White Paper: CDP Supply Chain Leadership Collaboration (SCLC) Pilot Results and Findings Report

The Carbon Disclosure Project’s (CDP) Supply Chain Leadership Collaboration (SCLC) is an effort to help companies better understand the climate impacts within their supply chains. Twelve companies (members) participated in a pilot collaboration launched in October 2007 and completed in February 2008. Members distributed surveys to 328 suppliers, requesting information on their climate change initiatives. Forty-four percent of suppliers solicited responded. A particularly noteworthy finding was that, of the 144 responding suppliers, 95 companies submitted information to CDP for the first time. The number of new reporters is evidence of how supply chain initiatives can create excellent penetration into industry for broader disclosure on climate change planning. 

The SCLC survey is a successful first step in creating a consistent approach for suppliers to report their climate change efforts to their customers and other stakeholders. The number of companies becoming a part of SCLC demonstrates that there is a growing interest from businesses to gain a better understanding of the climate impacts of their supply chain. The survey responses are useful as a baseline for members to understand the preparedness of suppliers to address climate change issues and to increase their knowledge of supply chain greenhouse gas emissions. Survey responses reveal participating companies generally have an understanding of the potential risks from climate change. A smaller number of responders (58%) have assessed their risk through completion of a greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory of their operations, and even fewer companies (33%) have an understanding of their indirect climate emissions, including supply chain impacts. Although many survey responders are still in the early stages of addressing the climate issue, they are willing to share information regarding their climate change activities and appear committed to increasing their efforts in the future. 

The challenge for the next phase of the SCLC is how to effectively scale the effort to include a larger number of participating companies and improve the quality of survey responses. The SCLC pilot did reveal some findings that could aid in both improving the number and quality of responses.

Key Findings and Recommendations:

• Initial findings show that response rates to the survey are higher where members distributed the survey directly themselves rather than CDP.
• Based on SCLC members’ experiences, coordination with suppliers in advance of survey distribution appears to significantly increase response rates.
• Survey results also show that suppliers that received a survey from more than one member had a much higher response rate (68%) than the average response rate of 44%. As SCLC membership grows, suppliers will be more likely to get survey requests from multiple customers.
• Given that many supplier companies are new to GHG reporting and strategy, a logical first area of focus should be to understand their Scope 1 (Direct) and Scope 2 (Indirect from electricity, heat, and steam purchases) emissions. Once they have assessed the climate impacts of their operations, they can expand efforts to their supply chain and other Scope 3 (Other Indirect) emissions. 

Want to read the rest? Please fill out this form to download the full white paper.