Final Climate Disclosure Regs Expected: Michael Littenberg Discusses Anticipated SEC Climate Disclosure Rules

Partner Michael Littenberg, global chair of the firm’s ESG, CSR and business and human rights practice, was quoted in International Financing Review (IFR) and Environmental Finance, discussing the US Securities and Exchange Commission pending climate disclosure rules.

The SEC rules, which were first proposed in March 2022, would require public companies to report emissions data and climate-related financial risks in response to increasing investor demand for the information.

The SEC is expected to remove some of its most ambitious disclosure requirements from the rules, including Scope 3 data that account for greenhouse gas emissions along a company’s value chain. A scaled-back version of the SEC rule will deviate from recently adopted climate disclosure laws in California and the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive in the European Union, both of which make Scope 3 disclosures mandatory for large corporations.

Michael explained the new SEC rules will still make it easier for investors to compare companies’ climate disclosures, which are currently reported in very different ways across corporate sustainability reports and will also offer more disclosure on how companies are thinking about the physical and transition risks of climate change.