Global companies take actions to address climate change

Companies globally are taking actions and making investments to prepare for the transition to a low carbon economy, according to a report launched in Beijing yesterday by the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), a London-based international non-profit organization.

A launch event of the CDP Climate Change Report 2015 is held in Beijing on Nov. 4, 2015. [Photo by Gong Yingchun/China.org.cn]

The CDP Climate Change Report 2015, charting the changed corporate landscape by comparing data from 1,997 companies in 51 countries around the world this year with 1,799 in 2010, shows 94 percent of the companies allocate responsibility for climate issues to the board or to senior management and three quarters are incentivizing employees through financial and non-financial means to manage climate issues.

Additionally, the percentage of companies setting targets to reduce emissions has also grown significantly, with 44 percent of them setting goals to reduce their total greenhouse gas emissions and 50 percent having goals to reduce emissions per unit of output, up from 27 percent and 20 percent in 2010, respectively.

Moreover, the report also highlights the impressive progress that Chinese companies have made in energy conservation and emission reduction. Nearly 60 percent of them (who have replied to the CDP's questionnaire) have set absolute emission reduction targets, the report said, adding that being inspired by policies for tackling climate change, more and more Chinese companies have become more willing to cut emissions and conserve energy.

In recent years, China has achieved significant results in reducing carbon emissions and conserving energy. "The share of China's energy conservation over the past two decades accounts for 52 percent of the world's total amount," Xie Zhenhua, special representative for climate change of China, told China.org.cn during the 21st BASIC Ministerial Meeting on Climate Change held in Beijing on Oct. 31, in which ministers from four countries, namely Brazil, South Africa, India and China, expressed their unequivocal commitment in a bid to achieve success at the upcoming Paris climate talks.

Based on current achievements, China will continue to step up efforts to accelerate its transition to low carbon development. In the recently concluded 5th Plenary Session of 18th CPC Central Committee, a meeting to discuss and give suggestions to China's 13th Five-Year Plan, a blueprint for the country's economic and social development from 2016 to 2020, China stressed the importance of "green development." The proposals approved during this meeting pointed out that the country will pursue low-carbon and sustainable development, and build a clean, efficient energy system.

Li Gao, the deputy director general of the Department of Climate Change of the National Development and Reform Commission, said that "the green development demonstrates China's understanding that development has undergone some significant changes, highlighting the important role that low carbon development and addressing climate change plays in China's economic development and the ecological civilization construction."

The report was launched ahead of COP21, also known as the Paris Climate Conference, a pivotal meeting which will be held in December in a bid to reach a new climate deal for reducing carbon emissions after 2020.

Paul Dickinson, executive chairman of the CDP, pointed out that a successful Paris agreement would set the world on course for a goal of net zero emissions by the end of this century, providing business and investors with a clear, long-term trajectory against which to plan strategy and investment.

He was quoted as saying that decarbonizing the global economy is an ambitious undertaking. "But the actions that companies are already taking show that corporate leaders have understood the size of the challenge, and the importance of meeting it," he explained.

"The momentum of business action on climate change suggests we have reached a tipping point, where companies are poised to achieve their full potential," he added.

Despite good progress in addressing climate change, it needs to accelerate. Governments have committed to hold global temperature rise under 2 degrees Celsius. But the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) calculates that to do this, global emissions need to fall between 41 percent and 72 percent by 2050. "Although more companies are setting emission targets, few of them are in line with this goal," the report highlighted.

The world needs to rapidly reduce emissions to prevent the worst effects brought on by climate change, the report concluded. Thus both companies and investors should redouble their efforts to confront the challenges of climate change in the years to come.