US Sen Warren wary of misleading ESGs
US senator Elizabeth Warren in a letter sent December 15 to regulators accused major US energy companies of misleading investors with their environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals and profiteering off climate change.
Warren, a Democrat representing Massachusetts, pointed to an October 10 report from The Washington Post that suggested energy companies “were using easily manipulated metrics and shifting goalposts that guaranteed high bonuses for executives even when the corporations caused severe environmental damage.”
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The senator said companies such as Marathon and Chevron were using ESG goals to cast themselves as environmentally friendly while continuing to be major polluters.
“These potentially deceptive environmental, social, and governance (ESG) metrics pose a serious problem: they have the potential to mislead investors and the public on the terms and conditions under which executive bonuses are paid to top company officials,” she wrote. “I am requesting that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) investigate this matter,”
Warren sent a letter to 11 different oil and gas companies last month demanding answers on the steady rise in commodity prices. Prices continue to hold near multi-year highs to the detriment of consumers, something the senator said was the result of “corporate greed and profiteering."
Representatives from the US energy sector, however, shot back. Toby Rice, the CEO of energy company EQT Corp., said that commodity prices were accelerating because “the economic engines of the world have reignited,” not because of any decision from the front office.