Some ‘Green’ P.R. Is Called Smoke Screen : Environment: Many companies that trumpet their ecological records still pollute, a research group says.

A two-year study of the environmental records of 35 corporations shows that many are using “green” public relations campaigns to cover up business as usual in the dumping of wastes and fouling of the environment, a research group said Tuesday.

Dow Chemical Co., for example, received favorable publicity for a $3-million wetlands protection program. Yet downstream from its factories, birds were turning up with dioxin-related deformities, said the Council on Economic Priorities, a nonprofit research organization in New York.

“As environmental issues become a greater public concern, corporations realize that green marketing is a good corporate strategy,” said Alice Tepper Marlin, the council’s director.

“But for such a strategy to really work, companies must implement sound environmental practices in all aspects of their operations.”

Cindy Newman, manager of environmental communications for Dow, said of the council’s charges, “I guess my only reaction is we’re working to continue to improve our environmental performance, and we hope people will judge us on all that we do.”

She said one concern with the report is that it sketches complex issues but omits many sides of them.

“The bird study is a case in point,” she said. “There are volumes that could have been written about that bird study.”

The council’s report, the beginning of an effort to compile environmental information on 500 American corporations by 1996, also found that some companies had dramatically improved their environmental records, Marlin said.

H. J. Heinz was commended for its pledge to buy tuna only from suppliers that avoid trapping dolphins. It was also cited for promising to use recyclable containers for its products, Marlin said.

Kellogg was another company that received good marks. Its release of toxic wastes was far below the industry average, she said. “They’ve been cooperative, and good in disclosure, for years,” Marlin said.

Mobil, on the other hand, is a good example of a company covering up environmental sins with a green smoke screen, she said.

The company, she said, argued in 1988 that so-called biodegradable plastic bags would not disintegrate in landfills and that their use should not be encouraged, Marlin said.

“Then they went ahead and introduced biodegradable plastics with an enormous advertising campaign,” she said.

Mobil spokesman John Lord took issue with Marlin’s characterization of the incident. “I don’t think it’s fair because we were very public in our objection to degradability claims, and we made a claim that was accurate on our own packaging,” he said.