Commodity Futures Trading Commission to create a new ‘climate risk unit,’ joining initiatives at Treasury, Securities and Exchange Commission, Federal Reserve
A growing number of federal regulators are pushing corporate America to reckon with the cost of climate change, arguing that global warming poses significant peril not only to the environment but to the U.S. economy.
On Wednesday, Rostin Behnam, the acting chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, will announce that he is establishing a Climate Risk Unit to focus on the role of complex financial derivatives in understanding and pricing climate-related hazards. That follows a request on Monday by the Securities and Exchange Commission for public input on how to require companies to disclose “consistent, comparable, and reliable information on climate change” risks to investors.
The moves come as President Biden’s administration is pledging to slash greenhouse gas emissions and after 2020 set a U.S. record for billion-dollar weather and climate disasters. There were 22 extreme weather events last year, ranging from tropical cyclones to drought, that cost taxpayers, businesses, investors and homeowners a combined $95 billion, according to the federal government. Continue reading.