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Ties between Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) founder Jeff Bezos’ $10B charitable group and organizations that set corporate climate standards are raising concerns of potential influence in setting these norms, the Financial Times reported.
The Bezos Earth Fund is one of the largest backers of the Science Based Targets initiative, which businesses rely on for setting voluntary emissions targets and limits on carbon credits to eventually reach net-zero.
The SBTi is said to be rethinking its approach to carbon offsets, at a time when Big Tech emissions are surging due to data centers powering the AI wave.
Meanwhile, Amazon (AMZN) is expanding its voluntary pledging initiative signed by over 500 companies, which could provide an alternate way to reach climate goals and doesn’t limit carbon credits.
“If big polluters like Amazon (AMZN) want to reach net-zero as cheaply as possible, they may well have an incentive to engineer a situation where offsets are seen as credible,” Holger Hoffman-Riem, member of SBTi’s technical advisory group, told FT. “And if Bezos funds so much of the climate standards space, then Amazon could be in a position where it can influence decisions in that space.”
A former SBTi staff member flagged the perceived influence of Bezos’ fund on climate standards in a complaint to the U.K. Charity Commission.
“We have clear governance processes in place, including a conflict of interest statement, and continue to take proactive steps to improve these mechanisms,” said SBTi. The Bezos Earth Fund said it looks forward to reading the findings of the commission.
In July, Amazon (AMZN) became the first company to sidestep a global standard for verifying carbon offsets, according to Reuters, by creating its own alternative framework called Abacus.
However, the current global standard was developed by the Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market, and one of its biggest donors is Bezos’ fund.
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