UN Expert Calls Upon Companies to Tackle Climate Issues in Supply Chains

Lead UN climate negotiator Christiana Figueres has her hands full what with 194 countries breathing down her neck to arrive at a consensus on a climate change treaty at the global warming talks in Can-cun.  

Unlike last year in Copenhagen, she was holding forth on leveraging value chains – a phrase one would associate with supply chain management.  She implored to the 200 business leaders in attendance at the World Climate Summit to transform the sector they operate in.  The latter may oblige in the back-drop of climate action stagnating at Cancun and Congress.  Companies are dealing with the supply chain climate problems on their own. They are collaborating and open-sourcing with their peers beyond all expectations. Quicker, cheaper and larger-scale solutions are thus emerging.

Recent successes concerning the elimination of hydro fluorocarbon (HFCs) a potent greenhouse gas associated with refrigeration has been the talk of Cancun.  Negotiators are serious about banning HFCs outright.  Only last week, the Consumer Goods Forum, a consortium of 400 global consumer goods manufacturers accounting for revenues of approximately USD 3 trillion committed themselves to phase out HFC refrigerants, come 2015 and replace them with natural refrigerants. This is no mean achievement considering that HFC emissions, a pollutant 1,000 times more potent than CO2, are slated to triple to 1.2 billion tons by 2015 from 0.4 billion tons in 2002 if preventive action is not taken, according to UN.  HFCs could account for as much as 19% of total GHG emissions by 2050 according to projections.  

A decade-long effort by Coca-Cola to eliminate HFCs seems to be bearing fruit.  The former set the tone by implementing the measure in its own refrigeration units and hopes all its units will be HFC-free by 2015.  

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