Inside D.C.

Beating multinationals at the climate change game

This has been a week of subtle rumblings regarding climate change.  The White House held a ceremony for multinational corporations “pledging” to do the right thing, while the Senate Energy & Natural Resources Committee, in stout bipartisan fashion, beat back a “provocative” amendment from presidential hopeful Sen. Bernie Sanders (I, VT) to formally acknowledge climate change actually exists.

I’m not going to debate the veracity of climate change, but the reality is President Obama has made shifts in weather a “legacy” issue and has ordered all hands on deck throughout the Administration to do something to “assist” their constituents in “transitioning” to a warmer/colder, wetter/drier planet.  Heck, even the Pope is holding Vatican confabs on climate change, and Sanders’ competitors on the election trail are starting to make lots of noise about it.

With a major United Nations (UN) conference on climate change set for November 30, several major U.S. companies, including Cargill, Inc., joined a July 27 White House ceremony where they signed “The American Business Act on Climate Change.”  Under this “pledge,” these monster multinationals with massive carbon footprints agree to cut greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, reduce water use, increase renewable energy use and support U.S. negotiations on climate change at the UN meeting in Paris.

Joining Cargill at the White House were Walmart, Alcoa, Apple, Bank of America, Berkshire Hathaway Energy, Coca-Cola, General Motors, Goldman Sachs, Google, Microsoft, Pepsico and UPS.

While Cargill set its goals over a decade ago, and reports it’s improved energy efficiency 16%, carbon intensity by 9%, and freshwater efficiency by 12% since setting energy goals in 2000, and climate and water goals in 2005, it occurs to me there are very likely companies and farms out there that can match or exceed the Cargill achievements.

Successful business people running or owning/running operations automatically care – or should care – about the overhead, and should be consistently looking for ways to cut operating costs while increasing efficiencies.  So when it comes to climate change, my cynical self tells me all of the efficiencies and renewables and reductions talked about at the White House this week can be translated into operational efficiencies applicable to and likely in place at many companies

Again, most companies likely aren’t aware they have a major, positive public relations image-buffing tool sitting among their monthly operating reports. I’ll wager if most companies sat down and worked out their own energy efficiency increases, their carbon “intensity” reduction – though I must admit I’m not exactly sure what that means – along with water reductions and other cost-cutting moves, they could crank out press releases ballyhooing the facts of their climate change wonderfulness.

Now, as to signing a “pledge” to support this or any other White House’s negotiations at a UN meeting, I’m not sure I’d go that far.