Green Illusions and the Carbon Neutrality Paradox

The notion of sustainability has reached the forefront of global climate conversations but has also become more contested in meaning and practice. This paper interrogates how sustainability has been framed into a narrow construct of carbon neutrality, deterring considerations about broader ecological and social consequences. It will use a review of international frameworks, corporate commitments, and specific examples to illustrate the ways in which sustainability often operates as a rhetorical and branding device disconnected from a genuine concern for planetary health. The analysis employed policy papers, corporate announcements, independent watchdog and scholarly outputs as sources and was triangulated on analytical case study practices. Three case studies were selected as illustrative examples as each reflected patterns of interest. Carbon offsetting is heralded as a solution to the climate crisis; in practice carbon offset projects often validate land dispossession and alienation, harm ecosystems, and exacerbate pollution through mitigation claims of neutrality. The Indian Railways' introduction of kulhad cups shown as an example of the process of "symbolic" policy wherein environmental costs are displaced as new costs emerge where the value of ecological virtue is claimed. The 'traceability' of the commodity chains of cobalt and lithium demonstrates the deliberate obfuscation of brands taking little, if any responsibility for the human and environmental costs of the so–called green transition.The evidence implies that sustainability is now less a universal ecological principle and more a curated agenda for political legitimacy and corporate profit. Greenwashing, reliance on offsets, ignorance of Scope 3 emissions, and reliance on interventions that are yet to be proven as technically feasible, are a few standard tactics that disguise the ecological damage. Unless sustainability is reclaimed as a holistic framework that accounts for the ecological, social, and ethical, we have the potential to duplicate unsuccessful, false solutions while entrenching systemic inequity.