The world is way off track to reach its climate goals. Meanwhile, major polluters such as Shell and BP are shifting their focus back to fossil fuels (Photo: Getty Images)
Metropolis Desk-
Over the past five years, the majority of the largest corporations in the world have done virtually nothing to cut their climate-changing pollution.
According to a recent ESG Book assessment seen by CNN, large corporations are more likely to either cause extreme warming or fail to disclose their greenhouse gas emissions.
Only 22 percent of the 500 largest public firms in the world, measured by market value, have matched their efforts with the Paris Agreement, which seeks to keep global warming to 1.5 degree Celsius over pre-industrial levels. This is according to the world’s leading provider of sustainability statistics. To do. This represents a small increase from 18 percent of businesses in 2018.
The chance of major floods, droughts, wildfires, and food shortages could substantially increase beyond an increase in average world temperature of 1.5 degree Celsius, according to climate scientists.
At least 2.7 degree Celsius of warming, which would expose billions of people to dangerously hot circumstances, is acceptable to nearly half of the firms, or 45 percent. A decrease from 61 percent in 2018.
Daniel Claire, CEO of ESG Book, stated that “our data present a clear message: we need to do more, and we need to do it quickly.”
“It is unclear how we see a significant change without a fundamental change in how the global economy operates,” the author writes.
The research adds to a growing body of information showing that the globe is not on track to meet its climate change goals. The extraction of fossil fuels is now again receiving attention from major polluters like Shell and BP, helped by a year of record profits from soaring oil and gas prices.
To evaluate a company’s contribution to the goals of the international climate agreement, the ESG Book gives it a “temperature score” based on variables including publicly disclosed emissions statistics and emissions reduction targets.
Companies from the United States, United Kingdom, China, India, and the European Union having a market value of at least $10 billion are included in the analysis.
It takes into consideration both direct emissions from business activities and indirect emissions from the use of the products made by the firms. This is crucial for oil and gas companies because the majority of their emissions come from burning products like jet fuel and gasoline.
Since 2018, the number of businesses in the UK, India, and the EU with carbon reduction goals in line with the Paris Agreement has hardly changed. China and the United States have made more progress, albeit from a lower basis.
20 percent of American businesses are connected with Paris, up from 11 percent in 2018. 12 percent of Chinese citizens now support the Paris Agreement, up from 3 percent five years ago.
In a research released in May, the World Meteorological Organization stated that there is now a 66 percent likelihood that global warming would reach 1.5 degree Celsius for at least one year during the next five years. Even though this will just be a brief breach, it will be the most obvious indication yet of how quickly climate change is happening, leading to a rapid rise in sea level, increased extreme weather, and the collapse of vital ecosystems, according to the group.
Source – CNN
