Banking and
financial giants Banco Santander, Banesto, Banco Bilbao Vizcaya
Argentaria  (BBVA), Henderson Group plc and APG Asset
management joined together in calling for cost effective action on
reducing carbon emissions.

They are just some of the newest members of the href=”https://www.cdproject.net/en-US/Pages/HomePage.aspx”
target=”_blank”>Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), a project that
claims to hold the world’s largest collection of self-reported
corporate environmental performance data.

They have joined 92 other institutional investors - with a net
worth of over $10 Trillion USD - in proactively driving the global
finance community to take more action focused on reducing climate
change related risks, while recognizing the environmental and cost
reduction benefits of a strategic joint approach to tackle these
challenges.

Research by href=”http://www.mckinsey.com/Client_Service/Sustainability/Latest_thinking/Pathways_to_a_low_carbon_economy”
target=”_blank”>McKinsey & Company, a global
management-consulting firm indicates that most companies have the
option to reduce carbon emissions, which can result in a CO2 global
emissions reduction of 12 Gigatonne representing a cumulative
reduction of 25% by 2030.

More importantly, this also means significant long-term cost
reduction potential for organizations.

Paul Abberley, CEO at Aviva Investors London, says: “We were a
founding signatory because we believe that the external costs of
greenhouse gas emissions will become internalized into company cash
flows and profitability. There still remains huge potential in
companies for achieving cost effective emissions reductions but we
are so pleased that there has been such increased support this
year.”

Members of the CDP, have sent href=”https://www.cdproject.net/SiteCollectionDocuments/Carbon-Action-Letter-2012-Investor-Signatory.pdf”
target=”_blank”>Climate Action letters calling for 415 of the
world’s largest public companies to also join in their effort and
recognizing the climate change risks and potential benefits of a
proactive mitigation approach.

Some climate action items included in the letters include
suggestions include the following:

• Make year-on-year emissions reductions;



• Invest in emission reduction activities with a positive return
  on investment;



• Set and publicly disclose an emissions reduction target that
  covers the principal sources of emissions in their business if they
  have not already done so;



• Demonstrate management and steps toward reduction of emissions
  across their supply chains.

By pursuing such measures and participating in the project, the
CDP signatories hope to lead other in the industries to drive
increased visioning at the management level in regards to carbon
emissions reduction and large scale change through collaborative
economies of scale.

CDP first launched its emissions disclosure programme in 2002
with the backing of 35 institutional investors, requesting
transparency from public companies of their carbon emissions.

There are now over 655 signatories representing $78 trillion in
assets that are part of the CDP, and disclosure rates among the
world’s largest companies run at 80%. CDP data is downloaded on
average more than 730,000 times a month via Bloomberg
terminals.