GHG ManagementPlease make a selection
Correct Answer
BlackRock
330 million tons - BlackRock portfolio GHG emissions in 2020
BlackRock has about $10 trillion of assets under management, so that comes to about 33 g of CO2 emissions for every $ they hold.
But the real number could be higher as the CO2 footprint includes only 65% of its portfolio (mainly real estate and corporate investments). It is not known how much more the rest 35% will add.
But taking 330 million tons as the baseline, let’s look at some stats.
Likely less than global CO2 emissions as a proportion of GDP: The world emits about 50 billion tons of CO2 equivalent, and the global GDP is about 90 trillion USD. That would make it about 550 g CO2/$ of GDP. BlackRock’s 33 g/$ of assets to the global average of 550 g/$ of GDP. Well, as you would point out, this is not an apples to apples comparison as assets are not the equivalent of GDP. Revenues perhaps would be a closer match. While I do not have the data of the total revenues of all of BlackRock’s assets, even if we take a very high ratio of 10 for market cap to revenues, BlackRock’s CO2 emissions per $ of revenue comes to only 330 g/$ for 65% of their portfolio. Assuming the rest 35% contribute at the same rate, CO2 emissions per $ of revenue under the earlier assumption would be about 510 g/$, still lower than 550 g/CO2 but a lot closer to it.
Some large power plant companies emit as much. Some of the large power producers worldwide, especially those using coal based power generation, emit enormous CO2. In fact, Huaneng Power International, the Chinese power firm, emitted about 320 million tons of CO2 across all its power generation facilities in 2019. BlackRock must be glad that it does not have Huaneng in its portfolio (I’m assuming they don’t).
Emits more than those of 90% of the countries: At the same time, about 175 of the 195 countries emit less than 330 million tons per annum, so BlackRock’s portfolio, if taken as a country, emits more than 90% of the countries in the world.
That’s not a statistic the folks at BlackRock would be very happy about, one presumes.
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