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Maybe you’ve seen the recent headlines—recent ones include “AI’s Energy Demands Are Out Of Control” (Wired), “AI brings soaring emissions for Google and Microsoft” (NPR), “AI emissions are fueling a new doomerism. This time it’s climate change” (Fortune), and “Artificial Intelligence Can Make Companies Greener, but It Also Guzzles Energy” (Wall Street Journal). Given the abundance of such press, it certainly seems as if the growing prevalence of AI across all platforms has sparked some climate controversy.

Among the growing concerns regarding climate change, social inequality, and corporate responsibility, (environmental, social, and governance) ESG reporting has become a tool for businesses to demonstrate their commitment to sustainability.

On February 23, 2024, ISO (along with the International Accreditation Federation (IAF)) published short amendments to all standards aligned with its Harmonized Structure. In the form of new requirement language and one additional note, ISO has now adapted climate change concerns as considerations for a wide range of popular certifications.

As part of the fight against the effects of climate change, a global effort has been kickstarted to reduce the use and production of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) due to their high global warming potential (GWP). For their part in this HFC phasedown, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is asking organizations to report their HFC allowance, and the deadline to do so is May 31, 2024.

Back on March 21, 2022, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposed rules that would enhance and standardize climate-related disclosures provided by public companies—two years and unquantified lobby and legal dollars later, the final SEC Climate Disclosure Rules were announced today.

More and more, organizations are turning a keener eye toward ESG initiatives. Though the Social Governance pillars are no less important, it’s the Environmental cornerstone of ESG that is commanding more scrutiny—more specifically, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

With the escalation of climate and various environmental, social, and governance (ESG)-related risks, organizations are now actively setting bold sustainability objectives, and in recognition of the related concerns in their supply chains over which they lack control, companies are also asking for cooperation from their vendors in addressing their emissions to further minimize their environmental impact.

Unlike Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions—which are the direct and purchased energy emissions of a corporation, respectively—Scope 3 emissions are indirect emissions generated from activities of assets not owned or controlled by the reporting organization.