More than a dozen major companies, including several from the Fortune 500 list, traveled to Washington DC today to tell Congress to take immediate action on climate change and to express support for the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Clean Power Plan which would reduce the country’s power plants’ carbon emissions by 30 percent, EcoWatch reported.
Representatives from companies like Kellogg Co., Unilever, PepsiCo, Starbucks, Nestle, Ben & Jerry’s, and L’Oreal “traveled to Washington because they believe that reaching a strong global deal on climate change in Paris this December is critical for the long-term stability of their business and the overall economy.”
In total, more than 220 companies signed a letter to President Obama and Congress, saying that the EPA’s “proposed Carbon Pollution Standard for existing power plants represents a critical step in moving our country towards a clean energy economy.”
“Our support is firmly grounded in economic reality,” the letter read. “We know that tackling climate change is one of America’s greatest economic opportunities of the 21st century and we applaud the EPA for taking steps to help the country seize that opportunity.”
“The new standards will reinforce what leading companies already know,” it continued, “climate change poses real financial risks and substantial economic opportunities and we must act now.”
This letter follows another published last week by the CEOs of 43 global corporations, calling upon “governments to take bold action at the Paris climate conference in December 2015 to secure a more prosperous world for all of us.
“We are CEOs from 43 companies and 20 economic sectors,” their letter said. “With operations in 150 countries and territories, we generated over $1.2 trillion of revenue in 2014 … We affirm that the private sector has a responsibility to engage actively in global efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and to help the world move to a low-carbon, climate-resilient economy.”
The private sector has spoken; the scientific community has spoken; and the general public has spoken: Man-made climate change is real, and steps to reduce its effects need to be taken immediately. Maybe with people in so many different fields yelling at them, the government will have to actually stand up and do something.
