Iimagine traveling to an unknown destination, without a map or GPS, or a scientist without data to validate his experiments.
In both cases, the will is there but not the means to succeed: without reliable and relevant information, both the traveler and the scientist risk failing. Tautological? However, in the fight against climate change, this is the problem facing companies in establishing their “net zero” carbon emissions objectives. This must change.
Consider an imaginary company that would seek to significantly reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. It would own stakes in a car manufacturer, a clothing brand, a hospital chain and a food delivery application. , as well as in many other companies.
Its total emissions would include those of its own operations, such as office heating and cooling, but also the emissions of all the companies it owned and invested in, including those of their supply chains, and their impact on their customers and citizens.
However, currently, this company has no standardized means of knowing these emissions beyond those resulting from its direct activity.
Bold commitments
Around the world, a growing number of companies and investors have made bold commitments to reduce their emissions. More than five hundred financial companies have joined the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ) and are committed to achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions for all of their portfolios. The only problem: they don’t know how to get there because the information and data needed to guide them are not available globally. They will be soon.
At COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh (Egypt), the climate data steering committee, a international initiative launched with the French government in June, will release its recommendations for a new platform that will make company broadcasts publicly available for the first time. This data will allow businesses to map out their roadmaps to achieve their net zero goals and give the public the data to hold them to account.
We are convinced: climate data must be produced and used as a common good. In the absence of climate data, financial markets and environmental planning cannot function properly, as the risks of some investments and the benefits of others are obscured.
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