We have work to do. By 2030, global emissions must drop by almost half in order to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius and mitigate the most severe impacts of the climate crisis. And with just seven years remaining, a newly released Ceres analysis of companies in the sectors responsible for the most significant amount of greenhouse gas emissions showed that 56% of the more than 450 public U.S. companies analyzed have yet to even set comprehensive climate goals, and 44% don’t publicly disclose any greenhouse gas emissions data at all.
2030 is just seven years away. In some ways, that’s an eyeblink. And yet, scientists and market analysts say that it is well within our ability to reach the 2030 emissions reductions we need. Just look at the accomplishments that have happened over the past seven years. To begin with, the world’s leaders signed the Paris Agreement, signaling a worldwide commitment to pursue emissions reductions necessary to achieve the 1.5-degree target and driving climate action that has helped cut expected warming by half.
During the past seven years, the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) was launched, becoming the gold standard for helping companies ensure that their efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are aligned with the latest climate science. Today, more than 3,000 companies have worked with SBTi, including more than 1,000 with verified net zero commitments. At the end of 2016, it was hard, if not impossible, to imagine that Congress would pass the most ambitious climate legislation in history — the Inflation Reduction Act — which is pumping $370 billion in federal investments in climate, energy, and environmental justice investments and catalyzing billions more in private investments.
Yet, despite all of this progress, the world hasn’t acted fast enough to deliver on the commitments of the Paris Agreement. Halfway to the 2030 benchmark, emissions are still rising. We still have a window, but we must act quickly, resolutely and strategically.
That’s why the Ceres Ambition 2030 initiative is focused on decarbonizing six of the highest-emitting sectors in our economy, which together account for roughly 80% of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, according to 2019 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency data — banking, electric power, food and agriculture, oil and gas, steel, and transportation.
With Ambition 2030, we are leveraging the power of investors and other stakeholders, corporate leaders, and company value chains to support and catalyze momentum across these key sectors. We are developing and refining sector strategies to accelerate this transition. Our new Ambition 2030 webpage includes resources for engagement and case studies within each of the six sectors. Our data dashboards will be updated regularly to help us measure progress and understand how to strategically engage and pivot if necessary.
Ambition 2030 stands on three fundamental expectations:
Change starts with clear goals. In the coming year, all companies — that haven’t already — must set transparent climate targets, aligned with the urgency of the crisis. The Ceres Ambition Spectrum is a resource investors and companies can use to assess corporate progress towards decarbonization. The Ambition Spectrum evaluates the robustness of existing corporate climate and clean energy commitments and identifies key moves a company must take to progress along the spectrum towards a robust 1.5-degree Celsius-aligned goal. We have our work cut out for us. Our current data snapshots show that only 4% of companies (19 out of 452) currently have such goals.
Transforming each of our focus sectors will require strategies unique to each industry, but the basic model is shared: Once the sector’s top companies set, and act upon, strong climate commitments with time-bound, science-based, near and long-term targets, peer companies will be pulled along through a competitive cascade powered by investor, employee, and consumer expectations.
Goals are insufficient if they don’t facilitate ambitious action. In 2023, every company must release a time-bound, climate transition action plan for achieving its goals that details how it will integrate and fund climate action as a core element of their business model. These plans must be consistent, comparable, and complete. A 2021 report from Ceres’ partner CDP found that just one third of companies that disclosed through their platform in 2021 have transition plans to meet their goals – and only 1% of companies disclosed against all 24 indicators that CDP considers must make up a credible transition plan.
This year, Ceres partnered with CDP, the We Mean Business Coalition, and EDF to create a report on Climate Transition Action Plans (CTAPs) that includes guidance on aligning internal business strategies as well as external climate and energy policy advocacy with emissions reduction goals in a way that is just and equitable. A well-executed CTAP allows companies to share key details of their plans with investors, NGOs, governments, and the public.
Once goals and plans are published, regular disclosure provides critical insight into attainment. Companies must disclose the actions they have taken, assess the progress of those actions, and adjust as needed. Mandatory climate disclosure, like that proposed by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in March of 2022, can play a crucial role in ensuring broad compliance and comparable transparency. Again, our data shows we need to make a lot of progress in a short time to improve disclosure, with only 16 % of companies across the six sectors disclosing scope 1, 2, and most relevant scope 3 categories.
Ceres designed Ambition 2030 to meet the urgency of the moment and we will continue to refine, update, and analyze our own strategies for each of these six crucial sectors. The data and resources shared in our Ambition 2030 data snapshots will be regularly updated to provide accountability and actionable information for companies, investors, policymakers, regulators, and the broader public. The coming seven years will pass rapidly, but critical climate goals are still achievable, and we will need all hands on deck.