Big business gets on board

Corporates club together on climate changeThe climate is changing fast in blue-chip boardrooms. The CBI has launched a new UK task force to follow up last year’s Stern Review, with recommendations on what companies can do. It includes top level leaders from British Airways, BP, Shell, BT, Rolls Royce, Tesco, Barclays, the London Stock Exchange and Sun Microsystems. Look out for its conclusions later this year.

New corporate coalitions in the US [see ‘American Eye’] and worldwide have also declared their commitment to help develop effective systems for carbon emissions control and trading.

The global Combat Climate Change coalition (3C), announced in January with 18 founder members, is spearheaded by Swedish energy company Vattenfall and includes the likes of General Electric, Siemens, chemicals giant Bayer, ABB, and energy companies such as Enel of Italy, Eskom of South Africa, and Duke Energy and Pacific Gas & Electric in the US.

“Instead of being pulled by society, business leaders should be pushing in a positive direction,” said Vattenfall CEO Lars Josefsson, to integrate climate change issues into the working of markets and trade on a global scale. One specific goal for the coalition is to develop a road map for a low-emissions society after the expiry of the current Kyoto agreement in 2012. As a spur to action, Vattenfall has put its own ‘climate map’ on its website at www.vattenfall.com, with region-by-region data showing current emissions and the unsustainable projections which a ‘business-as-usual’ scenario would entail. - Ros Davidson

10 March 2007

Ros Davidson