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https://theconversation.com/making-fossil-fuel-companies-accountable-for-their-products-emissions-would-support-the-clean-energy-transition-219659>
"I recently found myself among a group of alarmed scientists, writing a fervent
plea to the European Commission to be more ambitious when it comes to corporate
greenhouse gas reporting requirements. Our open letter calling for
comprehensive disclosure of corporations’ contribution to the climate crisis
gathered support from over 100 fellow researchers around the world.
So, news from the COP28 global climate change conference this year that
countries have agreed to “transition away from fossil fuels” is welcome,
although it’s far from the level of ambition needed.
One of the actions that could help properly address fossil fuel production is a
much stronger stance from regulators on the fossil fuel sector’s scope 3
emissions, which arise from other parts of a company’s supply chain, and so are
indirectly linked to a company’s activities. In particular, we need more
transparency around a scope 3 category called “use of product” emissions –
those that come from people using a company’s product after it’s sold.
This was also pointed out recently by António Guterres, secretary general of
the UN.
“On the one hand, the fossil fuel industry – the giant behind the climate
crisis – is finally starting to wake up,” he said. “But the promises made
clearly fall short of what is required … the announcement to achieve net zero
by 2050 says nothing about eliminating emissions from fossil fuel consumption –
the so-called Scope 3.”
Under the greenhouse gas protocol, the industry standard for accounting for
corporate emissions, scope 3 emissions include “upstream” emissions, for
example, goods and services bought by a company, but also “downstream”
emissions such as those related to distribution or waste management.
Importantly, scope 3 also includes emissions from the use of products a company
sells. This means it’s an excellent test of whether a business model will
actually work in a net zero world."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
