What We Believe: We believe the scientific understanding of climate change is sufficient to compel prompt, effective actions to limit emissions of greenhouse gases. We believe that to be successful these actions will require concerted engagement by the world’s governments, along with technological innovations by businesses, and individual actions by all citizens. DuPont’s mission is sustainable growth – the creation of shareholder and societal value while reducing the Company’s environmental footprint along the value chains in which we operate. We see many opportunities to take our commitment to sustainability and apply this to developing the products and technologies that our customers will demand in a low carbon economy
We believe any strategy to address climate change must be both environmentally effective and economically sustainable. Policy solutions must be good for the environment, for business, and for people around the world. The magnitude of innovation and action required to effectively address climate change is unparalleled.
What We Have Done: DuPont began taking action to address climate change over fifteen years ago. We have accomplished major global reductions in our own greenhouse gas emissions, and we continue to set ambitious goals for additional emission reductions. We publicly report our corporate emissions data and associated climate risks and opportunities through the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) and are listed on the 2009 Carbon Disclosure Leadership Index. Tell me more.
Effectively addressing climate change will require changes in the way the world produces and uses energy and other natural resources. This is why DuPont has created corporate sustainability goals that focus on achieving more efficient use of resources and producing products that help others do so as well. Tell me more.
The Role of Business: The business community has a critical role to play in developing and bringing to market the technologies and solutions that will make possible the transition to a low-carbon economy. This transition will provide new markets for innovative companies to prosper. With DuPont’s latest set of sustainability goals, we have broadened our focus beyond our own environmental footprint to include targets related to products that help others in the economy reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. These include both product revenue goals and research and development investment targets. These goals tie business growth to the development of safer, cleaner, and more efficient products for global markets. DuPont is dedicated to using our science to bring innovative products and solutions to market. Tell me more.
The Role of Government: Responding to climate change presents a significant challenge that will require concerted global action by individuals, businesses and national, state, and local governments. Government policies will be required to create an effective and fair framework for these actions. All major emitting nations will need to play a role if we are to successfully address the global challenge of climate change. Effective global climate policy will help drive the market changes that are needed to stimulate and efficiently deploy new innovations in science and technology.
DuPont believes that there is an appropriate leadership role for the developed nations to fulfill. As negotiations towards a global framework for reducing greenhouse gas emissions continue through the United Nations, the European Union has put in place an Emissions Trading Scheme and the United States is actively debating a federal climate change program. National and regional policies will provide important cornerstones for a global framework, and should be designed to maintain economic competitiveness and avoid shifting carbon emissions from capped to uncapped economies in the years before an international approach has been adopted. Given the scope of economic and technological transformation required to slow, stop and reverse the trend in greenhouse gas emissions, policies must be developed quickly, but carefully to ensure adequate reductions in an economically sustainable manner. Innovation is essential to addressing the long term challenge of climate change and can help promote economic growth in developed and developing countries around the world.
To encourage environmentally effective and economically sustainable policy actions, DuPont is actively engaging with policymakers and other business and NGO stakeholders from around the world to develop constructive public policies to address global climate change. DuPont’s belief in the importance of taking prompt, coordinated, and strong action to address climate change is why we actively participate in a number of stakeholder initiatives around the globe and why we are a founding member of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership (USCAP). To that end, DuPont is advocating the passage of U.S. climate change legislation consistent with the U.S. Climate Action Partnership (USCAP) principles, and working closely with members of both the House and the Senate to advance progress on this important issue. Tell me more.
Working With Others: The kinds of concrete action DuPont and many other companies are taking to address climate change can also be undertaken by other suppliers, customers and consumers throughout the value chains in which we operate. DuPont encourages and is active in dialogues among companies, the scientific community, governments and environmental groups – and we urge action by everyone. DuPont is committed to climate change policy that is both environmentally effective and economically sustainable. While specific policy actions and proposals are still being debated, what should not be debated is whether action is necessary. On that point the early results are in and they confirm what we expected – action works.
To learn more about DuPont’s voluntary initiatives and partnerships, please visit: http://www2.dupont.com/Sustainability/en_US/sustain_action/initiatives/index.html
