European companies are heading for global warming of 2.7 degrees by the end of the century with their current climate targets and emissions, according to a data analysis. That’s the key finding of an analysis of corporate-ied savings targets and other data released Tuesday by the London-based Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP).
The non-profit organization uses standardized surveys to collect data and targets from companies on their climate protection efforts, and also includes indirectly caused emissions in the calculation. An annual index is published to provide comparability for shareholders and the public.
Emissions harmful to the climate still too high
"The European corporate sector is running heib. Based on current ambitions, it is on a 2.7-degree path of global warming – more than one degree more than climate science says we should be able to achieve to avoid the most catastrophic effects of climate change", said the organization’s executive director, Maxfield Weiss. However, it is positive that more and more companies are putting a plan in place to reduce their climate-damaging emissions. As it stands, 56 percent of the nearly 1,000 companies surveyed by the Carbon Disclosure Project have such a strategy to date.
In the report’s analysis "Running Hot – Accelerating Europe’s Path to Paris" it can be seen that companies in Sweden, Denmark and Switzerland are still best off with a sub-two degree path, while companies in the UK, Belgium and Italy have been driven by their emissions to as much as three degrees of global warming by the year 2100.