How business really talk about climate change

GReetings of Los Angeles where the Milken World Conference ended earlier this week. For the uninitiated, Milken is a key stop on the conference circuit for many business and finance leaders – an excellent way to escape Manhattan to brush the shoulders with the industry titans and the best political decision -makers of Beverly Hills.

This is by no means a climate conference. This year, the public sessions with the secretary of the American Treasury Scott Bessent and the CEO of Nvidia, Jensen Huang, drew ballrooms. But, for many, the real conference draw is behind the scenes – an opportunity for gathering and transmission of information.

For me, Milken is an ideal place to take the pulse on how key figures in the business and finance world are about energy, climate and related problems. There is no doubt that the climate has slipped from the scene while the CEOs face prices and what could be diplomatically qualified as an evolving political environment. At the same time, this may surprise those who simply follow the headlines, but the problem remains well placed on the agenda-not just in the discussion panels of the Beverly Hilton ballroom in Milken, but in executive conversations in the background in the corridors in the background in private meeting rooms, restaurants nearby, and even in corridors in the background.

The image that emerges for me is dynamic. Companies are trying to sail in an increase in climate regulations in many jurisdictions around the world while facing an American government which does not want to hear about it. They try to protect their operations from the risks posed by climate change while retaining their financial resources in an uncertain economic time.

“I have had hundreds of conversations since the elections. I have never talked to a company that said:” What do you know? We are going to abandon our net-zero objective “” said Nili Gilbert, vice-president of Carbon Direct, a company that invests in carbon management, on a milk panel. “However, there are a lot of conversations on the provisional strategy.”

My conversations at Milken will inform my reports in the coming weeks, but for the moment I want to highlight a few things that have marked me:

Physical risk

Much of the public discussion at the intersection of business and climate has focused on how businesses can reduce their emissions. But companies have also been forced to see how the physical risks of climate change can affect their operations. This rethink is the result of the two Climate disclosure rules in Europe This forces companies to assess how climate change threatens their operations and recent climate -related disasters that brought these realities home.

Many companies want to avoid talking about climate risk directly. It is not exactly an excellent movement of public relations. But a careful look at the most recent sustainable development initiatives of many companies makes the link apparent. Think of an agriculture company that helps farmers in the supply chain to use less water or a diversifying fashion company where it buys materials. “Being able to map these impacts and these dangers is super important,” said Melissa Fifield, who directs the BMO Climate Institute, on a moderate water and water -based panel. “This is an important impact on many companies.”

Investment speed

The climate is not an island. The thousands of investments that the world needs to mitigate and adapt to climate change will arise in forms that could otherwise be largely classified as infrastructure, venture capital or investment capital. And the uncertainty of the moment – political and economic – has made companies and investors reluctant to make big bets and to focus rather on the conservation of cash.

“These asset owners … want to focus on climate and infrastructure,” said Mark Berryman, associated with Capricorn Investment Group, an impact investment fund on a milk panel. But “they can simply tighten their belt in general, even if it was not a climate -oriented investment”, ”

AI, on the other hand, is a bright point for the way companies could concentrate their investment. As I wrote Before, the race for the construction of data centers has created a race to build clean energy.

Financial innovation

Innovation generally attracts new technologies, but financial innovation can be just as important to put clean energy on the market.

Throughout the conference, it was reassuring to hear managers at the intersection of the climate and finance in different ways whose companies could soon collect the funds necessary to give life to climate projects. This includes long -standing conversations such as carbon markets and Mixed fundingWhere public or philanthropic dollars are combined with investments focused on the return. But it also includes new vehicles such as private credit, an emerging asset class where investors outside typical banks lend directly to businesses.