FTSE 100 carbon reporting: After the Volkswagen emissions scandal, how do Britain’s blue chip companies stack up?
Still reeling from the Volkswagen emissions scandal, FTSE 100 companies’ own carbon reporting has now been put to the test – and financial companies have been found wanting.
BT has been named the FTSE’s greenest company, as the telecoms group was lauded for its “rigorous and far reaching carbon strategy” by Carbon Clear, the organisation that ranks Britain’s blue chip companies not just for their strategy for reducing emissions, but also how well they measure and report them.
The ranking was released hot on the heels of the news of Volkswagen’s emissions-cheating, which has the German car maker’s share price plunging, and the entire German market forecast to be depressed until the end of 2016.
Marks & Spencer came up just one point behind the winner in the FTSE carbon ranking, but these two companies are clear leaders, soaring some 10 percentage points ahead of the closest rival.
Carbon Clear stated in the report that although some companies were making “excellent efforts”, many were still lagging far behind. Mark Chadwick, the organisation’s chief executive, said:
It’s encouraging to see some companies making good progress in their efforts to tackle climate change. These are the real “game changers” who go above and beyond in terms of carbon management. However, what is clear from our report is that much more needs to be done and sooner rather than later.
Breaking results down by sector show that results vary wildly. IT companies were praised, while mining and financial companies’ efforts in particular were criticised as “disappointing”.
Financial companies make up over a fifth of the FTSE 100, but only 60 per cent of these companies have set carbon reduction targets today.
