Op-Ed: Here’s how companies can strong-arm their suppliers into cutting carbon emissions
It’s become all too common for companies to require that their suppliers meet their environmental standards. After all, they’re not going to be able to meet the same standards they have set for themselves.
That’s a big deal. It means companies are taking a strong-arming approach to environmental management. They’re trying to ensure that their suppliers meet their standards without also meeting their own.
What’s happening here? What’s going on? The rules around carbon emission and supplier environmental management in the U.S. and U.K. are a mixed bag.
On the one hand, U.S. companies are increasingly required by law to meet the same climate standards as their suppliers.
On the other, their suppliers are starting to get caught up in the carbon offset game, which forces them to take a stance on the causes and causes of climate change and how their products help it.
“This, plus the U.S. tax code being much more restrictive of fossil fuels than the rest of the world, means that more companies are turning towards the more conservative carbon offset sector,” says Martin Whittaker, co-founder of Carbon Disclosure Project, a U.K. not-for-profit promoting environmental standards.
Here’s why:
1. Companies are becoming more and more carbon-negative
Most of the world still needs to develop an efficient power sector to reduce the carbon intensity of fossil fuels. But, in the U.S., more companies are choosing to voluntarily embrace carbon-negative practices.
“In Europe you can actually get an environmental compliance rating, but the U.S. does not have this,” says Whittaker.
According to the Carbon Disclosure Project, a not-for-profit, the U.K. has only one third the number of companies as its European counterpart that are carbon negative. The U.S. has around 10 times the number of carbon-negative companies.
Meanwhile, the average U.K. and Canadian company is still carbon positive while companies in the U.S. are getting closer and closer to
