EcoAct published its climate change business leaderboard for the UK, ranking FTSE 100 companies on sustainability performance reporting and announcing the top 20 for outstanding efforts. However, overall the report makes for sobering reading with a clear message that UK businesses are not going far enough in implementing critical steps to limit carbon emissions.
With the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reporting less than a 12-year window to limit global warming to 1.5°C, and the UK government’s recent net zero emissions law requiring the country to bring all greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2050, it is critical that the commercial sector urgently transforms their operations.
EcoAct’s report discloses that while 81% of the FTSE 100 companies have some sort of emissions reduction target, 85% currently do not have a sufficient emissions reduction strategy in place to limit global warming to safe levels. The report also reveals that only 8% of FTSE 100 companies have attained carbon neutrality, with only a further 10% making the commitment to do so, highlighting the enormous performance gap needed to be filled in a short space of time.
Scores for the FTSE 100 companies – which make up the rankings in the report – range from 1% at their lowest to 87% at their best, demonstrating a highly disparate mix of sustainability performance and indicating that adequate sustainability reporting is still not a given in large companies.