US SEC to vote on long-awaited climate disclosure rule, notice says
By Douglas Gillison
(Reuters) — Wall Street's top regulator will vote on March 6 on whether to adopt rules requiring U.S.-listed companies to report climate-related risks, the agency said in a notice on Wednesday, in a potentially major overhaul of U.S. disclosure rules.
The Securities and Exchange Commission rules aim to standardize climate-related company disclosures about greenhouse gas emissions, risks and how much money they are spending on the transition to a low-carbon economy. The agency says that such information is important for investors.
Currently, US securities regulations do not impose common standards for climate-related disclosures. But the agency says that investors need such information to be consistent and comparable across the many companies increasingly producing climate information on their own terms.
First proposed two years ago, the rules are part of Democratic President Joe Biden's agenda to address climate change threats through federal agencies, and would join similar requirements in Europe and California.
Top Democratic lawmakers, reform advocates and environmental groups have urged the SEC to adopt «strong» rules requiring detailed disclosures of emissions, risks and capital spending.
«The information that it would require about a company's greenhouse gas emissions is critically important to investor decision-making,» Washington advocacy group Better Markets recently wrote in a note urging the SEC to adopt the rules.
But the pending regulations have been bogged down by pushback from companies and Republican state officials who say they overreach the SEC's remit and will be burdensome for companies. They are expected to bring legal challenges once the rule is finalized.
While the SEC has
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