Florida wants to sue the world's largest sustainability-focused platforms over misleading practices

Florida’s attorney general has announced an investigation into the practices of SBTi (Science Based Targets initiative) and CDP (Carbon Disclosure Project). These platforms are widely used by companies around the world to set sustainability commitments and internal targets, and report on them.

Attorney General James Uthmeier said the organisations would be investigated over potential antitrust violations and the use of deceptive business practices. The news was reported by ESG Today.

Uthmeier called CDP and SBTi a “climate cartel” and said the investigation would initially seek to determine whether the organisations had violated state consumer protection or antitrust laws by forcing companies to disclose confidential data under the guise of environmental transparency. Other companies can then pay to access this information.

SBTi is a global organisation that helps companies set greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction targets in line with the trajectory set out in the Paris Agreement. It provides guidance and a validation process to ensure companies’ climate targets are ambitious and measurable. CDP provides a framework and platform for reporting on companies’ progress. The organisation collects, assesses and shares environmental data to promote transparency, including for investors. In 2024, a record more than 22,700 companies disclosed information through CDP.

In its announcement of the investigation, Florida’s attorney general said that SBTi “sells companies verification of their climate targets and then directs them back to CDP to report on their progress, seemingly creating a feedback loop to generate profit”.

The investigation will examine the organisations’ “deceptive business practices” and focus on the sale of their services, as well as potential antitrust violations, including whether coordination between CDP, financial institutions and investment services amounts to illegal market manipulation.

The initiative is the latest in a series of anti-ESG initiatives (ESG refers to a set of corporate practices and rules covering environmental, social and governance factors) pursued by Republican politicians in the US in recent years.

“Radical climate activists are weaponising corporate governance rules against the free market. Florida will not stand idly by while international pressure groups extort American companies into funding their ESG scams,” Uthmeier said.