‘We cannot rely on voluntary measures’: WWF calls for net zero mandate for large UK firms
UK should pass climate legislation ordering large companies to establish robust and science-based climate action plan, according to WWF
The government should make it a legal requirement for large companies to publish detailed action plans setting out how they plan to reduce their emissions in line with net zero, according to WWF.
Publishing research this morning showing the majority of net zero commitments made by UK’s largest listed companies jeapordise global climate goals, the campaign group urged the government to set a new net zero mandate for the largest listed firms.
The analysis reveals FTSE 100 companies are currently on a pathway to collectively deliver 3C of global temperature rise, more than double the 1.5C threshold recommended by the Paris Agreement.
It found that just 19 per cent of the UK’s largest companies have established climate plans that will help keep global temperature rise to below 1.5C. The rest, meanwhile, do not have a credible plan for how they will reduce their emissions in line with climate goals, and more than a quarter of firms have yet to commit to any form of net zero target at all, it said.
WWF UK chief executive Tanya Steele said that stricter rules were necessary given levels of climate inaction from the private sector.
“It is six years since the Paris Climate Agreement set a target to keep global temperature rise to below 1.5C and most of the UK’s largest businesses aren’t doing nearly enough to curb their emissions to make our planet safe for future generations,” she said. “We cannot rely on voluntary measures to tackle the greatest crisis of our time.”
WWF stressed that more concerted climate action would be needed from the private sector to chart a pathway where global emissions are halved by the end of this decade – a goal experts have warned must be met to prevent dangerous levels of global warming.
While the UK government has issued several major appeals to businesses to ramp up their climate action – such as through joining the UN-backed Race to Zero initiative in the run up to COP26 climate summit next month, there is currently no government regulation that requires companies to set net zero targets or transition plans.
As such, the NGO has called on the government to bring in a new law that requires all large UK firms to adopt and implement net zero transition plans that are independently verified by a science-based target organisation as being in line with a 1.5C pathway.
“Before the UK hosts the COP26 climate talks in Glasgow, the government must tell us that they will make businesses publish transition plans on how they will cut their climate emissions,” Steele said.
The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) was considering a request for comment at the time of going to press.
