A First Look at a New California Bill That Would Impact GHG Emissions Disclosures
A new bill that would impact California greenhouse gas emissions disclosures was introduced last month by Josh Becker, a California State Senator from a district just to the south of San Francisco. Senate Bill 285 would require that offsets counted for purposes of greenhouse gas emissions reporting under the Climate Corporate Data Accountability Act meet […]
Michael Littenberg is a Partner, Marc Rotter is a Counsel, and Peter Witschi is an Associate at Ropes & Gray LLP. This post is based on their Ropes & Gray memorandum.
A new bill that would impact California greenhouse gas emissions disclosures was introduced last month by Josh Becker, a California State Senator from a district just to the south of San Francisco. Senate Bill 285 would require that offsets counted for purposes of greenhouse gas emissions reporting under the Climate Corporate Data Accountability Act meet specified requirements. The bill is among other things intended to help California achieve its 2045 carbon reduction goals, by enabling it to better measure progress against its targets. SB 285 is discussed in further detail in this post.
First, to recap, the Climate Corporate Data Accountability Act (SB 253) requires annual public disclosure of scope 1, 2 and 3 greenhouse gas emissions by U.S.-organized entities doing business in California with total annual revenues exceeding $1 billion. Under that Act, the first disclosures are required in 2026 for fiscal 2025. The Climate Corporate Data Accountability Act is discussed in recent Ropes & Gray posts here and here, among others.
