How BHP plans to reduce climate-changing emissions

London — The world’s biggest listed miner BHP said on Tuesday that it would invest $400m over five years to reduce emissions from its own operations and from those generated by the use of its resources.

BHP is the biggest producer of coking coal, which is used with iron ore, also mined by BHP, to make steel in a process responsible for millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO₂).

At a speech in London, BHP CEO Andrew Mackenzie was due to say the company’s “climate investment programme” would scale up technology to help decarbonise the company’s own operations and drive investment in curbing downstream emissions.

“We must take a product stewardship role for emissions across our value chain and commit to work with shippers, processors and users of our products to reduce scope 3 emissions,” he was expected to say, according to advance extracts of his comments.

Emissions are divided into categories. Scope 1 and 2 cover direct emissions by an organisation and indirect emissions generated by power it buys to run its operations. Scope 3 emissions are caused when a company’s products are used, for instance in steel-making or when they are shipped to customers.

BHP’s investment is the equivalent of roughly 5% of its most recent, full-year underlying profits, announced last August, of $8.93bn.

BHP stands apart from others in the mining sector with its target of net zero emissions by the second half of the century, in line with UN carbon-cutting goals.

It was expected to say on Tuesday that it wished to go further and establish a medium-term, science-based target for scope 1 and 2 emissions. Other measures will include strengthening an existing link between emissions performance and executive pay.

Reuters