Shareholders Push SEC for Tougher Climate Regime for US Oil

Activist groups are calling on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to make it easier for shareholders to table climate resolutions at oil producer annual meetings in another early test of the Biden administration’s efforts to tackle climate change.

During Donald Trump’s presidency, campaigners say, the SEC made it easier for companies to throw out shareholder proposals on spurious grounds rather than put them to investor votes. “In the last four years, there were a lot of surprising developments and I think it’s fair to say that many shareholders felt like it was an adverse decision-making environment for shareholder proposals,” said Sanford Lewis, a lawyer and director of the Shareholder Rights Group.

Joe Biden has promised to make tackling climate change a core pillar of his presidency. But a narrow majority in Congress will leave him depending on regulatory bodies such as the SEC, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to push his agenda.