Tribune. While COP26 is being held from 1er On November 12 in Glasgow (Scotland), the way in which companies report to their external partners – and to society as a whole – for their actions in the face of the climate emergency must urgently be debated. Does accounting, and specifically the financial statements as they are presented today, allow economic activities to be compared with climate change?
International accounting standards (IFRS) do not explicitly mention the issue. But the international body responsible for developing these standards (the IASB) considers that any company applying them is supposed to mention climate risks, since these can have an impact on its results, its cash flows, or the value of its assets, and therefore on the expected returns.
Beyond carrying out carbon assessments providing information on their greenhouse gas emissions, companies are therefore supposed to integrate the effects of the acceleration of climate change into their accounts, in order to properly inform investors. However, like institutional investors for the climate, who bring together more than a hundred investment funds mobilized on the issue, it is clear that too few companies are fulfilling this duty.
For the emergence of “green” innovations
For the situation to evolve, for companies’ accounts to reflect the way they manage climate risks and comply with the zero carbon objective of the 2015 Paris Agreement, it is now essential to make IFRS standards more more explicit on how these risks should be integrated into the accounts.
Thus, a building, considered in the accounts as a fixed asset, should be indicated as having a shortened “useful life” if it consumes a lot of energy, because environmental regulations will soon prevent it from being used as is. . Likewise, an asset must see its value depreciated with the foreseeable evolution of the markets and the occurrence of “green” innovations.
In 2020, Total, for example, recorded exceptional depreciations for $ 8 billion, considering that beyond 2030, technological developments should reduce demand for oil and affect the value of its reserves. Such accounting operations are not sufficiently systematic today, despite the work of the auditors and statutory auditors, responsible for evaluating the fairness of the financial statements.
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