The last twenty odd years has been a slow process of creating the thesis of climate action as an upgrade from public health safeguards. It has led to a new regime of compliance, and ESG is the new umbrella without the teeth of legal redressal. The entire alphabet soup is an attempt to create a new market for doing good. Carbon offsets is one, where the intentions are good but the real value is the data for the risk calculus. It is all risk management.
Philanthropy through core funding creates more value than carbon credits. Carbon credits akin to TNFD and TISFD, are good at infrastructure creation. The data helps, but should we focus on impact first? Then do MEL?
The maze of standards and guidance is to foster a moral pressure on the investment community to do well and create a business case for it, while being all voluntary. ESG was a post Paris creation whose expiry was the second DJT era and the Ukraine- Gaza wars. ESG needs an upgrade, where S is Security and E is the EV. The AI dimension has a real energy security dimension, and governments need voters and not bots despite the enthusiasm of valley tech bros.
Change Thinker 