Environmentalists are pressing financial regulators to look skeptically at companies' use of carbon offsets to help meet their climate pledges.
Driving the news: In a public comment docket posted by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency about draft guidelines for how large banks should handle climate risk, the Center for American Progress said OCC should deter banks from using offsets to meet their public emissions pledges.
The Biden administration unveiled new plans Tuesday morning aimed at cutting emissions from heavy industries with new funding in the bipartisan infrastructure law and executive powers.
Why it matters: Climate solutions for electricity and transportation probably get more attention. But the path to deeply decarbonizing the U.S. economy also goes through industries like chemicals, metals and cement that often lack tools available at commercial scale.
Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Gary Gensler said he's working with other commissioners on details of a draft climate risk disclosure mandate — and he's dropping fresh hints about its direction.
Why it matters: The rule is part of a wider push by Biden-appointed financial regulators to expand analysis and disclosure of risks to various kinds of companies.
A federal judge is barring the Biden administration from using the social cost of carbon put into place on Jan. 20, 2021. The decision, issued Friday, affects the interim figure in place now, as well as an updated metric expected to be issued later this month.
Driving the news: The social cost of carbon is a dollar estimate of the damages caused by emitting one additional metric ton of greenhouse gases into the air.
Oil prices Monday morning have slipped off seven-year highs reached earlier in the session as markets brace for a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine that would likely send prices soaring above $100 per barrel.
Why it matters: The potential invasion — which U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan says could happen "any day" — is putting upward pressure on already-high prices amid the demand recovery from COVID and tight supply.
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