Clifford Chance targets net zero ambitions at the same time as seeking to help our clients with theirs.
The Net Zero Delivery Group (NZDG), which reports to our Responsible Business Board, is responsible for the development and implementation of Clifford Chance's emissions reduction plan, with current focus areas including business emissions, travel emissions, supplier emissions and lawyer engagement. The NZDG is also tasked with assessing climate change-related risks and opportunities and risks to the firm.
Our near-term target, validated by the Science-based Targets initiative, is to reduce absolute Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions 80% by 2030 from a FY20 base year, and to reduce absolute Scope 3 GHG emissions by 47% within the same time frame. For the financial year ending 30 April 2023, we can report that our aggregated Scope 1, Scope 2 (market based) and Scope 3 emissions are 25% lower in FY23 versus our FY20 baseline.
To add to and improve risk management practices and opportunities identified related to climate change, during FY24, key areas of focus of the firm’s NZDG, working with Operations, Risk and Compliance and other relevant stakeholders, will be to review:
- our methodology for assessing climate change-related risks and opportunities and their integration into the firm’s Enterprise Risk Management Framework
- whether to employ any additional metrics tracking the financial impact of climate change-related risks and opportunities
- the resilience of the business model; while our qualitative assessment is that the firm’s business model is resilient to climate change, we will complete a more detailed analysis in FY24.