Environment : News brief

Most consumers want companies to do more to protect the environment and reckon that firms should play a leading role in fighting global warming, a worldwide survey has shown.

Read more about the Nielson Survey here. 

The latest findings from the Carbon Disclosure Project analyzed responses from Global 500 and U.S. Standard and Poor’s companies. The findings revealed a big gap between awareness and action on the part of U.S. S&P 500 companies: Only a third of these respondents to the annual survey have emissions reduction goals in place despite 81 percent acknowledging climate change is a risk.

Read more about the S&P 500 here. 

The latest findings from the Carbon Disclosure Project analyzed responses from Global 500 and U.S. Standard and Poor’s companies. The findings revealed a big gap between awareness and action on the part of U.S. S&P 500 companies: Only a third of these respondents to the annual survey have emissions reduction goals in place despite 81 percent acknowledging climate change is a risk.

Read more about the S&P 500 here. 

COMPANIES could face class actions from shareholders unless the companies adequately report the risks that climate change poses to their businesses.

While climate change-related litigation has been confined to planning in Australia, class actions against regulatory authorities have been taken up in the US.

 REad more about shareholder lawsuits here. 

The Environmental Protection Agency has done little to curb the export of discarded electronic products containing hazardous waste, much of which ends up in poorly regulated countries and harms the environment and public health, the Government Accountability Office concluded in a new report.

Read more about electronic waste here

The head of the U.N.'s Nobel Prize–winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Pachauri on Monday urged people around the world to cut back on meat in order to combat climate change. "Give up meat for one day [per week] at least initially, and decrease it from there," Pachauri told Britain's Observer newspaper. "In terms of immediacy of action and the feasibility of bringing about reductions in a short period of time, it clearly is the most attractive opportunity." So, that addiction to pork and beef isn't just clogging your arteries;

he majority of Fortune 50 corporations use the Internet to disclose some information on their environmental performance but most are missing opportunities to involve stakeholders, tap the interactive potential of the web, and provide transparency in their reporting, new research suggests. 

Read more about F50 reporting here. 

"WATER is the oil of the 21st century," declares Andrew Liveris, the chief executive of Dow, a chemical company. Like oil, water is a critical lubricant of the global economy. And as with oil, supplies of water—at least, the clean, easily accessible sort—are coming under enormous strain because of the growing global population and an emerging middle-class in Asia that hankers for the water-intensive life enjoyed by people in the West.

The tax on passenger vehicles with engines bigger than 4 liters will be doubled to 40 percent from 20 percent, effective Sept. 1, the Finance Ministry said in a statement on its Web site. Those buying vehicles with engines sized from 2 liters up to 4 liters will have to pay a 25 percent tax, up from the current 15 percent, it said.