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Presented by Bank of America: | | | | |  | | By Debra Kahn | | |
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Progressive shareholder activists are getting all the attention, but conservatives are mounting their own push to influence companies. | Spencer Platt/Getty Images | ANTI-ESG GAINS STEAM — A lot of ink has been spilled on the upward trend of progressive shareholder resolutions at investor meetings. But conservatives are filing them, too — and they could have an impact, even though they're not passing, Corbin Hiar reports for POLITICO's E&E News. Conservative activists have filed 52 proposals at major U.S. companies this year — twice as many as in 2021, according to an analysis from Georgeson LLC. Their proposals "are often critical of the evolving ESG landscape," the shareholder consultancy said last week in an early review of the annual meeting season. While their proposals haven’t fared very well, conservative activists and business experts said resolutions with minimal shareholder backing still can have an impact. "By submitting a very conservative leaning proposal — even if they represent a tiny constituency of the company — it's a reminder to everyone that there is a constituency of the company that feels differently," said Mary-Hunter McDonnell , a management professor at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton business school. "That makes it more likely that the leaders will temper their responses to the more liberal leaning asks." The National Legal and Policy Center filed a resolution at Meta Platforms Inc., calling for greater disclosure of the Facebook parent’s charitable contributions. The proposal faced long odds, especially after Paul Chesser , the director of the group's Corporate Integrity Project, gave a speech at Meta's annual meeting that promoted climate and vaccine misinformation and suggested that President Joe Biden's election victory was illegitimate. Chesser said he's less concerned about attracting votes for his proposals than he is with having his voice heard in the press and the C-suite. He's explicitly aiming to counter the influence sustainable investment advocates have had in corporate boardrooms. "Hopefully this is the beginning of a more aggressive or ambitious effort from our side," he said. "Because we basically ceded the ground to the left all these years with regard to shareholder activism and the left has … had great success." Sustainability advocates say they aren't concerned about the spike in conservative shareholder resolutions. "If they're bona fide shareholders, they have a right to file a resolution and all shareholders will vote on it," said Andrew Behar, the CEO of As You Sow, which has gotten approval for five of its 22 resolutions filed this year, including one that urged the refining company Phillips 66 to publish a report on how it could shift its plastics production business from using virgin polymers to recycled ones. "That's part of capitalism." Read more from Corbin here. | | | | A message from Bank of America: Transitioning public transportation to clean energy could reduce global CO₂ emissions by 20%. Proterra is developing safer, cleaner, more reliable transportation — with the support of partners like Bank of America. | | | | | | BANKING ON IT — The nation’s bank regulators are inching closer to releasing sweeping guidance that would steer how major banks assess the threats they face from climate change. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.'s comment period ended last week for the “draft principles for climate-related risk management" it released in December. (The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's draft came out in April, and the Federal Reserve is also expected to come out with something similar.) Avery Ellfeldt of POLITICO's E&E News lays out some broad themes that emerged from the comments: — The banking industry wants the regulators to only apply the guidelines to lenders with more than $100 billion in assets. But groups including the Rocky Mountain Institute, the Center for American Progress, MSCI Inc., Moody’s Analytics and Ceres say the principles should be applied to lenders of all sizes, arguing that smaller banks are just as exposed to risk. — Banks and progressives are also split on whether the agencies should encourage lenders to reference well-established metrics, climate scenarios and more when gauging their own vulnerabilities. Climate advocates want firmer, more-detailed language. — Industry groups such as the American Bankers Association, meanwhile, said the FDIC should stick with a flexible approach that “allows banks to assess the risks they identify as the most material to their unique circumstances." Avery has more details here.
| | | | DON'T MISS THE 2022 GREAT LAKES ECONOMIC FORUM: POLITICO is excited to be the exclusive media partner again at the Council of the Great Lakes Region's bi-national Great Lakes Economic Forum with co-hosts Gov. JB Pritzker and Mayor Lori Lightfoot. This premier, intimate networking event, taking place June 26-28 in Chicago, brings together international, national and regional leaders from business, government, academia and the nonprofit sector each year. "Powering Forward" is this year's theme, setting the stage to connect key decision-makers with thought leaders and agents of change to identify and advance solutions that will strengthen the region's competitiveness and sustainability in today's competitive climate of trade, innovation, investment, labor mobility and environmental performance. Register today. | | | | | IT'S FOR THE TREES — Stalled immigration reform is getting in the way of what should be a national wave of tree-planting, Marc Heller reports for POLITICO's E&E News. Reforestation has bipartisan support as wildfires increasingly sweep the West. Lawmakers boosted tree-planting in last year’s infrastructure bill, including legislation called the REPLANT Act, which lifts the $30 million annual cap on spending from the national reforestation trust fund. But temporary foreign workers plant the vast majority of trees in the U.S., including in national forests, and limitations on how many workers can enter the country through the H-2B visa guest worker program raise serious doubts about whether ramped-up reforestation goals can be met, according to people in the forest industry. Workers on H-2B visas make up about 85 percent of tree-planting jobs. They plant around 1.5 billion trees a year, according to the Forest Resources Association, a trade group for the forest products industry. “The need is huge right now,” said Tim O’Hara, FRA's vice president for government affairs. Read more from Marc here.
| | | | A message from Bank of America:   | | | | | | Happy Friday — TGIF. Team Sustainability is editor Greg Mott, deputy editor Debra Kahn, and reporters Lorraine Woellert and Jordan Wolman. Reach us at gmott@politico.com, dkahn@politico.com, lwoellert@politico.com and jwolman@politico.com. Want more? You can have it. Sign up for the Long Game. Four days a week and still free. That’s sustainability!
| | | | STEP INSIDE THE WEST WING: What's really happening in West Wing offices? Find out who's up, who's down, and who really has the president’s ear in our West Wing Playbook newsletter, the insider's guide to the Biden White House and Cabinet. For buzzy nuggets and details that you won't find anywhere else, subscribe today. | | | | | | | | — Trump's paint job might be making a heat island out of Air Force One, POLITICO's Lee Hudson and Lara Seligman report. — A Saudi company is getting a great deal on an Arizona lease that lets it pump unlimited groundwater for alfalfa feed, the Arizona Republic reports. — A California labor-law dispute could hurt the business case for keeping goats to help reduce wildfire risk. The Fresno Bee has more. — Yikes: Taking down dams in Washington state to help salmon would cost between $10.3 billion and $27.2 billion in lost power, irrigation and other benefits, according to an analysis commissioned by Democrats, the AP reports. — Glad we didn't jump on the Musk-Twitter hot-takes bandwagon. The Elon Musk Show is a bit of a sequel to the Trump Show, NYT's Farhad Manjoo notes.
| | | Events are listed in Eastern Time. June 13 — Duke University holds a virtual briefing on "Oceanpreneurship: Creating a Vibrant Ecosystem to Scale Ocean Innovation." 12:30 p.m. June 13 — The Environmental and Energy Study Institute holds a virtual discussion on "Living with Climate Change: Wildfires Policies to Anticipate Threats and Build." 1 p.m. June 14 — The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee holds a hearing on "Short And Long Term Solutions To Extreme Drought In The Western U.S." 10 a.m. June 14 — The Wall Street Journal holds a virtual CFO Network Summit, featuring SEC Chair Gary Gensler. 11 a.m. June 14 — The House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis holds a hearing on "State Perspectives on Cutting Methane Pollution." 1 p.m. June 14 — Punchbowl News holds a discussion on energy alternatives. 5 p.m. June 15 — The Alliance to Save Energy holds its 2022 Energy Efficiency Global Forum. 9 a.m. June 15 — The House Agriculture Committee holds a hearing on "The Role of Climate Research in Supporting Agricultural Resiliency." 10 a.m. June 15 — Resources for the Future holds a virtual discussion on "Climate Philanthropy and Transformational Change." Noon. June 17 — The State Department holds a virtual meeting of the Clean Energy Resources Advisory Committee to discuss the advancement of environmental, social, and governance standards across clean energy supply chains. 11:30 a.m. | | | | A message from Bank of America: The EPA estimates that the transportation sector accounts for more than one-quarter of energy-related CO₂ emissions worldwide. While much attention has been paid to lessening these emissions by transforming light-duty passenger vehicles, there’s also ample opportunity to innovate heavy-duty commercial vehicles used for public transportation — especially diesel buses.
To counter these emissions, Proterra is developing innovative solutions that drive sustainability, with the support of partners like Bank of America.
Proterra is a leader in the transition to zero-emission, electric commercial vehicles, including electric transit buses, school buses, delivery trucks and more.
To help companies like Proterra achieve their business goals, Bank of America has committed $1.5 trillion towards sustainable finance by 2030. This funding will help society transition to a low-carbon future.
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