Treehugger continues to follow questions of opposition to adjusting for climate change. First, Margaret Badore reports on the work of InfluenceMap:
The UK-based non-profit InfluenceMap gave Koch Industries and Duke Energy failing marks, as did Philips 66 and the Asian energy company Reliance Industries. Using data aggregation, analysis and original research, InfluenceMap grades major global corporations on their influence on climate change policies, in an effort to understand how corporate influence is holding back climate progress.
Google, Unilever and Cisco Systems came out ahead in InfluenceMap’s ratings, however no company earned a grade above a “B.” Chevron and BP both earned “E-” grades. Comcast and 21st Century Fox earned “E-” grades as well, making them the lowest ranking media companies. You can see the full list here.
Some companies are understandably irritable over the matter. There’s roughly 100 companies on the corporate list currently, mostly gargantuan-sized organizations which therefore possess a great deal of influence. Google is currently at the top of the heap, rated a B. InfluenceMap has a separate list for trade organizations (roughly 30), which they label “Influencers“. They do even less well than do the corporations, with the best rated a C-; ALEC, the provider of ready-made legislation to state legislators and previously mentioned here, where Google resigned from the organization, and here, sits at the plumb bottom of the list. I wonder how many incumbents and contenders would twitch if you asked them to promise not to use ALEC.
At the other end of the spectrum, Sami Grover reports that utilities and power grid operators see the future as being green.
While utilities used to fret about the challenges of too much intermittent, distributed power, Kahn talks to Ted Craver, CEO of Edison International Inc—parent of Southern California Edison—who expects most of his new power to come from rooftop solar on his customers’ homes and buildings. The era of the big, centralized powerplant—says Craver—is probably in decline. Due to a combination of cheaper renewables, better storage options and more sophisticated software being used to balance demand with supply, Craver sees the future of his industry looking more like eHarmony or eBay than the traditional utilities we have come to know and, well…know.
