By Isla Binnie
(Reuters) – Wall Street’s top regulatory body meets on Wednesday to vote on whether to adopt rules that would force public companies to disclose certain climate-related risks, in first-of-its-kind regulation that was watered down after an earlier draft sparked two years of debate.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) aims to set a standard for how companies communicate with investors about greenhouse gas emissions, weather-related risks, and how they are preparing for the transition to a low-carbon economy.
Companies and business groups sent thousands of comment letters in response to a draft proposed in 2022. Some of them raised the prospect of lawsuits alleging the requirements would be too expensive to meet and went beyond the SEC’s mandate.
In its final version, the rule drops a previous proposal to ask larger companies to gather and report data on planet-warming emissions from suppliers and end-users of their products, known as Scope 3 emissions, in some circumstances. Reuters first reported this change last month.
In a further move away from the more prescriptive draft, it also allows those larger companies to determine whether emissions from their own operations and the power they purchase constitute information that investors need to have in order to make decisions.
Companies will be asked to add a note to their financial statements detailing costs stemming from severe weather events like hurricanes and wildfires.
Smaller firms – which make up the majority of U.S companies – will be exempt from reporting their greenhouse gas emissions.
(Reporting by Isla Binnie; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)
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