Corporate Carbon Emissions: Recommendations for Increasing Disclosure and Evaluating the Changing Regulatory Framework

The Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) is a nonprofit organization which holds the world's largest database of corporate climate change information in the world. The data is obtained from responses to CDP's annual Information Requests, issued on behalf of institutional investors, purchasing organizations, and governmental bodies. CDP requested a Capstone team to investigate reasons for non-response in the United States and to conduct research surrounding governmental legislation and United States greenhouse gas registries. The Capstone team interviewed representatives from S&P 500 companies to ascertain how CDP can improve their yearly questionnaire. The legislative and registry research was obtained from scholarly journals, websites, and other current publications. The Capstone team's report issues recommendations for how CDP can improve the response rate to the yearly Information Request, and maintain its position at the forefront of environmental reporting as the United States considers new regulations to combat climate change.