For Some Major Companies, Business As Usual Means Steadily Cutting Their CO2

Fewer than 200 global companies are leading the world in responding to climate change, including U.S. technology giants Apple, Google and Microsoft, and three domestic energy firms -- electric utilities Entergy Corp. and Pepco Holdings Inc., and Spectra Energy Corp., an oil and gas pipeline firm.

Those firms are among 34 American companies that the British nonprofit CDP, formerly the Climate Disclosure Project, included in its Climate Performance Leadership Index 2014, released Wednesday.

Other major U.S. brands that earned CDP's highest marks for corporate efforts to mitigate the effects of climate change are General Motors Co., Bank of America Merrill Lynch, CVS Health, Goldman Sachs Group, DirecTV and Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
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Paul Simpson, CDP's chief executive officer, said the index reinforces earlier reports from CDP and others showing that the world's largest private-sector companies are responding to the threats of climate change, even if governments have been slow to act.

"The bottom line is at risk from the climate crisis," Simpson said in a statement. "The unprecedented environmental challenges that we confront today are also economic problems.  This irrefutable fact is filtering through to companies and investors.

"However," he added, "global emissions continue to rise at an alarming rate.  Businesses and governments must raise their climate ambition.  The data shows that there is neither an excuse nor the time for lethargy."

The 2014 results show that 9 percent of nearly 2,000 companies that responded to CDP requests for information on greenhouse gas emissions and other measures of climate change performance received the group's highest grade.

For Some Major Companies, Business As Usual Means Steadily Cutting Their CO2