By Simon Jessop
LONDON (Reuters) – Administrators of a climate target verification group at the center of a governance storm on Friday sought to calm concerns over its plan to allow companies to offset emissions from their supply chain.
The Science Based Targets initiative initially presented its plan in a statement on its website Tuesday, prompting staff and some technical consultants to write separate letters to the board criticizing the measure.
Among the complaints was that the board had bypassed an established governance process and made the decision to allow offsetting of so-called Scope 3 emissions without the agreement of the broader group.
By allowing limited use of offsets for Scope 3 emissions, it is hoped this will help direct money towards climate-friendly projects such as afforestation. Scope 1 emissions, those directly under a company’s control, could not be offset.
In exchange for financing a project like planting more trees, a company could get a credit that it could use to offset pollution from parts of its value chain, such as when a customer uses its products.
In a “clarification” to their April 9 statement, the administrators stated that no changes had been made to the group’s current standards and that any use of such “environmental attribute certificates” would be “informed by the evidence”.
Furthermore, any changes to the group’s standards would follow the usual process that includes a research and drafting phase, as well as a public consultation, and review and approval by the group’s technical council, it said.
A preliminary proposal on possible changes to Scope 3 will be published in July and will be included in the drafting phase of the process, the statement added.
Separately, administrators also received a letter of support from a group of nonprofits and companies working with communities in the Global South most exposed to climate change, including in Tanzania, Kenya, Peru and Indonesia.
Among the 15 signatories were the Instituto Ecológica do Brasil and Rioterra.
The group said it welcomed the decision to allow Scope 3 offsets, as “finally” money would flow to communities working to protect nature, including through reducing deforestation, restoring pastures and reforesting mangroves.
“Simply put, if realized, this bold change by the SBTi Board will unlock more climate finance for natural assets and local communities in the Global South, accelerating global climate action,” the group said in a letter seen by Reuters.
“We urge the SBTi team to listen and act pragmatically, and to work quickly, to propose guidance to operationalize the Council’s direction.”
In a statement released on Friday, global environmental group WWF, the initiative’s founder, said the use of offsets should be limited and not a substitute for reducing a company’s operational emissions.
“WWF supports science-based positions and recommendations from technical teams whose work provides the basis for the integrity of the SBTI,” the group said in an emailed statement.
(Reporting by Simon Jessop in London. Additional reporting by Ross Kerber in Boston. Editing by Diane Craft)
