We saw that Al Gore recently made the trip to the Cannes Advertising Festival where the industry annually fetes itself with accolades for its creativity. It’s great to see the ad industry becoming more aware of, and seemingly concerned about, some of the challenging environmental and social issues that we face today in increasing numbers.

It might seem odd that Gore would not only speak at the event, but would receive the rock star status that the ad folks gave him. The irony is not lost here that the man who we hold so high for his gutsy campaigning against global climate change from greenhouse gases, is celebrated by the very people (ourselves included) who it could be argued are quite complicit in driving the climate change train. This business is all about getting people to consume more, right? Not to mention the fact that by driving the desire for consumption, we are also therefore driving the production, transport, and sale of goods and services. That is a telling carbon footprint story.

Hamish McLennan, the chief executive of the large ad agency Young & Rubicam that arranged for Gore’s visit to Cannes said, “We have to change the way people consume and get people to think about it,….from a Y&R perspective, we wanted to take a leadership role on this.” This is great to hear, and we are hopeful that such a large ad player is seemingly concerned about its responsibilities towards climate change. With clients like Virgin and Land Rover, there seems to be the opportunity for some healthy conversations. Perhaps Y&R’s trademarked Energy Brand Process and proprietary BrandAsset Valuator will actually take into consideration the energy use of a brand instead of just its energy to drive consumption.

Credit should be duly assigned to Y&R for helping Al Gore develop the “S.O.S.,” or “Save Our Selves” campaign for environmental awareness. Now let’s talk about how exactly we’re going to achieve that as an industry.