Climate Change and Mandatory Carbon Reporting: Impacts on Business Process and Performance

As part of their annual directors' report, UK‐listed companies are now required to disclose their greenhouse gas emissions and account publicly for their contributions to climate change. This paper uses this mandatory carbon reporting to explore wider debates about corporate social responsibility and the purpose, practice, and impacts of such non‐financial reporting. Empirically, it combines documentary analysis of the carbon reporting practices of 176 large firms listed in the FTSE100 and/or subject to the UK government's adaptation reporting power with 60 interviews with stakeholders involved in carbon reporting. Firms disclose their emissions in response to financial incentives, social pressure and/or regulatory compulsion. In turn, rationales shape whether and how carbon reporting influences internal business processes and performance. The importance of reporting to the bottom line varies by sector depending on two variables – energy intensity and economic regulator status – yet there is limited evidence that carbon reporting is driving substantial reductions in emissions. Findings suggest reasons for caution about hopes for ‘nudging’ firms to improve their environmental performance and social responsibility through disclosure requirements.     

Board Effectiveness and the Voluntary Disclosure of Climate Change Information

This paper examines the relationship between board of directors' effectiveness and voluntary climate change disclosures. Since risk management and reporting fall under the board's responsibility, we relate board effectiveness to the firm's decision to voluntarily respond to the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) annual questionnaire as well as the quality of disclosures about climate‐change‐related risks and strategies to mitigate them. Our results show a positive association between board effectiveness and the firm's decision to answer the CDP questionnaire as well as its carbon disclosure quality. The paper contributes to the ongoing debate on the determinants of voluntary climate change disclosures. Our findings highlight the importance of the board of directors' role in enhancing the transparency and relevance of voluntary disclosures of climate change business impacts. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment     

全球气候变化的主要影响研究

全球气候变化带来一系列影响,主要包括海冰缩小、海平面上升、积雪减少、冻土融化、生态系统脆弱性、人类生存面临的危险。     

国际贸易对气候变化的影响研究综述

随着世界贸易量的急剧增长,贸易自由化引起了一系列对气候变化问题的思考:贸易自由化是否导致温室气体排放的增加?贸易对气候变化影响的程度到底有多大?围绕这些问题,国内外学者进行了大量研究。文章在对国际贸易与气候变化关系的文献进行梳理后,侧重于分析贸易自由化对气候变化影响的研究,主要围绕三个方面对现有文献进行述评:对外贸易的环境效应、环境库茨涅茨曲线、国际贸易隐含碳。这些研究对我国减排目标和政策的制定都具有重要的启示。     

基于可持续发展观下的环境会计信息披露

科学技术的日新月异使全球经济正以前所未有的速度向前发展,为人类创造了大量的财富。但经济快速增长的同时,随之而来的是自然资源的迅速耗竭和环境的严重污染。环境问题已由局部问题上升为人类生存性问题。要真正的让全社会认识到企业对环境的影响程度,必须加强企业对环境造成损害程度科学的披露,这就涉及到环境会计信息披露相关问题。文章从可持续发展观的视角入手,阐述了目前我国环境信息披露的现状和方式以及环境信息披露的局限性,并就目前的局限性提出了改进建议。     

The Impact of Climate Change on Agriculture in the Southwestern United States: The Ricardian Approach Revisited

This paper estimates a Ricardian model of farmland value across the counties of the semiarid Southwestern United States. Compared to previous contributions, we focus on one climate zone and include the presence of extreme weather events and of farm subsidies in our analysis. We also control for heterogeneity and for various types of spillover effects. Once calibrated, the model is used to project changes due to future climate conditions. We find that the probability of a decrease is great in highland counties while an increase or decrease is equally probable in lowland counties where climate impacts farmland value less.     

Firms’ Response to Climate Change: The Interplay of Business Uncertainty and Organizational Capabilities

With climate change emerging as one of the most important issues increasing uncertainty in the business circle, firms have shown different reactions. Why do firms differ in adopting and implementing carbon management practices (CMPs) in response to the global warming issue? This paper attempts to explore this question with particular attention to two factors: external business uncertainty and internal organizational capabilities. This study investigated whether business uncertainty, organizational learning and lean production capabilities influenced the adoption and implementation of CMPs as well as examining how organizational capabilities moderate the relationships between business uncertainty and the level of CMPs. The results of a cross‐sectional survey and hierarchical regression analyses indicate that perceived business uncertainty decreases the adoption of CMPs, organizational learning and lean production capabilities strongly facilitate the adoption and implementation of CMPs, and lean production capability positively moderates the impacts of business uncertainty on the adoption of CMPs. This study provides guidance for managers and academics considering how to identify, design and manage the dimensions of a firm's practices in response to the global warming issue within the organization as well as with other organizations. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment     

气候变化对小麦流通的影响及中国的应对策略

主要分析气候变化对国际间小麦的流通量、流通格局及流通渠道的影响,并提出我国应加强国内粮食安全;改善流通设施,提高信息化水平;培育中国本土国际粮商,积极拓展海外业务的应对策略。     

Corporate Carbon Strategies in Responding to Climate Change

With climate change emerging as one of the most important issues affecting the business circle, companies have begun considering the carbon issue in their overall strategic positioning. However, few studies have examined the corporate carbon strategies in developing and advanced developing countries, where climate change regulation is extensive and market uncertainty is relatively high. In addition, there has been growing interest among researchers and practitioners concerning the relationship between the carbon strategy and firm performance. This paper presents a framework for identifying the corporate carbon strategy. The cluster analysis of 241 Korean companies indicates six types of corporate carbon strategy: ‘wait‐and‐see observer’, ‘cautious reducer’, ‘product enhancer’, ‘all‐round enhancer’, ‘emergent explorer’ and ‘all‐round explorer’. This study empirically examines whether there are differences between these carbon strategy types in terms of the sector, firm size and firm performance. The results indicate a significant relationship between a firm's carbon strategy and its sector and size but a significant relationship between the carbon strategy and firm performance is not confirmed. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

全球气候变化问题应对研究

全球气候变化问题成为全球变化研究的热点和难点,全球气候变化领域的国际谈判成为各国政治、科技、经济、环境与外交的综合较量平台。     

关于环境会计信息披露的设想

环境会计是现代会计的一个新兴分支。构建环境会计、实现环境会计信息披露是会计学愈益成熟的结果。是会计工作发挥更大的社会作用和走向可持续发展之路的重要标志。构建环境会计具有坚实的理论和现实基础。由于会计学特别是现代会计理论和方法的快速发展，由于环境经济学和发展经济学的日益成熟，构建环境会计、实现环境会计信息披露已经具备了足够的理论、思想指导和技术方法上的支持。     

Climate Change and Financial Performance in Times of Crisis

Over the past years there has been a debate on the relationship between the environmental and financial performance of businesses, but researchers have not reached any agreement. This research attempts to explore this relationship, especially as in recent years there has been controversy about how this relationship has been affected by the global economic crisis. Taking into account that successfully limiting global climate change to safe levels in the long term is likely to require connecting climate change policies to sustainable development strategies, this paper focuses on the performance of environmental policies. We used a sample of 855 international companies in sectors of intensive greenhouse gas/CO₂ emissions. Specifically, we used data from the Forbes Global 2000 Index and Carbon Disclosure Project data from 2006 to 2009. The data analysis was performed using panel data methodology. The results obtained show that in times of economic crisis, the synergy between environmental and financial performance is higher, meaning that companies must continue to invest in sustainable projects in order to enhance relations with their stakeholders, leading to higher economic profits. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment     

The Impact of Climate Change on the Pattern of Demand for Bottled Water and Non‐Alcoholic Beverages

To date, the majority of the research literature on the impacts of climate change has addressed the negative aspect, i.e. the risks associated with a future permanent modification of climate. Potential opportunities have received much less attention and are rarely transformed into monetary values. Furthermore, manufacturing is one of the economic sectors where the influence of climate change remains practically unknown, although the economic performance of some industrial activities depends directly on climatic conditions – bottled water and non‐alcoholic beverages (i.e. soft drinks and fruit juices) are among these. This paper aims to explore the link between weather and product sales in these sectors, and estimate in quantitative terms the potential impact of future climate change on their revenues. Historic data were explored through statistical analysis and appropriate regression models were developed. Models were applied for the historic (1961–90) and future climate (2021–50) and the difference in sales forms the expected quantified impact of climate change. The results indicate that significant opportunities may arise for some sectors from modifications in climate, provided their production infrastructure can meet the expected demand and their management strategies can successfully adapt to altered climatic conditions. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

全球气候变化机理和预测研究

气候系统是生态系统的重要组成部分,也是人类赖以生存的自然环境,但是随着经济发展,特别是大量使用矿石能源造成温室气体的无限制排放,导致全球变暖。     

全球古气候变化研究

全球古气候研究是全球变化研究的重要组成部分,古气候研究为探索气候变化机制和预测未来气候变化提供全球变化的历史相似型和早期信号。     

能源行业的碳信息披露、碳绩效对财务绩效的影响

文章以2011~2013年CDP报告中的世界500强能源行业为样本,探究能源行业的碳信息披露、碳绩效对财务绩效的影响。通过层级回归分析发现,碳信息披露与财务绩效负相关,碳绩效与财务绩效正相关。最后,根据研究结论对中国能源企业提出建议。     

The Influence of Board Composition on Sustainable Development Disclosure

Despite knowing the potential effect of social reporting on firms' continuity, there is limited research into the influence of the composition of boards of directors on CSR disclosure. This paper adds to the emerging CSR literature empirical evidence by examining how board composition relates to a firm's social and environmental disclosure as well as the implementation of social policies. Using a sample of FTSE 350 firms for the period 2007–2012, the results show that higher board independence facilitates the conveying of firms' good citizenship image through enhancing societal conscience. The results also show that female participation on boards is favorably affecting CSR engagement and reporting as well as the establishment of ethical policies. Hence, the research suggests that boards with higher female participation and independence boost the legitimacy of CSR reporting. Board gender diversity and independence facilitates directing part of the firm's scarce resources toward value maximizing social projects and subsequent reporting on these. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment     

Carbon Disclosure,Contextual Factors,and Information Asymmetry: The Case of Physical Risk Reporting

Abstract

The paper focusses on the reporting of climate change-related physical risks. Drawing on data from the CDP questionnaire for 717 European companies over three years (2011–2013) we find that information asymmetry is generally smaller when firms report about their physical risks. Furthermore, we find that reporting of a higher exposure to physical risks is associated with lower information asymmetry for firms falling under the regulation of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme, whereas for other firms the direction of the relationship reverses. We can rule out that our results are driven by other climate change-related risk disclosures and by disclosures about opportunities arising from climate change. This study is not only relevant because it attests the materiality of climate change-related physical risks. Moreover, we show how a contextual factor – in this study: whether a company falls under climate change-related regulation – moderates the direction of the relationship between reported information and information asymmetry.     

What is Climate Change Policy Now Trying to Achieve?

Almost all advocates of international climate change policy hope and expect that the Climate Change Conference to be held in Paris in November–December 2015 will reach an agreement to reduce global anthropomorphic greenhouse gas emissions. Yet more than 25 years of international climate change policy has failed to reach such an agreement; emissions, far from having been reduced, have greatly increased. In the author's view, no such agreement will be reached in Paris. Anticipating this, Lord Stern, a highly influential figure in international climate change policy, has restated the case for continuing with this policy while relinquishing the objective of reaching such an agreement, though it had previously been claimed that this was essential to ‘save the world’. Advocating the continuation of climate change policy while disavowing a formerly acknowledged condition of its success seems to represent a further stage in the abandonment of rationality in climate change policy formulation.     

The Potential Environmental Benefits of Co‐Operative Businesses Within the Climate Change Agenda

The economic benefits of agricultural co‐operatives are well rehearsed and have received significant attention in the literature, especially in regard to the resource efficiencies flowing from collective action that might be absent from investor‐owned firms. This article provides evidence to show how these resource efficiencies might also manifest themselves as environmental advantages, which may not be available through investor‐owned firms due to the different purpose of, and motivation for, business activity. Specifically, the article explores how co‐operative businesses may deliver climate change benefits by examining case studies of alternative co‐operative functions that provide a mix of qualitative and quantitative evidence. Results show that, where co‐operative businesses achieve efficiencies through economies of scale, knowledge and skills transfer, sharing of risks and other means, this can also lead to coincidental reductions in greenhouse gas emissions that may not be achieved if investor‐owned activity prevails. Whilst coincidental at present, the future exploitation of this phenomenon could lead to valuable market advantage or aid sustainable development policy. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.