As climate change accelerates, cities across the globe are no longer waiting for national governments to lead. Instead, they are rapidly experimenting with bold, sometimes controversial policies aimed at reshaping how people live, travel, and consume. The latest and most striking example comes from Amsterdam, which has become the first capital city in the world to ban public advertising for both meat and fossil fuel products.
From Burgers to Billboards
Effective May 1, the Dutch capital removed advertisements for high-carbon goods, including burgers, chicken nuggets, SUVs, low-budget holidays, petrol cars, flights and gas heating from billboards, metro stations and bus shelters.
Billboards are now focused on highlighting city museums like the Rijksmuseum, the national museum of the Netherlands, or a piano concert. The policy is designed to curb consumption patterns that contribute heavily to greenhouse gas emissions while promoting plant-based diets and sustainable mobility.
Communities on the frontline of the climate crisis, particularly those in Africa, Asia and Latin America, are already facing the devastating consequences of droughts, floods, cyclones and rising sea levels, which have now reached Europe.
The latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report stated that corporations have attempted to derail climate mitigation by targeted lobbying, doubt-inducing media strategies and through corporate advertising and brand building to deflect corporate responsibility to individuals. This climate science report also recommends regulating corporate advertising.
According to the US Climate Accountability Institute, companies like Total Energies and Royal Dutch Shell, who are among the top 20 most polluting fossil fuel companies in the world, continue to promote their dangerous businesses via advertisements and sponsorships.
However, city officials argue that advertising plays a powerful role in shaping public behaviour. By eliminating promotions for carbon-intensive products, Amsterdam aims to align everyday visual culture with its broader climate goals, including achieving carbon neutrality by 2050.
Amsterdam’s move is not happening in isolation. Around the world, cities are increasingly regulating advertising as part of their climate strategies, treating fossil fuel promotion in similar vein to tobacco advertising.
In 2024, lawmakers in The Hague in the Netherlands passed what is widely considered the world’s first legally binding ban on fossil fuel-related advertisements, covering everything from petrol and diesel vehicles to aviation and cruise travel.
Elsewhere, cities such as Stockholm, Edinburgh, and Florence have introduced local restrictions targeting high-carbon advertising, particularly in public transport systems and municipal spaces. These measures, while varying in scope, reflect a shared recognition: influencing consumer behaviour is essential to meeting climate targets.
At the national level, France has implemented a nationwide ban on fossil fuel advertising, signalling that city-level experiments can scale up into broader policy frameworks.
While ad bans are one way to curb the climate crisis, larger transformations in cities worldwide include redesigning infrastructure, transport, and food systems to adapt to a warming planet.
In many European cities, car-free zones are expanding rapidly. Paris, for example, has been converting major roads into pedestrian-friendly corridors, while also investing heavily in cycling infrastructure. Similarly, Copenhagen continues to push toward its goal of becoming the world’s first carbon-neutral capital, with bikes already outnumbering cars. Data from the government suggest approximately 62-64% of residents now commute to work or school by bicycle, with over 675,000 bicycles compared to roughly 120,000 cars in the city.
Urban Experiment
Urban climate policies often move faster than national ones because cities are closer to citizens and can experiment more freely. However, they also face constraints, including legal challenges, economic trade-offs, and political opposition.
Amsterdam’s advertising ban, for instance, has drawn criticism from some industry groups who argue it restricts commercial freedom and could hurt businesses. Supporters counter that similar arguments were once made against tobacco advertising bans, which are now widely accepted as public health necessities. Environmental advocates see these policies as part of a broader shift in how societies think about climate responsibility. Rather than placing the burden solely on individuals, cities are beginning to reshape the environments in which choices are made.
What connects these diverse efforts-from advertising bans to infrastructure redesign — is a growing understanding that climate change is not just an environmental issue but a systemic one. Thus, by targeting everyday behaviour, how people eat, travel, and consume, urban policies can have an outsized impact.