After much anticipation, on March 6, 2024, the US Securities and Exchange Commission voted to adopt final rules that require reporting by public companies of climate change-related disclosure. While the final rules differ from the SEC’s controversial proposed rules in significant ways, the final rules are prescriptive, and require substantial new, additional disclosures.

The SEC

The Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) has adopted new rules that require public companies to disclose substantial information about the material impacts of climate-related risks on their business, financial condition, and governance (the “Final Rules”).  The SEC says that “climate-related risks, their impacts, and a public company’s response to those risks can significantly affect

The Securities and Exchange Commission adopted (in a 3-2 vote) final rules related to climate-related disclosures.  These rules had first been proposed in March 2022.  In his opening remarks, SEC Chair Gensler noted that the climate-change related disclosure rules will apply to public companies and to public offerings, and are intended to benefit investors by

On March 5, 2024, the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union reached a “political agreement” on a Regulation prohibiting products made with forced labor on the European Union (“EU“) market.1 While binding legislation was initially proposed by the European Commission (“Commission“) in September 2022 (see Legal Update

A new lawsuit filed by several business interest groups seeks to overturn two recent California laws relating to emissions disclosures (SB253) and climate-related financial risk disclosures (SB261), which would require thousands of covered companies to begin making disclosures as early as 2026. This Legal Update addresses the main arguments of the lawsuit, the initial reaction

Recognising the threat of climate change and the importance of sustainable development, Singapore has made a commitment to establishing a robust framework of environmental and climate change laws and regulations – an unprecedented initiative in the Southeast Asia region.

Singapore launched its key environmental strategy in 2021 with the Singapore Green Plan 2030, a

On December 21, 2023, the New York Department of Financial Services (“NYDFS”) finalized guidance on how the banks and mortgage institutions it regulates (“New York Institutions”) should manage climate-related financial and operational risks (the “Guidance”). The Guidance establishes extensive obligations for New York Institutions, which—even if tailored by the state to be proportionate to size

On December 14, the National Congress of Brazil overrode most of the presidential vetoes to Federal Law No. 14.701/2023 (the “Time Limit Act”), which regulates Article 231 of the Constitution to set guidelines for the recognition, demarcation, use and management of Indigenous lands. The Time Limit Act was initially published on October 20, 2023, but

On 7 December 2023, the Commission tabled three legislative proposals (the “Proposal(s)”) to implement the “One-substance-one-assessment” (“OSOA”) announced in the European Green Deal and the Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability (“CSS”).

At present, different harmonised agencies may carry out the safety assessments of the same chemicals under different pieces of harmonized legislation, at different times and often using different data. This, according to the Commission, creates inefficiencies and may result in inconsistent and less predictable regulatory outcomes.Continue Reading Initial reflections on the recent ‘one substance, one assessment’ EU proposals