ESG Isn’t Dead. The Language Around It Is.
Over the past 18 months, something interesting has happened in corporate sustainability communication.
A lot of companies have stopped saying “ESG”.
Not necessarily because the work disappeared. In many cases, the opposite is true. Organisations are still investing heavily in emissions reduction, climate risk management, sustainable supply chains and transition planning. Investors are still asking questions about governance and resilience. Regulators are still tightening disclosure requirements.
Sustainability teams are still buried under spreadsheets.
But the language itself has changed.
Across finance, climate tech and corporate communications, companies are quietly reframing how they talk about sustainability:
“energy transition”
“resilience”
“risk”
“operational efficiency”
“future readiness”
“responsible growth”
The underlying priorities often remain similar.
The terminology doesn’t.
And that shift says a lot about where sustainability communication is heading next.
Because increasingly, “ESG” has become less of a business framework and more of a communications problem.
ESG was never designed to become a cultural battleground
In theory, it was fairly practical:
environmental risk
labour practices
governance structures
climate exposure
supply chain ethics
Reasonable stuff.
Nobody in the early 2000s was sitting around saying:
“One day this acronym will trigger congressional hearings and LinkedIn arguments with the energy of a family group chat during election season.”
And yet here we are.
Over time, ESG became:
politicised
oversimplified
commercially overused
inconsistently interpreted
heavily debated across media and politics
For some audiences, ESG signals responsible corporate behaviour.
For others, it signals corporate virtue signalling.
For others, it simply sounds like another vague executive acronym floating around investor presentations next to words like “synergy” and “transformation”.
That creates a major challenge for communicators.
Because once terminology becomes emotionally or politically loaded, the language itself starts distracting from the actual work.
And increasingly, organisations appear to be deciding:
it’s easier to change the framing than defend the acronym.
The backlash against ESG is real — but uneven
The political backlash against ESG has been particularly visible in the United States.
According to research from The Conference Board, anti-ESG shareholder proposals and political campaigns increased sharply between 2022 and 2024, particularly around climate investing and diversity initiatives.
Meanwhile, Morningstar reported that sustainable investment funds in the US experienced significant outflows through parts of 2023 and 2024 as political scrutiny intensified and investor sentiment shifted.
But globally, the picture is more nuanced.
In Europe, sustainability disclosure regulation continues expanding through frameworks like:
the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD)
the Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR)
the EU Taxonomy
In Australia, climate disclosure requirements are also becoming more formalised, with mandatory climate-related financial disclosures moving closer to implementation.
In other words:
the work around sustainability risk, transition planning and climate disclosure is not disappearing.
If anything, expectations are increasing.
What’s changing is the language strategy around it.
The quiet shift from “purpose” to “proof”
A few years ago, sustainability communication leaned heavily on aspiration.
Brands talked constantly about:
purpose
vision
commitments
impact
changing the world
building a better future
There was a strong sense that optimism itself functioned as strategy.
Now the tone is noticeably different.
Across annual reports, climate disclosures and investor communications, companies are placing greater emphasis on:
measurable outcomes
operational detail
transition risk
resilience
energy security
adaptation planning
near-term targets
supply chain exposure
In other words:
corporate sustainability communication is becoming less idealistic and more pragmatic.
That shift is partly political.
Partly economic.
And partly driven by audience fatigue.
Because after years of broad sustainability promises, stakeholders increasingly want evidence over ambition.
Public trust increasingly depends on competence and tangible action rather than broad institutional messaging alone.
That dynamic is especially visible in climate communication.
Audiences are becoming less impressed by generic ambition statements and more interested in:
what’s measurable
what’s verified
what’s operationally real
The era of:
“We are committed to building a sustainable future”
…is giving way to:
“Here’s what changed, what didn’t, and what still needs work.”
Honestly, it’s probably healthier.
Sustainability communication is sounding increasingly defensive
Another noticeable trend:
many ESG and sustainability reports now read like they were co-written by communications teams and legal departments trapped in a room with elevated cortisol levels and a stack of regulatory guidance documents.
That caution is understandable.
Regulatory scrutiny around sustainability claims is increasing rapidly.
The European Commission has proposed stronger rules targeting misleading environmental claims through the Green Claims Directive.
Meanwhile, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has intensified focus on greenwashing enforcement, taking legal action against several companies over sustainability-related representations.
And globally, companies are facing growing pressure around:
climate disclosure accuracy
offset claims
supply chain transparency
emissions reporting
transition plan credibility
The reputational risks are significant.
Nobody wants to become tomorrow’s headline about misleading climate communication.
But there’s also a downside to hyper-managed messaging.
Over-optimised language often becomes unreadable.
The more communication gets engineered for risk avoidance, the less effective it becomes at building trust, engagement or emotional resonance.
And ironically, overly cautious sustainability communication can sometimes create more scepticism, not less.
Because audiences are very good at recognising language that sounds excessively polished, vague or evasive.
Especially now.
Audiences are becoming much more climate-literate
One of the biggest changes happening right now is audience sophistication.
Five years ago, many sustainability claims passed with minimal scrutiny because the average reader had limited familiarity with:
offsets
emissions accounting
Scope 3 reporting
net zero pathways
transition finance
climate disclosure standards
That’s changing quickly.
People increasingly understand:
the difference between targets and actual emissions reductions
the limitations of offsets
the gap between ambition and execution
the complexity of decarbonisation pathways
the role of supply chain emissions
the difference between “carbon neutral” and “net zero”
This is partly due to increased media coverage, partly due to regulation, and partly because climate conversation itself has become more mainstream.
The result is that simplistic sustainability storytelling is becoming less effective.
Generic climate language that may have sounded impressive in 2019 now often feels hollow or performative.
Which is forcing organisations to communicate with:
greater precision
more operational detail
clearer evidence
stronger data
more transparency about limitations and trade-offs
Put differently:
the audience has evolved faster than a lot of corporate messaging has.
The companies cutting through don’t necessarily sound more optimistic
They sound more real.
That’s the interesting shift happening now.
The organisations gaining credibility in sustainability communication are often the ones willing to:
acknowledge complexity
admit challenges
avoid inflated claims
communicate uncertainty honestly
speak with specificity rather than abstraction
And importantly, they sound more human.
Less:
“leveraging innovative ESG-aligned sustainability pathways to unlock stakeholder value”
More:
“Here’s the problem, here’s what we’re doing, here’s where progress is difficult.”
That tone performs better because it feels operationally grounded.
It feels believable.
And in a sceptical communications environment, believability matters more than polish.
So what replaces ESG language?
Probably not a single replacement term.
Instead, we’re likely moving into a more fragmented sustainability communications landscape where messaging becomes increasingly audience-specific.
For example:
investors hear about transition risk and resilience
policymakers hear about economic security and adaptation
customers hear about product impact and transparency
enterprise buyers hear about supply chain exposure
employees hear about culture and purpose
boards hear about material risk and governance
The sustainability work remains.
The framing evolves.
This shift is already happening across major industries.
Oil and gas companies increasingly talk about “energy security” and “transition”.
Technology companies focus on “resilience” and “efficiency”.
Financial institutions emphasise “risk management”.
Infrastructure firms talk about “future readiness”.
Same broad themes.
Different vocabulary.
Because organisations are learning that language itself shapes audience perception.
And increasingly, the acronym “ESG” introduces friction that many communicators would rather avoid altogether.
There’s also a broader trust issue underneath all of this
Part of the reason ESG language is losing effectiveness is because audiences are becoming more sceptical of corporate language generally.
People have spent years being exposed to:
vague mission statements
inflated sustainability claims
branding-heavy purpose campaigns
endless “journey” metaphors
stock photos of wind turbines and smiling children standing in suspiciously green fields
At some point, audiences started wanting less performance and more substance.
That doesn’t mean storytelling is dead.
It means storytelling now needs operational credibility underneath it.
Because audiences increasingly reward communication that feels:
informed
transparent
evidence-based
realistic
specific
Not just aspirational.
And frankly, that’s probably a good thing for the sustainability sector long term.
Final thought
ESG isn’t disappearing.
The sustainability challenges facing businesses are very real:
climate risk
disclosure pressure
supply chain instability
investor scrutiny
transition planning
regulatory complexity
None of that is going away.
But the era of broad, vague sustainability language probably is.
The next phase of climate communication will belong to organisations that can explain complex transition work clearly, without hiding behind jargon, abstraction or corporate wallpaper language.
Because in a more sceptical communications environment, clarity is starting to outperform polish.
And increasingly, the companies building trust aren’t necessarily the ones making the loudest sustainability claims.
They’re the ones sounding the most believable.