Sustainability Communiqué: April – 2010

CSR 2.0: The Responsibility Revolution Takes Off

By almost any measure, corporate responsibility is now front and center on the vast majority of CEOs' radar screens as well as on Board Meeting agendas, investor's analysis, employee concerns and activists focus.
To cite just one prominent piece of evidence: Even back in a 2007 report by McKinsey, the global consultancy, more than 90 percent of the chief executives surveyed said they had done more to push environmental and social strategies into their operations than in the previous five years.

Today, given the number of senior managers who are scrambling to keynote CR conferences and expound on their companies' beneficent deeds, it's safe to conclude that CEO buy-in is still on the rise. And yet, while CR is on the lips of almost every CEO, it's lost a good deal of its power and potency.  There remains a yawning chasm between what companies say they value and what they actually do.  Or don't do.

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EU Cap-and-Trade Mandates; Read the Sustainability Update

Only 30% of the companies subject to the United Kingdom's Carbon Reduction Commitment Energy Efficiency Scheme (CRC) are prepared to meet their April 1, 2010 compliance deadline, according to a recent survey conducted by the global financial consultancy KPMG. Many of them have misstated the amount of carbon they produce while others have failed to recognise that they are regulated under the legislation.

Companies face fines and penalties for noncompliance, and also may be at a competitive disadvantage in a marketplace increasingly attuned to sustainability and corporate responsibility.

What is CRC?

The CRC is a mandatory cap-and-trade program designed to reduce carbon emissions generated by organisations with operations in the UK. Those organizations, which had not been regulated until now, represent a broad cross section of sectors, from banking and retail to government agencies. Companies regulated under the three-phase law must register with CRC between April and September of 2010, identifying their electricity use in 2008. Additional requirements are imposed annually until 2013. While the actual requirements under CRC are relatively straightforward, there has been some confusion in the regulated community about which organisations come under the new law.

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