The Limits to Private-sector Climate Change Action: The Geographies of Corporate Climate Governance

Corporate carbon footprint assessments have been employed by hundreds of the world’s largest corporations in an effort to take seriously the role of climate change for a company’s operations. These assessments differ from personal footprints in that to produce credible and transparent calculations, companies follow established reporting guidelines. This article investigates how the corporate carbon footprint structures the business response to climate change across space. Two key tasks are undertaken. First, in referencing the rules and standards for calculation, how the footprint tool makes sense of atmospheric greenhouse gases (GHGs) for companies, helping them establish ownership and responsibility for certain emission sources is described. This is accomplished through an emission ranking system where GHG sources are categorized as either owned (scope 1 or 2) or value chain (scope 3). Second, the spatial implications to using this governing device as a climate management tool are documented. To do this, the emission performance of twenty-one large US-based corporations over a six-year period (2010–15) are tracked. The data reveal that over time, corporations reduce their owned emissions, while their value chain emissions grow. The article argues that the footprint tool as a means to govern GHG emissions contributes to the spatializing of a corporate response climate change. Specifically, it works to enclose climate responsibility, locating it in particular spaces and not in others. Importantly, this represents a limit to what the private sector can accomplish with regard to climate change action and should be considered in light of recent widespread calls for private-sector leadership on climate change.