Inside Business
Climate Change and Energy – How Rio Tinto Mitigates Effects
Rio Tinto believes that we must play our part in reducing global greenhouse (GHG) gas emissions. And we also understand that we must invest in research and development to find ways to reduce our energy use and GHG emissions. This will help us to ensure our continued access to markets and ability to retain our license to operate.
How we mitigate our effects on the climate
Our climate change position commits us to reducing our emissions, developing low emission product pathways and engaging with government and stakeholders to advocate sound and efficient policies.
We have a three-year Climate Change Plan which takes a stepped, group-wide approach to addressing each theme.
Our Climate Change Leadership Panel is responsible for ensuring that our program remains on course. All of our business units are implementing their own programs in support of the plan and each business has a climate change champion. We also hold regional workshops to encourage the sharing of information and best practice.
In addition, we are currently spending $4 million on 10 projects with the potential to reduce energy use and GHG emissions in progress across the group.
We are also preparing to respond to the potentially severe effects of climate change and have completed an assessment of the risk of such weather related losses at our operations across the globe.
Our results
We continue to publicly report our actions and results under the Carbon Disclosure Project. In 2006, we were named sector leader for metals, mining and steel with a score of 95 on a 100 point scale in its Climate Leadership Index.
Research & Development
Research, development and deployment of new technologies, especially new energy technologies, is essential to reducing GHG emissions and addressing climate change. We are engaged in a number of research and development programs, both in our own right as well as collectively with others.