"Green"-themed issues crowded newsstands in 2007.

Analysts and pundits are fond of discussing the potential for a “cleantech bubble,” but in 2008 it may be more relevant to look at the green-media bubble. Most say the year of the green-media boom was 2007. Media buyers were given “greenvertising” budgets [see “Green Media 2.0,” SI, August 2007] and everything from one-person blogs to large media conglomerates wanted in on the action. In addition to the ever-growing list of magazines that published green issues, broadcast media jumped into the game, as NBC added a “green” focus to some of its key prime-time programming during sweeps week in November.

Mainstream print, broadcast and Internet media companies also began buying up independent green-media outlets, forming environmental coverage teams and syndicating content from trusted sources.

With the market crowded to capacity and mainstream media more than ever interested in “green” topics, 2008 will see increasing consolidation of the green-media space and an inevitable thinning of the pack as those that lack credibility, visibility or focus face increasingly sophisticated competition.

“Some of the coverage that’s going on today is going to go away: You just can’t sustain this level of coverage,” says Jon Coifman, Media Director for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), although he maintains there will continue to be a mainstream appetite for environmental coverage.

Coifman describes the current media landscape in “chicken or egg” terms—it’s hard to tell whether the mainstreaming of green media or mainstream interest in all things green came first. Regardless, Coifman says he has seen environmental coverage adopt a lifestyle slant in mainstream media, with women’s magazines, lifestyle magazines and more business magazines focusing on such issues.

Coifman attributes the change in how environmental issues are covered to a shift in public thinking. “We’ve stopped talking about the environment as something that you go visit. It’s your backyard, dinner plate, kitchen sink, office, daily commute. The dichotomy has been broken down, partially by environmental groups and partially by the mainstream media,” he says.