World's largest firms face calls to release carbon data

Over 3,000 of the world's largest companies are to be asked to provide detailed information on their carbon footprint after the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) issued its annual information data requests.

The organisation, which represents a raft of blue chip investors including Merrill Lynch, ANZ, Banco do Brazil, Barclays, RBS Group and HSBC, said it has increased the number of firms it is contacting from 2,400 last year to over 3,000 in 2008.

It has also extended its global reach, sending information requests to China's 100 largest companies by market capitalisation for the first time and launching new operations in Korea, Latin America, Spain and the Netherlands.

Companies contacted have four months to respond to the CDP information request, which asks for data on total greenhouse emissions, risks and opportunities associated with climate change and steps being undertaken to cut emissions.

The group warned that firms that failed to respond to the information requests risked damaging relations with influential investors, citing recent CDP research which found that 60 per cent of investors identified which firms in their portfolio were either not responding to the CDP or offering incomplete answers and then contacted them directly.

The number of investors taking an interest in firms' carbon emissions footprint is also increasingly rapidly, according to the CDP. The group said that over 70 new investors signed up to the initiative last year, while the collective assets held by CDP signatories increased 30 per cent from $41 trillion to $57 trillion.

Paul Dickinson, chief executive of the CDP, said that the burgeoning number of investors supporting the scheme would crank up pressure on firms to disclose their carbon emissions and treat climate change as a "mainstream issues". " Investors recognise that corporate engagement with climate change issues is an important indicator of good quality corporate management," he added.