Target 13.2: Integrate climate measures into policies and planning
Integrate climate change measures into national policies, strategies and planning
Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
Why shareholder democracy is pivotal
Investor-owned producers account for about 25 percent of fossil CO2 from the 57 largest emitters since the Paris Agreement, and 55 percent of them increased production after 2016. The remaining three quarters of those emissions belongs to state-owned producers and nation states, which sit outside the shareholder lever. However, many of the companies that buy, burn and finance those fuels are publicly traded. They include utilities, automakers, airlines, steel and cement makers, and banks. So the demand for the same fuel is reachable by a vote even where the producer is not. The reason climate measures are not integrated into national policy is not a shortage of policy designs. It is that the companies affected fight them. InfluenceMap found that as of December 2024, 39 percent of assessed US companies and industry associations advocate on climate in ways that conflict with the recommendations of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The American Petroleum Institute, the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers, the American Gas Association, the US Chamber of Commerce, and the National Association of Manufacturers lead that opposition. If every publicly traded corporation were working toward climate neutrality and none were blocking legislation, the policies this target calls for would face no organized opposition. They would be drafted with industry help rather than against industry resistance. They would be implemented by the same companies that lobbied for them. Shareholders have already shown the vote works at the margin. In 2021, 58 percent of the ConocoPhillips vote backed targets covering not just the company's own operations but the emissions from its suppliers and from customers burning the fuels it sells. A majority at Phillips 66 backed a report on whether the company's lobbying lines up with the Paris climate agreement. The Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility's members filed 46 climate lobbying resolutions in 2022 alone, asking companies to show their lobbying and trade association memberships align with the Paris Agreement; 18 were withdrawn after companies made commitments. At scale the vote removes the obstacle entirely, so owners voting their values can deliver most of this outcome.
How this was scoredPivotal
Pivotal. Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
We have not yet written down the two answers behind this rating. Recording them on every item, so a reader can check the reasoning and not only the conclusion, is work in progress.
Every rating is the higher of two answers, one for what companies do and one for what they spend to stop the outcome, because the same vote reaches both. See the full method.
Sources
- Carbon Majors: 57 fossil fuel and cement producers linked to 80% of global fossil CO2 emissions since the Paris Agreement, InfluenceMap, 2024-04-04
- US Corporate Climate Advocacy Going Into 2025, InfluenceMap, 2024-12
- In historic votes, shareholders demand strong climate action from the U.S. oil and gas industry, Climate Action 100+, 2021-05-12
- As the 2024 proxy season gets underway, Climate Action 100+ investors call on companies to improve climate lobbying, accounting, and governance, Climate Action 100+, 2024-04-25
- Shareholders Escalate Campaign Pressing Companies to 'Walk Their Talk' on Climate Lobbying, Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, 2022-03-15
What civil society organizations are helping owners on this
Coordinated Paris-aligned climate lobbying proposals in 2022, with 21 filed and 16 withdrawn after companies including General Motors, Delta Air Lines, Walmart, Norfolk Southern, United Airlines, Phillips 66 and ExxonMobil committed to comply.
Investor initiative that publicized and supported the 2021 majority votes at ConocoPhillips and Phillips 66 on Scope 3 targets and climate lobbying alignment.
7 campaigns on record
Report on the alignment of the company's climate lobbying with the Paris Agreement.
Result: 37.2 percent
Report on whether and how the company's direct and indirect lobbying, including through trade associations, aligns with the Paris Agreement goals.
Result: 16 of 21 proposals withdrawn after companies committed to comply; the Honeywell proposal went to a vote on April 25, 2022 and did not pass; votes at UPS, Alphabet, FedEx and Tesla were pending at publication.
Adopt a policy restricting the banks from lending to and underwriting new oil and gas exploration and development projects.
Result: Citigroup 12.8%, Bank of America 11%, Wells Fargo 11% of shareholders voted in favor The proposal was precatory (advisory and non-binding).
we found no documented change at any of the three banks directly attributed to this 2022 vote
Shareholder proposals on climate fail to gain traction at 3 major banks, Banking Dive
Set Paris-Agreement-consistent emissions targets; at ExxonMobil specifically, set targets covering Scope 3 emissions from the use of its products (about 90% of the company's total emissions), which the company had so far declined to do.
Result: 33% of Chevron shareholders and 28% of ExxonMobil shareholders voted in favor The proposal was precatory (advisory and non-binding).
we found no documented change at either company directly attributed to this specific 2022 vote
Report on whether the company's lobbying is consistent with the Paris Climate Agreement.
With Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)
Result: 64 percent
Phillips 66 later set a target to cut Scope 3 emissions intensity 15 percent by 2030 and Scope 1 and 2 intensity 30 percent, becoming the first U.S. refiner to set Scope 3 targets.
Phillips 66 increases ambition of GHG emissions reduction targets, Climate Action 100+, 2021-09
Set and disclose a plan to reduce all of Chevron's greenhouse gas emissions, including Scope 3 emissions from the use of its products, in line with the Paris Agreement.
Result: 61% of shareholders voted in favor The proposal was precatory (advisory and non-binding).
we found no documented change at Chevron directly attributed to this specific 2021 vote
Engine No. 1, an activist investor holding about 0.02% of Exxon's shares, nominated an independent slate of board candidates and asked shareholders to replace directors with people who had experience managing a profitable transition in the energy industry, arguing the existing board lacked the expertise and independence to manage climate-related business risk and to spend capital with discipline.
Result: Engine No. 1's nominees won 3 of ExxonMobil's 12 board seats (Gregory Goff, Kaisa Hietala, and Alexander Karsner), per ExxonMobil's own June 2, 2021 announcement of preliminary results. Major pension funds including CalPERS, CalSTRS, and the New York State Common Retirement Fund backed the dissident slate.
One year on, ExxonMobil increased Scope 3 emissions disclosure, set more ambitious Scope 1 and 2 targets, shifted from a planned 25% production growth to holding production steady, and added board members with energy-transition experience; Engine No. 1's own team characterized the underlying long-term business strategy, continued heavy spending on new fossil fuel projects (about $30-35 billion a year), and lobbying posture as largely unchanged.
Engine No. 1 wins at least 2 Exxon board seats as activist pushes for climate strategy change, CNBC
Related subjects on other maps
How this rating was made
Every item on every one of our maps is read against one question: how far does this depend on the people who own companies voting their values? We answer it twice, once for what companies do and once for what they spend to stop the outcome, and take whichever answer is higher, since the same vote reaches both. The score carries its reasoning and its sources so that a reader can check it rather than take it.
- Pivotal. Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
- Necessary. Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes, and others must also act.
- Helpful. Owners voting their values help, and others carry most of it.
- Independent. This moves without owners. Other levers carry it.
The advocacy record on this page holds only what a source we opened says happened. Where we searched and found nothing, the page says so rather than leaving a silence. Where a campaign names a filer the source does not name, it says that too. Ratings are ours; the list of subjects is UN Sustainable Development Goals's, and we link to their original.
How we score dependency, in full.