CDP launches water disclosure programme

Reflecting growing awareness of the potential risks to business of water scarcity and security of supply, the Carbon Disclosure Project has launched a global water disclosure programme. The project is designed to help institutional investors better understand these risks by increasing the availability of high quality business information on this critical issue.

Financial institutions including NBIM, Schroders, APG Asset Management and Dexia Asset Management are supporting the programme because, as the CDP points out, "water already impacts companies’ operations and will become an increasingly important investment issue.

CDP Water Disclosure has released a report, ‘The case for water disclosure’, written by London-based environmental consultancy Irbaris, that details the rationale for the new programme and findings from data collected in a small pilot in 2008.

Next year the CDP will issue a questionnaire to some 300 of the world’s largest companies in water-intensive sectors, such as chemicals, fast moving consumer goods, forestry and paper products, food and beverage, mining, pharmaceuticals, power generation, and semiconductor manufacturing. It will report on the findings by the end of the year.

Water data collection, analysis and reporting looks set to be a major growth area of environmental consultancies, and has already risen rapidly up the agenda of major food and beverage companies. Earlier this year WSP Environment & Energy launched a water calculator to allow companies to measure the water footprint of their operations, supply chains and products (Environment Analyst 16-Mar-09).

• CDP news release
• report