attorney general is suggesting that what we’re doing isn’t real, that it’s a myth, that it’s a lie. Obviously, consumer companies that are looking to promote recycled content are concerned with those types of accusations, so we have to push back against what are essentially falsehoods.”

Future Legal Impact, Fallout

Exxon's defamation lawsuit against Bonta and the environmental groups is a significant legal development, suggested Braden Perry, a partner with Kennyhertz Perry LLC in Mission Woods, Kansas. Perry, a litigation and enforcement attorney, specializes in new and emerging regulatory issues.

“Given the high-profile nature of the case and the complex interplay between corporate interests and environmental advocacy, legal experts will closely monitor its progression,” said Perry in an email. 

The outcome will depend on whether Exxon can prove defendants’ statements were false and made with actual malice, a standard required for defamation claims involving public figures, Perry noted. 

Companies like Exxon have a right to protect themselves against demonstrably false claims that harm their reputation and business prospects, said Eric Rose, a Los Angeles-based public relations executive who has testified as an expert witness in defamation cases. Environmental advocates often use strong language to advance their cause, but Exxon must prove the words Bonta and others used were false and misrepresented advanced recycling, he added. 

“Exxon Mobil claims that Bonta’s statements and the broader campaign by environmental groups directly caused prospective business deals to fall apart,” noted Rose. “This is critical in reputation management and legal defamation cases, as actual damage – financial or otherwise –must be shown. If Exxon can tie the statements and actions of the defendants to specific lost opportunities, they have a basis for alleging reputational and economic harm.”

The lawsuit filing itself serves a public relations purpose as well, said Rose. It allows the company to proactively address the accusations in a highly visible public forum, he added. 
 
“This is a classic strategy in reputation management — taking legal or public action to signal confidence in one’s practices and refute damaging claims,” Rose said. “By initiating this lawsuit, Exxon Mobil shifts attention from being a defendant in California’s lawsuit to a plaintiff in its own case. This reframing positions the company as a victim of defamation rather than solely an accused party, which can influence public perception.”